Finally! I just figured out how to make it so that my readers...(reader, perhaps) can e-mail me from the blog. I will indeed someday master HTML.

This weekend Neil and I went to Roswell in search of Aliens. We did not find any, but it was still a fun and slightly fascinating weekend. Our hotel was old and a little funky, but we had a king suite, which meant we got two rooms, one with a big bed and one with the most uncomfortable couch we had ever sat on. Despite the fact that the couch sounded like crinkling cellophane when sat upon, we were both thrilled that our hotel room included a couch. I think it is evidence of the bizarre phenomenon wherein people are always overly excited about small features of hotel rooms despite the fact that they most likely have better features in their homes. For example, people get excited about coffee makers, when they have espresso machines at home. Or the excitement over the free toiletries supplied by hotels is another good example. Even if you have salon-quality shampoo in your suitcase, it is still somehow thrilling when the hotel provides Caswell and Masey shampoo or even Panteen.

Anyway, I digress. Roswell is basically a sleepy little oil town with an international reputation as the UFO capital of the world. For several blocks on the town's main street, the street lights are actually alien heads and there are at least three city blocks with virtually nothing but alien-related stores. There is the International UFO Museum and Research Center, a museum that opened in the late 90s and chronicles the history of the "crash" in 1947. The museum is a huge tourist draw. Then the rest of the alien stuff consists of stores selling alien junk and one cool-looking coffee shop called Out of This World. At the junk stores, you can get alien mugs, t-shirts, stuffed animals, golf balls, guitar picks, underwear, cookie jars, toys, candy, beer, wine... You name an item and you can get it with an alien on it in Roswell.

There is also an anti-alien research center set up directly across the street from the UFO museum. The sign has an alien head with a red circle around it and a line across it's face, as if aliens are something people can campaign against. The men inside the store are Christians selling coffee and a variety of super right-wing religious books. One of the founders of the anti-alien research center was abducted and wants to stop aliens through faith. We walked in, wondering what it was (we should have known when it said "Every knee shall bow" on the sign in big lettering) and walked out very quickly, but not before I got some free anti-alien stickers.

We also went to the newest Roswell attraction: Alien Encounter: Where Aliens Research Humans. I had high hopes for this, and while it was cool, it was basically a glorified haunted house with absolutely nothing to do with aliens other than the alien crap they sold in the gift shop. But we did get very scared... terrified, actually.

Perhaps the coolest place was Alien Zone, a gift shop that has an Area 51 in the back and for $2 you can go in and take photos with lots of friendly aliens. I can't wait to get the film developed so I can frame the picture of Neil drinking a beer with one alien wearing a plaid shirt.

I remain undecided as to whether or not I believe in the little green men, but my alien adventure was very entertaining. Even the Wal Mart in Roswell is in on the Alien craze. Instead of the traditional blue stripe on top of the building, Roswell's Wal Mart is green and has a big alien head painted on the side of the building. I wish I were kidding, but I'm not.

I was hoping to be abducted, or to feel an alien presence, or see a piece of the UFO (apparently the Military has every last piece.) But instead, Neil and I went to dinner and a movie and then drove home the next morning.