Rotating in a Small Town

I was walking around downtown Casper yesterday and some guy high on god knows what came screeching around the corner a block away and then erratically stopped in the middle of the road. He was waving his hand out the window at nothing. He drove and acted like someone who might become interested in taking a potshot at random human flesh so I took cover flatting myself against the wall of the entrance to a closed store still unable to stop myself from peeking out to see what would happen next. Curiosity killed the cat, they say. 

He went speeding by, stopped after the traffic light, placed a random traffic cone in the middle of the lane, hopped into his little old truck and sped off. A big truck came lumbering through when the light changed and had to stop. The driver was a middle aged lanky rancher, with some chaw in his lip and a none too hurried gate. He looked like this random traffic cone in the middle of the lane business was an everyday occurrence.Chewing contentedly, he moved it unperturbed and climbed back into his lifted truck and drove away.

Yesterday evening I was in a nice family oriented park between my hotel and the hospital and there was a group of two men and a woman drinking a huge bottle of whiskey. As if Sunday night in a park was the time and place to be getting completely hammered. At least when they passed out it was easy to get them to the emergency room. 

Perhaps it was payday this week and everyone is out abusing the drug of their choice. 

All I've heard here, is how Denver is such a terrible drug infested city. While in Denver, I have never seen anything like I've seen here. It exists in certain byways and streets but its avoidable. Here it's just everywhere & you can't get away from it. 

After that, the night on the ambulance and the high speed chase I witnessed through downtown last week it's easy to think Casper is full of people who are off their rockers. Many I've witnessed, I'm sure, are whacked on drugs and a few are part of one of the most violent South American gangs that has moved into town. 

As far as the rest of the driving Casper-ites I'm in contact with like squeezing their big trucks next to my Prius in the compact car parking spaces in the hospital parking garage. It's comical, there's my Prius, a compact car fitting nicely into one of the labelled compact car parking space and then a row of HUGE trucks and SUVs, hanging their full length beds and bloated backsides so far out into the ramp of the parking garage it's hard to pull past when using the ramp (this isn't an exaggeration, I wouldn't have believed it before living here). Plus they are all door to door so they can barely squeeze out from between the trucks once they open their doors. 

Nothing wrong with these vehicles, something is lost on the drivers when they think their extra cab full length bed Ford F-150 is a compact car. Several days I have laughed out loud at the silliness of it, other days its irritating to get into my car without door dinging their vehicles and exit the garage without removing a tailgate. 

Colorful place, this Casper, WY. It makes me laugh, often.