TALES...LONE STAR ROAD REPORT
do--although not as bad of a walk as in other cities that I have been in).
The first thought I have as I proceed towards downtown was the sheer distance between the bus station and downtown proper. I was led to believe at first in an e-mail from a friend that the station "..wasn't that far from the church and downtown." Yeah, right--it isn't that far IF you don't consider a walk of a mile-and-a-half loaded down with luggage a long walk. Ah, well--I need the exercise to stay awake in the middle of the night going through town anyway.
After a necessary pit stop at another 7-Eleven to check my Food Stamp/Lone Star card balance [ http://www.window.state.tx.us/comptrol/e... ](and finding out for the first time that I had gotten a $12 raise in those benefits--which was great news for me because I would find myself VERY EXTREMELY dependent on it to obtain the food that I needed to get through this trip) and purchase of snacks, drinks, and other foodstuffs, I continued my journey towards downtown.
Another thing that an observant tourist can easily find about Odessa is that the names of the streets do not necessarily run in a very sequential order. You can have a street named Grandview here, a boulevard named Dixie there (that's another interesting thing in itself over here--a street named after the Confederate national anthem. Definitely NOT a politically correct name for a street...) What are some of the major streets that Odessa is based on? How about Grant (which is also U.S. 385), University Blvd., and 42nd St. (how's that for regards to Broadway?)? And I also found out another interesting pattern about the growth of Odessa. Other places here in the state seem to have their major growth in the south parts of town. BUT NOT HERE-- there's virtually NOTHING past I-20 because all of the growth here grows to the NORTH!! (Strange concept, isn't it? I thought so myself.)
Around 5:30 AM, this weary traveler finds himself on one of the entrances of our first destination here in town--Temple Baptist Church at 10th and Texas. Since it was still dark, I thought that after a long bus ride in the night, I might try to catch a few winks of sleep (which is quite a challenge for moi since I have never been one who sleeps well in bus terminals, hotel rooms, or ANYWHERE away from home--ESPECIALLY if that object is in motion). A few minutes into this, I was suprized to see a man with garden hoses fixing to water the lawn around the porch where I parked
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