melannen: Commander Valentine of Alpha Squad Seven, a red-haired female Nick Fury in space, smoking contemplatively (default)
melannen ([personal profile] melannen) wrote2004-05-01 02:14 pm
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my own stuff, mainly

Yard sailing went well. L3wt included 16 books for four bucks. The prize so far is the 1971 hitchhiker's guide to North America, full of sage advice about such things as how to politely refuse a toke offered by a driver if you're already too stoned to see the scenery, and areas where the clenched fist salute will get you more rides than thumbing it. I read most of it on the ride back to college. (UMCP and UND both got stars for being "particularly hip or pleasant" for longhaired hitchhikers. and Columbia, Columbia of all places, had a "Grass Roots" hotline with a crash list for freaks.)

I want to hitchhike crosscountry now. wah. I even got Mom to admit that since she can't recall a single hitchhiking-related crime in the past ten years, she has no right to keep telling me that "it's getting more and more dangerous these days." Any of you know anything about contemporary hitchhiking conditions? I just don't hear about it anymore, and nobody thumbs rides in this area.
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[identity profile] aelkiss.livejournal.com 2004-05-01 01:11 pm (UTC)(link)
There's slugging, which is sort-of-but-not-really-at-all like hitchhiking.

I still think you should go on an ill-planned road trip with me.

[identity profile] theemptylife.livejournal.com 2004-05-01 01:42 pm (UTC)(link)
Hitchhiking? Man, dont you watch the news?

One time this guy picked up this hitchhiker, and was all driving around and stuff. Turned out it was a ghost! Theres ghosts on the highways! I saw it on this cool news show that broadcasts in black and white. Cant remember what it was called....The News Zone, or something like that.
ext_193: (smite)

[identity profile] melannen.livejournal.com 2004-05-01 07:56 pm (UTC)(link)
I really hope you aren't seriously expecting me to believe that?

The haunting hitchhiker is *the* archetype urban legend. Which is kinda the point, hitchhiking is so much a part of the underpinnings of our culture, yet another vital thing that's dying out.

[identity profile] aelkiss.livejournal.com 2004-05-01 08:59 pm (UTC)(link)
I think "cool news show that broadcasts in black and white" = Twilight Zone :-P

been good to me...

[identity profile] morgansalman.livejournal.com 2004-05-07 11:32 am (UTC)(link)
Very good score, the book you found! The American hitchhiking books are harder to come by. Another great one- The Hitchhiker's Field Manual, by Paul DiMaggio in 1973. It's a road charm that travels with me (though it was written the year I was born).

In the States, we don't realize how many hitchhikers are still out there until actually on the highway. There are -and have always been- risks. Driver come-ons and being dropped in a bad area are two annoyances, and drunks are trouble for all of us. If you do hitch, have a partner and alternate between super aware and head-in-the-clouds.
So much beauty and kindness and natural intensity to experience out there. It's a wide land, but being mobile makes it all feel familiar and doable.

Seems you already found digihitch.com (http://www.digihitch.com/)-- keep connecting there with other road poets to find more possibilities...
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