The Brothers’ Bike Ride

Day 5 had some fun parts and some less fun parts. I think my dad’s grumpiness rubbed off on me a little.

Highlights: 

• Working out in the Comfort Inn. I have very little self control when it comes to salty snacks (I have been known to finish a large bag of tour-till-ah chips by myself in one sitting) and need to offset all the chips, Triscuits, and beer. Even though we’ve stayed at brand name places throughout L2, this was the first place to have a gym.
• Lunch at Tre Rosat Cafe. Great pizza and good moods all around. On the bottles of the Mirror Pond Pale Ale some of us had, it said, “If you could only listen to one album for the rest of your life, what would it be?” Mark said Revolver. I said Third/Sister Lovers. But on reflection it would probably make me feel crazy after a while. I guess anything would, though, so maybe an album that’s already a little crazy is the best choice. I also tried to tell Mark to give Sinatra a chance by listening to In the Wee Small Hours but I know you won’t, Mark. That’s okay.
• Doing laundry. I got to feel domestic, and everybody likes having clean clothes.

Mimicking Mark’s bathroom self-portrait in Tre Rosat — I think I did pretty well copying his wide-eyed expression

Whiny lowlights: 

• Another minivan on Midnight Rider’s tail for most of the drive. (It was white; maybe it was the Betrayed Ghost of Great White.) It’d be cool if cars had the ability to post messages in their rear window for the car behind them. It would be in the form of a voice-controlled LED sign. My sign would have said, “DUDE, JUST PASS ME.” This is a great invention but I’m sure it would result in more road rage deaths so maybe it’s not actually that great.
• A cold interaction at the Holiday Inn check-in. The woman was professional but impersonal. I asked her for a dinner recommendation and she told me where I could find a list — which is fine, and yes, I could have pressed and said, “But what restaurants do you like?” I just didn’t like her fake-friendly tone. She made me feel fake welcome. She also put me in Room 223, and I hate numbers that are one off from being all the same digit. Also the handle on my room’s door was attached upside down. I forget that the backwardness only applies to the door and keep trying to flush the toilet by pushing the handle up.
• Dinner at Wendy’s. It’s more important for the guys to get rest than to experience the city, and the Wendy’s was near the hotel. As SAG driver you sometimes need to take one for the team.
• Mild anxiety about not getting any work done. I told someone I would finish their project this week and don’t think it’s going to happen. Sorry, NR!

The sun rises over Lordsburg

No time for posing today

Rural route mailboxes where I stopped to refuel the guys

Testing out the new bike seat

Hotel Art of the Day

Shapes and hatch marks on rustic blocks of color
~48″x28″
Holiday Inn Express, Silver City, NM

Hotel Art Score

5/10. This is similar in tone to yesterday’s piece. I did a little research, and of course art specifically for hotels is a real thing. There are a bunch of sources, but this place has the best website. You can search for art by what colors it has so that you can best match it to the room. This particular piece would be categorized as Abstract (don’t bother looking for it, though — I just did and it isn’t there, though similar pieces are).

Art Art Score

3/10. If the artist told me this represents how he feels inside or some other concept he feels is important, I’d be like, “Okay, this is kind of a lame and ineffective expression of that, but who I am to judge.” It’s the cynical “I’m going to make money with some hotel art” thing done with just a touch more gusto. But let’s be clear: it’s still bad.