The Last Of's: Final Thoughts on Being a Nickel-Plated Wayfarer

I think Former President George W. Bush called his final days in office the days of "last of's"--the last time I'll wake up and wonder what city I'm in. The last time I'll listen to a group of 40+ women complain to me about the room temperature, to which I respond with a look of concern and understanding. The last time I'll sit at the hotel bar alone with my thoughts and a crowd of Bluetooth toting businessmen chewing the fat.

Looking back from last year's posts as a Nickel-Plated Wayfarer, I wonder what I've learned this second time around? Patience, that's a quality I've definitely acquired. How many hours were spent in traffic jams? What about airport lines? How many flights were delayed or canceled? I can tell you, not once did I flip out and flail my arms in the air like a rabid monkey. Instead I've learned to recognize when something's out of my control and find the next best alternative, which oftentimes is simply waiting with a trusty newspaper.

I've learned how to stay organized (even though I lost my cell phone yesterday...the second time in a month!). Pocket routines have been essential in my life this year. My pen always goes in my left inside pocket of my jacket. My wallet always goes in the opposite one. My room key could always be found in my shirt pocket. If I wasn't wearing my Kino sandals, they were in the second compartment of my suitcase, waiting in the mesh-lined pocket.

I've learned empathy. Traveling every day, a person encounters many different lives and lifestyles, and not all of it is pretty. There are many out there who have had a pretty rough time of it. I've discovered the power of a genuine smile and a few words of understanding can work wonders for someone having a bad day, and those kind gestures often lead to a free hotel breakfast or being bumped to first class. Regardless, you meet a lot of jerks on the road, but also a lot of beautiful people. I've learned you have a choice to be either one.

So that's it. I gave my final announcement yesterday and told the ladies in the room I've had a great run of it. For the last time I told Judy, the banquet manager, I'll need my last extra gallon of coffee in the Regency Room. For the last time I told the guy making breakfast I'd have my last free ham, mushroom and spinach omelet with an orange juice and English Muffin. For the last time I told Kim at the front desk I was checking out of my room. And for the last time I retrieved my luggage from SeaTac Airport and headed home, exhausted from a five hour flight.

It's weird to think I'll never commute like that again. Flying every day becomes a lifestyle that sets a person apart from the moving world 35,000 feet below. Now that I'm finally down here again, it will be fun moving within it.

Thanks for reading!

Bruce & Barry Play Engelberg Humperdinck

Here's Bruce & Barry singing After the Loving by Engleberg Humperdinck on the beach. The video is too dark but if you turn it up on your stereo or headphones you can listen to the lovin' on island time.

Love in Hawaii...Mahalo to the Locals!

I arrived in Honolulu at 10:30pm Thursday night weary after over a six hour flight. My only solace on the plane was Marley and Me, which I felt strange tearing up during as I sat next to a shifty coach from some WNBA team I've never heard of. Random, yes, but it's just one of those things that occurs as a Nickel-Plated Wayfarer. Island Time is four hours earlier than Phoenix Time (Mountain Time?), so my body thought it was 3am when I finally went to bed. But it also meant waking up four hours later, and I was refreshed and ready for the festivities of Lei Day. Yes, "Lei Day is May Day" on Island Time and I made good use of it stringing up one of my own:

I gave it to Mary, a person I've traveled the country with to many places these past two years, including Jackson, MS, New Orleans, and Grand Rapids, MI. I presented my lei in the Hawaiian way with a hug and a kiss, as I received from my good friend at the hotel:


After a hard day's work I hopped in a cab where I had a good conversation about love with Toni, a Vietnamese cab driver who's lived on the island for over 15 years and has been happily married for over 30. He had much to say about how young and stupid I was, but in a more helpful, pedagogical way. Saying goodbye to Toni, I checked in to my room at the Hilton Hawaiian Village, a collection of five high-rise hotel buildings sitting on the shores of Waikiki. In the village there was a man-made pond with real penguins and a fancy jewelry shop among other retail options that were just as appealing. On the sixth floor of the Ali'i Tower I found my room had a balcony and overlooked the Pacific Ocean and all of the happy couples and families waddling around the sand.

There was a couple riding segways with bike helmets on and I yelled down to them "You don't need helmets for Segways!" I sat on my balcony, watching the ocean and thinking about how much love there is on Island Time when a pair of pigeons showed up to say hello. I suddenly felt lonely and decided to hit the bar, where I ordered a $13 pineapple drink and watched the hostess spray pigeons with water from a hose. I called to her "Leave them alone!" to which she responded "They're discusting, flying rats!" I wondered how much she wanted to spray the sentimental newlyweds as they populated the beaches and contributed to love on Island Time:

Could it be that love is manufactured here in Hawaii? I said "Aloha" to all sorts of people on the beach. Some literal "beach bums" sat under the gazebo by the squash courts later in the evening and said "Aloha" before I could so I approached them and was handed a beer. Bruce sat on his scooter and began strumming a tune that Barry began to sing along to.


Bruce's notes were light and melodic against Barry's voice, which was deep and filled with pain. Of all the sandy beaches, hula girls and surf boards on the island, our jam session on the beach was the best part of my time in Hawaii. The fuzz came and busted up our party at 10pm. Respect came from both my beach friends and the police, and everyone called each other by name. I'm sure this routine has lasted for years. I hugged my friends goodbye and and left in my bare feet. On my walk back to the hotel, I stopped in one last place for a beer and saw a bunch of kids dressed to the 9's, leaving their Senior Prom.


Hawaii is known for it's romantic landscapes and the feelings that go with it. I learned that the beauty on Waikiki is no novelty to the locals either, as their love was the genuine article to our postcard versions that come one week a year if we're lucky. I don't think the weather is the catalyst for love in Hawaii but it certainly does help.

Airports and Clementine...

Friday's commute home from Knoxville provided me with hours of reflection at the Chicago O'Hare Airport as our flight was delayed by three hours. All of these airports I've been to: spouses kissing each other goodbye, crying babies reunited with a parent, flight attendants picking up shuttles to airport hotels. The airport is a strange place to live part-time. It's wierd to brush your teeth in a bathroom full of strangers. Company becomes the newspaper or a paperback author. If you're lucky, you'll be stuck in an airport with Big Buck Hunter II: Sportsman's Paradise.

Waiting at Chicago O'Hare

Finally, after a turbulent flight that made me wonder about what happens when you die, I made it to SeaTac airport. After a quiet cab ride home, I was happy to find Andy and Adam waiting for me with a 12-pack of PBR. We watched Adam's newest production about muralist Ryan Henry Ward that can be watched here. We also watched an awesome piece on Mr. Yuk & the Poison Control Center that friends Harry Calbom and Austin Wilson produced that everyone should see as you never know when you might drink too much cough syrup (like I did when I was four).

Saturday was a day of errands including getting a new phone plan and buying this amazing fake cigarette that actually draws what looks like smoke! I'm going to use it for the next couple of months (after this job is over) to finally end my expensive and discusting habit that has interrupted my "nice-guy" image. In the evening, Andy and I had a bit of pre-party fun at the BalMar where friends John and Walter took good care of us:


After a couple of Sea Breezes we were off to Adam & Kelsey's, where I got to meet their newest kitten, Clementine. It was a great time seeing some good Seattle friends who are not happy about my decision to move back to Minneapolis after a 4+ year stint (give or take a few months building fences or lulling around Chicago).

The plan is to load up the minivan and head home some time in August, after a summer of taking in what I've missed about the Pacific Northwest, including camping and Vancouver, BC. In the fall, I'm heading back to school to get my teaching license from Metropolitan State University, and hopefully pick up a Masters in Education before re-entering the real world with a whole bunch of stories to tell about my "passage into adulthood." Until then, I'll enjoy the ride.

Clementine and I enjoying a cocktail at Adam & Kelsey's on Saturday night

My Week Off Catching Up With Doing Nothing

The first half of my final break from being a Nickel-Plated Wayfarer was spent in Seattle, where I enjoyed watching many movies and generally loafing around. It was, as Seattle is until July, cold and rainy and when I wasn't watching movies I was most likely sleeping.

On Wednesday, Andy drove me to the airport and I flew to Minneapolis, where my old pal Ryan was nice enough to take a break from school to pick me up. His class was canceled so we headed to the Electric Fetus to meet his brother and see an in-store performance of Justin Townes Earle, the son of Steve Earle. After the show we pre-partied a bit before heading to Big V's in St. Paul to see Matt Kunes perform as Dos Taco. It was a great welcome home and I woke up Thursday feeling like a ten-dollar bill.

Back in Burnsville, not much has changed. Murphy the dog is still restless, only now he's humping everything, but especially this blanket:


I spent much of my time at Champs, where I brought my grandma Alice May out for brunch and bloody marys. I also did some good catching up with Dave (da Boosh), drinking Miller Lights and talking about our lives since Vista View Elementary School.


So that's about it! I know it's been a couple weeks since my last post (thanks Adam), but there's just not that much to say. I could talk about the wonderful job I did picking up Murphy's poop from the backyard or how I talked shop with the neighbors about the retaining wall I'm building for my parents.

Whatever the case, I'm lucky to have friends that will drive me to and from the airport.

Joel Osteen and a Six-Pack of Silver Bullet....I Miss My Friends

Sitting with a Silver Bullet I'm drinking at my bed, flipping through the television trying to find the Twins vs. Mariners game. It's ironic that the opening few games of this MLB season begin with the city I live in batting against the city I'm from. Of course, the Minnesota Twins are my team, and that says a lot seeing that I couldn't care less about "March Madness," "The Final Four," or some hockey team skating around an ice rink trying to keep their teeth.

Here in Waltham, MA, my presence is less than welcoming, and the first sports bar I entered wouldn't even serve me because I have an "out of state license." I don't understand what that has to do with drinking a beer and watching baseball, but let's all just shun The Common Cafe for being a bunch of Massachusetts elitist assholes. Of the three bars I dropped by, none can accommodate my humble need for some good baseball that doesn't play on Eastern Standard Time.

Anyhow, I'm stuck in the East Coast with bad accents and no sense of home, which is much needed in these last days of running around as a Nickel-Plated Wayfarer. Yes, I'm homesick, and nothing will alleviate this perpetual problem but a good old game of American baseball, especially when it's opening week with my favorite sports team at bat. The real knee-to-the-groin is that I am no sports fan but baseball is somehow a solace and I am without a nut cup.

Tomorrow I fly the six hours home to Seattle, where I'll spend a good week before heading to Minneapolis, where plans are already in the works to spend the weekend with my dad and his childhood friend Clancy at the cabin, along with Murphy the Dog. I'm looking forward to shedding this nostalgia and getting into the thick of home, with its pawing puppies, Twins fans, and acceptors of out of state licenses.

Joel Osteen on Larry King Live talking about J.C. I am really far from home.

Martinis, Oysters, and T-Bone Weekend

I flew home Thursday night from Dallas to meet up with my brother and Adam Bale for a nice evening at the BalMar, where John Staley treated us to some sort of lemon drop shot he invented that was delicious because it was free. That reminds me, John's working on a blog for the Ballard Tribune called Notes From the Bar Room Floor. For those of you who don't know John, he was the guy in Deadbeats with the chops.

Friday morning Andy and I changed the brake pads on the minivan! Of course, we had help from a guy named "Dan the Baker" who Andy works with. The only request Dan had for helping out was that we provided beer, and we enjoyed a number of them during the process. It was a good feeling to get my hands dirty and actually fix something myself.

Choppa taking the caliper off the rotor of my Bahama Mama

Friday night there was no squeaking from the wheels of the van as Andy and I drove to the airport to pick up my dad, also known as T-Bone, Timmer, or Papillon. It was bar time by the time we got back to Seattle, so we had a quick one before falling asleep and preparing for Saturday. And what is there to do on Saturdays in Seattle when out of towners come to visit but go to Pike's Place Market!? We wandered around town looking for a gift for my mom, and in the meantime bought some King Salmon and oysters. Also, we took some pictures:

T-Bone and I at US Bank in Pike's Place
Timmer and Andy in front of the Gum Wall!

The bus ride home for martinis and dinner

It was good to have my dad as a guest over the weekend. The salmon turned out pretty good, even though I left it on my football-shaped grill too long. The oysters were terrible and it was tramatizing to watch my dad smash them with a hammer because steaming them wouldn't do the trick: