Friday, July 1, 2016

Unidentified Fueling Object


 

 


Unidentified Fueling Object

 

            There are no good places to run out of gas but some are worse than others. In the middle of a desert, for example. Or the middle of a desert frequented by extraterrestrials.

            On a recent summer road trip my wife and I took to the Southwest, we made a decision to turn off U.S. Highway 6 and onto Nevada State Highway 375 toward the town of Rachel. Our original destination, Tonopah, fifty miles away, could wait. We decided instead to investigate the eponymous "Extraterrestrial Highway" that passes within a milli-parsec of notorious Area 51, the landing site of choice in the United States for Unidentified Flying Objects. Curious about what we'd find, we gave not so much as a glance at the gas gauge in our spiffy black late-model Ford Ranger pickup as it reliably purred along on six happy cylinders.