OPINION

November 28, 1997

Observations

By Mac McKinnon

Imagination runs rampant during trips

I never cease to be amazed about what you can see driving
down the highway, especially an interstate.

I seem to do a lot of travelling and I tend to gaze about
(yes, I also watch the road). The things I see are amazing,
curious, puzzling and surprising.

Many of those surprises can be seen parked at night at the
local motels and Flying J. You never know what you might see
on a truck.

It used to be that you could see the things on a train but
the railroad people have gotten where they box up all their
wares so you can't really see what they've got or get close
enough to tell what it is.

Having lived in the lake country, I'm amazed at the
different kind of boats you see going on trucks down the
road. I've seen some really huge ones, particularly sail
boats and I just wonder where they are going. It seems odd
to see them in the middle of the desert.

Just last week, I saw two of the buses used in making The
Lost World, the Jurassic Park sequel. One was the computer
wagon that was pushed in two stages off a cliff. I suppose
they had been somewhere to promote the fact that the video
is now on sale or else they were going somewhere to do just
that. Or maybe they're working on a sequel to the sequel.

My mind wonders and the imagination works overtime when I
see things like that. I've also seen car carriers with cars
that have obviously been used in movies, some marked for the
police, etc. I wonder just what movies they were in and did
I see those cars in the movies.

Then you see lots of school buses being driven to somewhere.
I guess they are made in Dallas or somewhere and then driven
to California. It seems rather odd.

Then you look on the back of trucks and see some really
weird looking cargo. It makes me wish I had a CB (citizen's
band) radio so I could talk to the trucker and find out what
he is hauling.

Of course, you see all kinds of car racing rigs being hauled
down the road as well as support vehicles for television
broadcasts, ESPN, Fox, CBS, NBC, etc.

It makes you really stop and think about the commerce of
this country and where we'd be without trucks to transport
everything from one end of the country to another.

I know a number of truck drivers and they go everywhere with
just about everything you can imagine. Bicycles from the
Roadmaster warehouse in Balmorhea go in every direction. A
friend just recently took a load from there to California. A
truck load of bicycles seems like a lot but just stop and
think that we have 250 million people plus in this country
alone and a lot of goods are consumed by all those people.

It's obvious that I'm easily entertained, especially when I
let my imagination run wild. Of course, unlike the
commercials with people who steal the Diet Dr. Pepper truck,
I want to loot the trucks with fancy new cars.

There goes that imagination again.

Editor's Note: Mac McKinnon is the Editor and Publisher of the Pecos
Enterprise whose column appears each Friday. He can be
e-mailed at: bigmac@bitstreet.com

Pecos Enterprise
Mac McKinnon, Publisher
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