our 83rd weekly open mike
Let’s see what happens when your host (me) has nothing to say. Step right up, speak your mind, tell a story, sing a song, whatever.
6/6/2026
Anything goes: 6/6/2026
14 responses to “Anything goes: 6/6/2026”
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thank you Doug for telling the truth. i’m a misfit adrift and it feels like i’m the most misfit man in the world, but there you are every day telling stories that make me feel almost normal.
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Sorry, I half missed this comment and half didn’t want to reply because blush. But… thanks.
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On The Road To Mexico: Travels With Allie
Sinaloa #1
The hopped up drug gang on meth, or something, tried to take us down on the highway through Sinaloa but with evasive maneuvers we got away to haunt the taco stands of Mazatlan searching for frijoles de la olla. (Plain beans in the pot.)
We hadn’t planned on driving down the West Coast of Mexico but got a wild hair and took a right at Tucson, abandoning Interstate 10 to Texas, Laredo and the big birthday party in San Luis Potosi. (My septic system had failed days before we left California and we each had to dig a hole in opposite ends of the back yard like the old days. The shit was bubbling up in the backyard but I didn’t want to postpone the trip waiting for the sewer pumper the next day, my caretaker would have to handle it. On our first stop for gas in Willits, Allie gave an Indian man some money, put her purse on the truck bumper and went into the store and discovered later that day that the guy stole most of her money.)
After a night at the beach of San Carlos, Sonora, we headed into the badlands of Sinaloa. We didn’t want to tarry in cartel-infested territory but as dusk neared it was apparent we wouldn’t be able to drive through the huge dangerous state in a single day.
By dark we found ourselves outside Culiacan, just about the last place I wanted to spend the night, and I sat at the gas station immobilized, wondering what to do: keep on driving through the night, not recommended, or drive into the city to find a hotel, notwithstanding the shoot-out on the main street the previous week.
We didn’t want to stay on the highway, not right downtown either, and so we drove around the neighborhoods for an hour and a half looking for a charming B and B with a kindly old Mexican woman in front ushering us in, something which I didn’t think existed in Culiacan. We finally found a tweener, a small hotel a few blocks from downtown with a nice little park nearby.
Mazatlan #2
After cleaning up and eating the last of our tofu sandwiches (eleven tofu meals in four days, a modern Sinaloa record) we went out in search of flan but just found kittens for motherly Allison to pet, and a “ladies bar” next to the hotel where we sat for less than a minute and I eyed some of the aging hookers, or were they just regular women? I wasn’t sure but the place felt so toxic we quickly left. At the hotel office I asked the boy if they were prostitutes and he said no.
The next day as we drove into Mazatlan a hoard of young thugs descended on the truck at a red light, madly splashing their soaps and liquids on the windshield, about five or six of them. I gave them the finger wave “no” but they kept coming. I put on the wipers and some backed off, then I gunned it through the red light, then safely through another and left the savages behind.
We drove around a neighborhood looking for frijoles de la olla then settled on a taco stand so Allison could eat something. When she couldn’t decide what texture of pork to order she burst into tears and went to the bathroom. She was gone a while so I made up and sang silly songs and flirted with the workers: “Oh, oh, lost in the bano!”
“It’s her time of the month,” I gallantly told our unimpressed waitress.
Running Out Of Gas #3
We raced out of Culiacan on the autopista, the long gringo superhighway, thinking there would be a gas station along that expensive, paved line through the state of Sinaloa and south down the Mexico coast but there wasn’t. When the gauge slipped under a fourth of a tank I exited toward a small town on the jungle road. The reserve light came on and I sweated it out, then spotted the sign “Chilapa 1 Kilometer.” I cruised into the little town and stopped to ask some people outside a restaurant if there was gas.
“No Pemex in this town,” she said. “But you can buy by the liter at a house, I will show you.”
“But I have no room in my truck for you,” I said.
“Follow me on my bicycle,” she said.
I turned around and as I passed by the little two- table restaurant I asked, “Do you have frijoles de la olla?”
“Yes!” the woman said as I drove away.
I followed the woman or man a few blocks to a street lined with big fancy buses, there was an evangelical revival meeting happening in a huge arena. She knocked on a door, called up to a house and the woman came out. “How much you want?” she asked.
“Eight liters,” I said, about two gallons. She came out with two gallon jugs and a funnel and poured it in.
I gave the ciclista a five peso tip, Allison woke up and later said, “The dyke on the bike was hot, just my type. I’d do her.” (Later she denied saying that.)
We drove on south toward Vallarta and San Pancho where I had reserved a few days at my friends sweet little guest casita for a beach vacation. We found the gas station just five more miles down the road, we would’ve made it but I couldn’t take the chance of being out of gas on a quiet jungle road in Sinaloa sans even a cell phone.
Sayulita #4
It was another unexpected day at the gringo and surfer-infested beach where we hummed the song: “Sayulita or Sinaloa, which is the worst hell?”
We paid five bucks for our chairs and went into the waves, glorious mini-breakers, and then it got weird: When we were in Tucson contemplating changing our road trip to Texas and heading south into Mexico, Allison had told me that if we go to the beach she would give me an avocado scrub on the sand. At the time I told her that was the nicest offer I’d even gotten. Now at the beach I sat in position and she handed me half an avocado.
“Here, rub this on your chest,” she said.
“What?” I said. “This is your whole idea, I’m not going to rub it on me, you said you were.”
“Just your shoulders,” she said. “I can’t rub your chest, we’re just friends.”
“Sure we’re just friends but I’d rub it on your chest, I don’t care. What? You’re afraid you’ll get all turned on my sexy hairy chest?” So she put it on me, tried to make me out as some freako who’s demanding an avo rub? She did my shoulders for a minute then I smeared the rest on my legs and we were good to go.
Allison put together some makeshift swimwear by wrapping a shawl around her hips and we had an amazing swim in the warm waters. We sat in our rented recliners gazing out at the surfers and the sea and it was nice, but the venders kept coming by, Allison talked to all of them and they were blocking my idyllic view of the sea.
At The Beach #5
“This is annoying. Stop acknowledging them. You already told me you don’t want to buy their junk,” I said. “Hey, could you take a picture of me to prove I was at the beach?”
Another vendor came by and distracted her. “No,” I said to one, another no to another, and then there’s three or four vendors around us and I scream out “No!”
Then I’m trying to get her to take my pic again and when she makes some derisive comment I lose it. “Take the picture you fucking bitch! Take a fucking picture bitch! Don’t flick your cigarette at me!” I gave her the finger with a snarling face.
“I was just throwing it in the pile of trash there by your feet,” she said.
“Bullshit! That’s an insult in just about every culture!” I said.
She didn’t take the fucking picture but she did video it, then she started crying and left her pile of garbage behind. “I’m leaving,” she said.
“Me too,” I said. “I’ll see you back at the car in twenty minutes.” When I found her a few minutes later she said she found some nice veggies at a little store and had picked out a bag of fruits and veggies. We walked back to the car.
“These will be nice,” she said. “Aren’t you going to get any?”
“Are you kidding? We’ll share those.”
“Well, if I’d known they were for you too I’d have gotten more. Let’s go back and get more.”
We turned to go back to the store when I said, “Forget it, we’ll just eat those. How can you think you would just get them for yourself? You know, everything I’ve done or gotten on this trip I’ve shared with you. And by the way, what do you think of me buying all the gas and the motel rooms?”
“Oh, you were going to Mexico anyway so I assumed you were paying.”
“Well, I wasn’t going to Mexico anyway, you influenced me to go.”
And that was one hell of a day at the beach.
Lost In Guadalajara #6
The thing about the whole Mexico trip was that it seemed accidental. My friends were here trimming weed and planning the big party for their father as they worked, and worked on me to go. Allison decided she wanted to travel South with me and because we were originally heading straight to Texas I hadn’t thought to bring any maps as it was a straight shot down to San Luis Potosi from Austin. (“Why do you even want to go with me?” I asked her. “To keep your eye on the boss?”)
After the beach and the really dumb arguments, probably mostly my fault, we headed east toward the party in SLP. In Guadalajara we got lost trying to find the highway to Matehuala and after almost three hours driving around in circles, I said fuck it and went downtown to find a taxi. I asked him to lead me to the highway to Guanajuato, he was happy to oblige for ten bucks and within fifteen minutes we were on the edge of town at highway 80.
On the road again we drove until sunset stopping for a simple room in a nameless town sans wi-fi. The next day we drove across Mexico on strange little roads, one with many potholes and little traffic. I had never been so disorganized traveling but we finally got to Matehuala where we spent the night, then headed up into the mountains to Real de Catorce the next day.
The Party #7
Oh man that was a blowout for the ages, I doubt that any of us will have a 70th like that, in our own hotel no less.
The patio was an amazing outside ballroom ringed above with more party/patio space. Drinks were at 6pm, servers came around with trays of mushroom hors d’oeuvres and other canapes. There were photo shoots with the birthday boy Humberto then dinner in one of the two dining areas consisting of bean soup, salad, rabbit mole, mushroom mole and an array of alcoholic beverages at each table.
All the usual suspects were there: Nouch, Diego, Brigit and the rest of the European contingent as well as the Texans, Humberto’s family, and others who had traveled many miles to get to this little village through a mile long tunnel at 9000 feet. (There was even a Huichol shaman and a famous Hollywood director who had cast Humberto in a couple small roles in his movies.)
After dinner the Matehuala Mariachi band came on, soon the patio filled with dancing celebrants and I’d had a few margaritas and was ready to rock. Without a partner I wove through the dancing couples, from the dining area to the bandstand, then back to the tables to the Mariachi beat. Fun times…
The Party Continues #8
More people poured onto the party floor and the couples motif broke down into a free form frenzy. I went upstairs to watch the action below and found some poles holding up the canopy to use as dancing props. I got a little crazed and busted my falling down move and once was enough for that little “crowd-pleaser.”
A Texas guy came up over and said, “You’re peculiar, aren’t you?”
I reflexively thought about denying it, then said, “Yeah I guess.”
Dancing dancing dancing with my dear friend Brigitte, just one more dance please I asked her husband Cristoff. He didn’t want to give her up so we did a Brigitte sandwich for a while and then I danced with Dana, an Austin doctor and fun American-style boogier.
On into the night we drank and danced while others talked around the fire and Allie, was the life of her circle of partiers wherever she roamed. It was reaching the point where I was starting to lag, starting to labor, losing a step or two yet not wanting to leave the party. An hour later toward midnight another more modern band played in the spacious bar and the revelers danced into the next day. I wandered home across town by midnight, leaving the party in full swing.
Now the coffee is hitting the receptors and I’m looking out the window to the desert 5000 feet below, and listening to the smooth morning wake-up music of Pancho Sanchez. Everyone, 200 or so, will gather again for noon brunch then an electronic dance party at 6pm. There will be toasts, maybe a roast, an erotic pinata and perhaps more surprises…(To start the day a few of the insiders took a 5:30 sunrise hike up to Wirikuta, the Huichole’s most sacred site.)
At The Border #9
We cruised up the autopista from Matehuala to the border with Allie feverishly holding back her pee. The guard in the booth waved us up to the unloading slots and Allie bounded out of the truck looking for a bathroom.
“You have to leave your purse,” the customs guy said. Away she went and the man said, “What is your relationship with her?”
“Friends,” I said. “She’s kind of like my niece.”
“Kind of?” he asked.
“Well I’m like an uncle, we don’t have sex.”
He looked at my California drivers license, “Do you have one of those medical marijuana cards?” He asked, with the sniffer dog looking on.
“No,” I lied and he looked at me skeptically.
Allie came back and the customs agents told us to take everything out of the car, which we did, filling the long shelf by the parking area. When everything was out a muscular Black woman wearing a bullet-proof vest and looking like a commando said, “The dogs have alerted, please come with me.”
We went into a locked room nearby where there were ten or fifteen people, all of Mexican or Central American descent and handcuffed to chairs. They handcuffed us also and I whispered to Allie, “When they find that money they’re going to want to know why we have it.”
At The Border Part 2 #10
“We have nothing to worry about,” she said. “We haven’t done anything illegal.”
Being handcuffed to a chair in a room at the border is a singularly unique and terrifying experience. We continued trying, sotto voce, to get our story straight and I knew if we were interviewed separately it would be all over.
A jail matron came by. “You can’t talk to each other,” she said. “We only put you together because of the space situation.”
After forty-five minutes the woman came back and gave me my wallets, my regular one and the one that I had stashed with Allison’s things in a plastic bag in the back of the truck. “You said you had less than $10,000, right?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said.
Ten minutes later she came back, unlocked my handcuffs and took me into another room with an Hispanic co-worker. She counted out the money, about $7000 in hundreds, and asked why I had so much cash. “Don’t you know it’s not safe in Mexico?” said her cohort.
“Well, really,” I said. “These squeegee guys, hopped up on meth or something, tried to take us down in Sinaloa last week and I ran two red lights to get away. But really its not so bad in Mexico.”
“What do you do down there?” the commando asked.
“Oh, same as up here, landlord. I have a house and…”
She looked at me like oh shit, now this? Like she was about to let me go but now? She gave me back the wallet and locked me back up next to Allie, who looked very tense. A few minutes later she came back, unlocked us and let us drive away.
To celebrate our freedom we drove through Laredo a few miles to Chili’s where I had an Old Timers burger and milk shake in honor of my father’s favorite meal. As I ate I saw Allie intently watching CNN: the school massacre at Sandy Hook had just happened.
The End
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My apologies to the south of the border folks, but I have never and still don’t grok the appeal of Mexico. The danger and dysentery, the language barrier, srsly, what’s the why of being there if you’re not of the place?
And yet, my takeaway from your story is that the clearest *real* danger was from US Customs coming back.
Is tofu big in Mehico, or was eleven tofu meals in four days a choice?
An avocado scrub sounds gross, even if it’s done all sexy it still sounds gross. Also wasteful. What’s the point of avocado on your chest instead of in guacamole?
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Mexico has been an escape for Americanos and others for over 100 years…
It’s nice to run into fellow travelers feeling the freedom of the road…
(I met the best sex of my life woman and the possible love of my life there…)
The food is damn good but I eat too much of it…
It’s nice to get out of English-speaking lands and speak Spanish…
It’s a beautiful country with amazing natural wonders (Example: Tolantongo and Xilitla)
Digital nomads like to move there as it is cheaper, though they drive up prices…
For me, it’s just damn exciting to cross the border and be in a different country…
My story might have been too long for your site but it’s one I’ve been working on, soooo
Mexican people are very nice, beautiful often also…
Warmer…
Have you ever been anywhere?
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Nah, I’ve never been anywhere. As a young man in Seattle I made a few weekend excursions to Vancouver and Victoria in BC; I remember Canada as basically America with funny money. And in my 20s I was briefly employed in the Virgin Islands, but that’s literally American turf. Really, just never saw the allure of being someplace… foreign. Unless it’s science fiction, maybe.
Guess I’m a homebody. I like being someplace where I speak the language, know the customs, understand the subtleties, etc. Love love love most of the Mexican people I’ve known, but I’ve just never wanted to go someplace famous for diarrhea.
Is Mexican food in Mexico superior to Mexican food at a good all-American taqeria?
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Oh, I forgot the hookers!
But since I swore off them in 2018…
Mexican food varies country to country,
street corner to street corner…
But yeah, it’s more work to go somewhere for a vacation,
last trip for me was Lucky Donuts
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Were they lucky? The doughnuts, and the hookers?
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Most exciting thing I’ve ever seen on C-SPAN: they’re livestreaming workers on the late shift ripping Trump’s name off the Kennedy Center wall:
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Thanks, definitely kinda fun. Wish it was a perp walk, of course.
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Jeez, I’ve been checking in every half hour or so for hours, and they’re still building the scaffolding, haven’t yet touched or even reached the lettering.
Seems inefficient. Why don’t they use one guy with a crane and a jackhammer?
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After 5+ hours, just as the workers were getting to the good part where they’d be removing the obscenity, they instead hung giant curtains blocking public view of their work. It’s literally yet another Trump regime cover-up.
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Hahaha, wow. Earlier there were hundreds of people there cheering, it was pretty wholesome, but there’s no way they can let that happen. You’re right, they’re going to do it undercover and in the dead of night, rather than in the open and broad daylight, like his corruption.
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Apparently, Trump’s intent is to keep the Kennedy Center’s name under wraps indefinitely, perhaps permanently.
It’s sad how little it takes to make people happy, and how hard Trump & his cohorts work to keep that little from us.
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