I travel a lot with my work. Usually, I find myself in a state of confusion, but this time I was in Arizona.

I love Arizona. I feel right at home there. After all, Minnesota is Canada’s Arizona. Arizona is fenced in by cacti, and the lack of manicured lawns wasn’t unappreciated. It’s where the chickens taste just like rattlesnakes. It’s hot in Arizona. Parked cars surround every tree. It gets so hot that people catch colds by fanning themselves. Yuma is so hot that one resident told me that it was two feet from hell. There’s no need to shovel snow there. By the time snow hits the ground, it’s been burned to ashes. All Arizona needs is more shade. Why doesn’t every rental car company offer a windshield shade with a rental? Even if you plan on doing nothing in Arizona, you’d want to wait until it cooled down.

I was trying to get from A to Z in Arizona. I drove in rush hour traffic in Phoenix. If the road had been just a bit more crowded, I could have shifted my car into neutral and been pushed down the highway. People who wanted to drive the temperature weren’t even able to drive the speed limit. I tried to leave at least two spaces between me and the car ahead as I creeped on down the road. The problem with that bit of defensive driving is that three other vehicles saw it as an invitation and quickly crammed themselves into those two spots. Adding insult to injury, none of them waved. Put your hand in the air and wave around as if you care. That’s all I’m saying.

I decided to stop at an In-N-Out Burger. I did so for a number of reasons. I was a bit peckish and I wanted to thin the herd by letting 100,000 cars roll by while I ate. I’d never eaten at an In-N-Out Burger restaurant before. It was mentioned in the movie “The Big Lebowski.” In that film, Donny, played by Steve Buscemi, said this in response to the mention of an In-N-Out Burger place, “Those are good burgers, Walter.”

That’s a ringing endorsement right there.

I went in, and I came out.

I’m not sure if they have good burgers. I can speak only to the lone hamburger that I consumed. It was a good burger.

Back on the highway, a strong wind turned my world into the inside of a giant vacuum cleaner bag. It was so windy that the roundabouts were no longer roundabout. Flotsam chased jetsam down the road. Sunglasses, a lawn chair and what appeared to be a George Foreman Classic Grill blew past. My vehicle collided head-on with tumbling tumbleweed that smacked the car with an apparent evil intent. The tumbleweed might have covered an acre. It might not have covered an acre. If only the Sons of the Pioneers song “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” had been playing on the radio.

“I’ll keep rolling along. Deep in my heart is a song. Here on the range I belong. Drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds.”

If that had occurred, that would have been a “Twilight Zone” moment. That song was part of the score of that film “The Big Lebowski.”

Doo-doo-DOO-doo! Doo-doo-DOO-doo!

Tumbleweed, Russian thistle and wind witch are common names for this symbol of the American west. Russian thistle plants, looking like the skeleton of a shrub, can be as small as a soccer ball or as large as a car. As it rolls along, a Russian thistle plant disperses seeds, about 250,000 per plant.

I ran into a number of Minnesotans in Arizona. That’s always a good thing. I think Minnesotans are friendly, but a friend maintains that Minnesotans are friendlier when they’re not in Minnesota. I do know for sure that some decrepitating Minnesotans applauded when the sun went down.

It was dry. A fellow told me that he’d happened across a rattlesnake eating a frog. The man said that he wasn’t sure that he hadn’t been a frog in a previous life, so he decided to save its life. He grabbed the pint bottle of rye whiskey and poured a shot down the snake’s mouth. The snake spit the frog out. Five minutes later, the frog was back with two frogs in its mouth.

“Did you have a good time in Arizona?” my wife asked upon my return.

“It was Mountain Standard Time,” I replied confidently.

 

Al Batt’s columns appear in the Tribune every Wednesday and Sunday.