Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Wonderful luck. By the time the alarm goes off, I can be running full bore somewhere between Needles and Death Valley - jamming the accelerator through the floorboard and shaking my fist up at Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., swooping down on me in his FBI/Screaming Eagle helicopter.

YOU CAN RUN, BUT YOU CAN’T HIDE

(… warning to smack dealers seen on a bulletin board in Boulder, CO.)

Fuck you, Efrem, that wisdom cuts both ways.

As far as you and the Mint people know, I am still up there l850 - legally and spiritually if not in the actual flesh - a “Do Not Disturb” sign hung out to ward off disturb - The maids won’t come near that room as long as that sign is on the doorknob. My attorney saw to that - along with 600 bars of Neutrogena soap that I still have to deliver to Malibu. What will the FBI make of that? This Great Red Shark full of Neutrogena soap bars? All completely legal. The maids gave us that soap. They’ll swear to it… Or will they?

Of course not. Those goddamn treacherous maids will swear they were menaced by two heavily - armed crazies who threatened them with a Vincent Black Shadow unless they gave up all their soap.

Jesus Creeping God! Is there a priest in this tavern? I want to confess! I’m a fucking sinner! Venal, mortal, carnal, major, minor - however you want to call it, Lord… I’m guilty.

But do me this one last favor: just give me five more high - speed hours before you bring the hammer down; just let me get rid of this goddamn car and off of this horrible desert.

Which is not really a hell of a lot to ask, Lord, because the

incredible truth is that I am not guilty. All I did was take your

gibberish seriously… and you see where it got me? My primitive Christian instincts have made me a criminal.

Creeping through the casino at six in the morning with a suitcase full of grapefruit and “Mint 400” T - shirts, I remember telling myself, over and over again, “You are not guilty.” This is merely a necessary expedient, to avoid a nasty scene. After all, I made no binding agreements; this is an institutional debt - nothing personal. This whole goddamn nightmare is the fault of that stinking, irresponsible magazine. Some fool in New York did this to me. It was his idea, Lord, not mine.

And now look at me: half - crazy with fear, driving 120 miles an hour across Death Valley in some car I never even wanted. You evil bastard! This is your work! You’d better take care of me, Lord… because if you don’t you’re going to have me on your hands.

12. Hellish Speed… Grappling with the California Highway Patrol… Mano a Mano on Highway 61

Tuesday, 12:30 P.M… Baker, California… Into the Ballantine Ale now, zombie drunk and nervous. I recognize this feeling: three or four days of booze, drugs, sun, no sleep and burned out adrenalin reserves - a giddy, quavering sort of high that means the crash is coming. But when? How much longer? This tension is part of the high. The possibility of physical and mental collapse is very real now

… but collapse is out of the question; as a solution or even a cheap alternative, it is unacceptable.

Indeed. This is the moment of truth, that fine and fateful line between control and disaster - which is also the difference between staying loose and weird on the streets, or spending the next five years of summer mornings playing basketball in the yard at Carson City.

No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride… and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well… maybe chalk it off to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get eaten. It’s all in Kesey’s Bible… The Far Side of Reality.

And so much for bad gibberish; not even Kesey can help me I have just had two very bad emotional experiences - with the California Highway Patrol and another with a phantom hitchhiker who may or may not have been who I thought it was - and now, feeling right on the verge of a bad psychotic episode, I am hunkered down with my tape machine in a “beer bar” that is actually the back room of a huge Hardware Barn - all kinds of plows and harnesses and piled - up fertilizer bags, and wondering how it all happened.

About five miles back I had a brush with the CHP. Not stopped or pulled over: nothing routine. I always drive properly. A bit fast, perhaps, but always with consummate skill and a natural feel for the road that even cops recognize. No cop was ever born who isn’t a sucker for a finely - executed hi - speed Controlled Drift all the way around one of those cloverleaf freeway interchanges.

Few people understand the psychology of dealing with a highway traffic cop. Your normal speeder will panic and immediately pull over to the side when he sees the big red light behind him… and then we will start apologizing, begging for mercy.