Searching Beneath One's Nose

Another entry in the Middling series.  This time only the main character is involved, and his name is exposed.  What fun! Props if you can discern the two lead singers his name is derived from...

Searching Beneath One’s Nose

342 minutes, 14.7 gallons of gas, 7 cigarettes, two bottles of water, two chili cheese burritos from Taco Bell, one emergency stop to take a dump at one of the dirtiest rest stops in the Midwest, and one vile case of swamp ass was all it took for me to get from Central Illinois to Columbus Ohio.  At times the drive felt like an odyssey and at times it felt as though it only lasted a second.  In either case, I was grateful to pull in to the hotel parking lot.  I had been to Columbus a lot, it was at least a quarterly trip for me and sometimes it was twice a quarter but I was somewhat excited because I was trying out a new hotel.  The beauty of trying the new hotel was that it was both brand new and in a similar geographic location to the last hotel I typically frequented.  This meant that all of the regular drinking and dining establishments would still be in play.

I walked into the hotel and immediately noticed two things, the wall with a waterfall on it and the hotel bar.  Traveling could be a real pain in the ass but there were a few perks, they ranged from not having to clean up after yourself and eating and drinking whatever the hell I wanted without the nagging vocal concerns of my wife Claudia.  Above all those, in my experience were hotel bars.  No other place welcomed such varied and weary souls.  Everyone inside a transient, longing to make their way home or to distance themselves from home; whether coming or going the feeling inside the bar was the same, a handful of folks in a communal miserable imbibe.  What horrific glory!

I checked in quickly, and I was pleasantly surprised by the gift bag of a water bottle, cheese crackers, and a snack size package of Twizzlers that I received due to my Honored Privilege Priority Member status.  Ah, the little things...

I made my way to the elevator with my bags of shit and hit the circular four with authority.  I had a feeling it was going to be a good night.

Once in the room I unpacked two days worth of clothing and life distracting paraphernalia; upon completion I set out to the bathroom and completed another dump to rid myself of the last of the chili cheese burritos.  I changed my sweaty t-shirt and headed down to the bar, hopeful that I would encounter some strange and miserable characters to both intrigue my fascination with the human condition and to hopefully make me feel slightly better about being a relative failure. 

The first thing I noticed was that the bar was small, it was a little disappointing but acceptable.  Luckily, it was mostly empty.  There was a well groomed asshole in a suit at one end chomping at a giant bloody steak and at the other end was what looked to be an over worked engineer drawing up schematics on napkins.  I sat in the middle, equally far away from the both of them. 

The bar maiden greeted me with an overture that was both phony and loud.  I was put off immediately.  “Hi! I’m Lymene, what’s your name?” 

Now it’s well known that a bartender should be friendly but they should be more than just that, with the amount of varied drunken bastards they had to deal with on any given night, being simply happy would not suffice.  The best bartenders I had experienced were able to fill three character types,  they should be one part chipper, one part pensive psychologist(for the real nuts like myself) and one part comedian.  Lymene, bless her heart was all chipper, and I wanted nothing to do with her.

I cleared my throat and spoke sheepishly, “Todd Armstrong, how are you?” 

She smiled big, “I’m fantastic! What can I get you?”

She was some kind of Asian and I stared at her for a moment trying to decide whether it was Philippino or Korean.  I stood silent staring at her before I snapped out of it.  “I’ll take a dirty martini up with Beefeaters and as many olives as you can fit on a stick.”  She skipped back to the bottles of hard liquor and my stomach rumbled.  Why did she have to be so fucking chipper? Blah.

I sat down and eyed the asshole eating the steak.  He was chomping away like he hadn’t eaten in weeks.  I dismissed him at once and looked to the other end of the bar and watched as the overworked engineer sketched furiously.  Lymene asked him twice if he wanted another beer while she was making my martini.  He replied in the negative both times. 

While Lymene had been shut down at that end of the bar, the starving suit at the other end had been happy to oblige her idiotic conversation starters.  They discussed the finest methods of making martini together; according to them the vermouth should be barely apparent, only swished around the glass in a finite amount just to give a hint of its flavor.  I felt as though my martini had been tainted before it even had a chance to slide down my gullet.  When Lymene had found a breaking point in her conversation with Dickface she brought me my martini.  “Can I get you something else; a menu?”

“No, thanks, my stomach is queasy; maybe in a bit.”

I did my best to ignore Lymene and the gluttonous steak guy, I fired up twitter on my iphone and read about a bunch of things that were so far beyond arms length that I began to wonder why I followed anything.  News was only news if you gave a shit, and I only did in widespread intervals. 

After a few sips of the martini an anxiety attack set in and I couldn’t get out of the hotel bar quick enough.  I wanted no part of these derelict interlopers, I longed for the solemnity of my backyard or basement.  My room would have to suffice.

I started chugging the martini, the best I could.  Despite my hatred for Lymene, it was one of the better martinis I had ever had, and when that notion hit me it made me feel even more out of place.  Why couldn’t I just enjoy this and see how the night progressed?  There was bound to be some fun to be had, but the thought was listless and floated for only a second before being shot down like a scud in the gulf war by the patriot missile of my anxiety.

Lymene could see me gulping quickly, “Todd, you want another one?”

All I could mutter was “Check please.”

She looked sad for a second but quickly smiled, “OK Todd, Thanks for coming!”

While waiting for her to run my visa; a crew of construction workers huddled behind me, trapping me at the stool.  Lymene dropped off the receipt and started asking the gang behind me for their drink orders.  I quickly signed for a heavy tip and finished the last of the martini.  I ate the last olive in frenzy and quickly turned around.  I bumped into one of the construction workers chest and clumsily made my way through them.  As I was heading through the lobby I could hear one of them call me an asshole.

The elevator doors opened and as they closed I breathed a huge sigh of relief.  I was an asshole, the construction worker was right but it felt good to be an asshole on his way to his own room.

Once in the room I sat for a while and had a few light beers that were in my fridge.  I tried to write but it all came out hackish and trite (see previous and current fabulous confessor blog entry) so I gave up and lay down on the bed.

After lying for a while, my phone alerted me to a text from my wife Claudia.  I assumed she was pissed that I hadn't called and looked at the message with a sense of impending doom. 

Fortunately, it was a link to a video file with the title Margaret Dances.  The message she wrote was a smiley face using a colon and parenthesis (J).

Pressing the button I was full of anticipation, I couldn’t wait to see my ever evolving 16 month old daughter.  Watching the forty eight second video of my daughter dancing like a fool to a children’s song made my torso feel warm.

 

I watched the video 16 times in a row until I drifted into a deep and peaceful sleep.