dietsch

I'm tired

I'm tired. I guess it's no surprise--the last week has been busy, with my interview on Wednesday, going with Tim and Christine to see Twelfth Night on Thursday, the drinkup on Friday. The drinkup. Lot of drinking at that drinkup, but I guess that's the point. I met Todd at his workplace on Friday afternoon. We schlepped my bags back to his apartment in Brooklyn, he changed clothes, and we headed back into the city. We stopped off for slices of pizza before joining the crazy kids at Ace Bar. The Ace kids were loud and funny and drunk and flirty and funny and drunk and loud. Which is pretty much everything a good drinkup should entail, no? We left Ace around 3 and since Todd and Lauren were hungry, we headed out with Molly and got slices of pizza. Molly knew another place, so we ducked in there and ordered a pitcher of beer. It was kind of a dive, but it was fine, and we sat and talked. Todd flirted with Molly and Lauren; I just sort of watched it unfold in my own little haze. When the bartender switched off the neon and upturned stools onto the bar a little after 4, we knew it was time to go home. Molly lives around there, so she walked back, and Todd, Lauren, and I grabbed a cab back to Todd's apartment. Next day, got up at 11. We washed as much bar smell out of us as we could and swilled cocktails of filtered water and Advil. We met up again with Molly--and a guy named Slippery Pete--for brunch. Biscuits and sausage gravy. And coffee and coffee and coffee and coffee. A large picture of a smoking cat gazed over us as we fought to take in all that food before us. The plates, I fear, won. I think Lauren put away most of her omlette and home fries, but the rest of us left a lot behind. Molly went one way, Slippery Pete another, and then Todd and I saw Lauren off at Penn Station for her train back to Long Island. We later met up with Josh for a late, late showing of Metropolis, followed by beer and pub grub at a Greenwich Village bar. Stumbled back to Todd's, collapsed at 3:30. Got up at 7 to haulass back to Indiana. Subway to Manhattan. PATH to Newark. NJ Transit to Newark International. Tram to the terminal. Kludged heavily to the gate, with 45 minutes to spare before the flight was to leave. Suddenly from my backpack, a cell-tone rendition of I Walk the Line. I fumbled open the zipper, rummaged around for the phone. Elizabeth, calling to apologize for missing me twice last week. We caught up on the rest of my week and the unfortunate disasters that plagued hers, and made tentative plans to get together when I get back. Buoyed by a nice call from a pretty girl, I boarded the plane. Uneventful flight to Detroit on a sparsely populated plane meant room to stretch out and nap. My connection to Indianapolis was almost immediate, so I rushed down the terminal to my other flight, just in time. I'd rather rush from one gate to the next than sit like a toad for an hour waiting for a flight. Sparse again with room to unpack my legs and doze. At the Indianapolis airport, I collected my stuff and waited for the shuttle back. My iPod handed song after song to my ears on the trip back to Bloomington: Springsteen, Costello, Waits, Dylan. Prince, Madonna, Ella. I dread travel days, especially those like yesterday: four states, four modes of transportation, navigating unfamiliar stations and airports and ticketing systems. What I once saw as adventure, I now view as tedium. But with the call from Elizabeth, the relaxing flights, and the relative compactness of the trip (just over three hours from Newark Int'l to Indy), it wasn't so bad.