Spring Break 2007 - Colleges, Deserts, and Tinsel
Day 1 -
The plane takes off way too early. I am only half packed. To make up for not attending the rodeo this year, I reenact the calf scramble to get ready. I really need new clothes. Father has promised to buy me some in Santa Fe. I am concerned about room in my suitcase. Suitcase is also worrying because it is heavy and wheel-less. Because my father would have an aneurism if we did not arrive at the airport two hours early, Mimi is über-tired and cranky just in time for some dumbass sunlight to try to blind her. Mimi is so tired she recounts in third person.
On the ride over:
M: “So, why is your ladylove [note: the retarded fiancée] not driving us to the airport like a good little fiancée?”
F: “She’s busy with that tax junk.”
M: “The bill for parking will be painful. A good woman would drop us off.”
F: “She’s busy!”
M: [mutter] “Five-letter woman engaged to a four-letter man...”
At the airport, a plague of zombism has come down and everyone is trying to flee. The line to check in baggage is out on the sidewalk. I see two people from school. I would love to stop and swap stories and enjoy the rare instance of running into friends at the airport, but Father is convinced that the check-in will take more than two hours and we will miss the flight and the College of Santa Fe will burn down and I’ll die alone in the gutter after prostituting myself to a stray Pekinese for table scraps. Suffice to say, check-in takes twenty minutes. A trip to Starbucks and a long-ass wait for the plane, and we’re off.
Luckily on the plane I am not seated next to Father. He tries to make conversation that I find irritating. Instead I am seated between an old guy and a middle-aged guy. Middle-Aged Fogy goes to sleep. Old Fogy is more interested in an account of Teddy Roosevelt’s last trek in the wilderness. The ride is uneventful. However, I am incredibly taken with the New Mexico landscape from a bird-eye view.
I try to take a picture of it and in the process wind up leaning really far over Middle-Aged Fogy. Conveniently he finally wakes up, just in time to see an underage redhead halfway in his lap. I look up and we exchange a rigorous “WTF?!” look. I slide back into my seat.
We land in Albuquerque, rent a car, and drive to Santa Fe. En route we stop for lunch at a place so awful that I considered skipping lunch entirely. It was called Blake’s. Beware. The tables were nasty, the wait was long, and the burger was a half-cold piece of shit that McDonalds would be ashamed to serve. The rest of the ride, however, is incredibly scenic. New Mexico has gorgeous land. The phrase that comes to mind to describe it is “barren beauty.” I don’t have a die-hard love of mountains or anything, but these horizons took my breath away.
Santa Fe has a very low skyline. The hotel towers over everything else. We check in and decide to check out the town. Ok potpies, time for a side note. This time is not the first I’ve visited Santa Fe. The first time was when I was nine. However it was the Vacation from Hell. Going up, my father feels a bit sick but shrugs it off as a cold. Once we had checked into our hotel, he walked to his bathroom and spent the next two or three days alternatively throwing up or lying in bed whining like a bitch. I wandered around the lobby in endless ennui, making friends with the shop owners and eating by myself. Then the day my dad started to recover, I fell sick. Suffice to say, that vacation was a giant clusterfuck. Now though, I hope to visit the city in good health.
My father and I split up to look in the shops. Santa Fe has a few streets composed almost entirely of clothing stores and art galleries. Santa Fe has over 200 galleries but only a population of 64,000. Spotting some interesting stores that happened to be closing for the evening, (like one with a crabby German lady) I made a note to come back and bankrupt my father.
I also popped into a jewelry store. There was only one guy running it.
We had a very interesting conversation:
G: “So where are you from and what are you doing in Santa Fe?”
M: “I’m from Houston. Touring colleges-College of Santa Fe.”
G: “Don’t go there.”
M: [I am intrigued] “Why not? Now you got me curious.”
G: “I’ve lived here for years. I know it. The town’s dead after 7:00.
You’re from the city and would be bored in a week. Also, the prices are outrageous. I have a two-bedroom apartment that costs $1500 a month and it’s considered pretty cheap. Crime’s bad too. Stay away from Albuquerque especially.”
M: “Wow…thank you for that.”
G: “I’m serious. See anything you like?”
M: “What about this ring? Opal, right? Ah, it fits.”
G: “I’ll give you a good price for it. It’s $92 right now…I’ll sell it to you for $50.”
Suffice to say, I now own a pretty opal ring. Afterwards I milled around and soon hooked back up with my father. There’s a Mexican restaurant that the desk lady at the hotel recommended. We go to that and just barely get a seat. The owner really went out of his way to accommodate us sans a reservation. The food is delicious, and so are the waiters. One had anime hair, though the photo doesn’t show it too well. The other is FAR cuter in real life than in the photo. Really, he looks awful in the photo. In real life he was adorable. As a side note I never would have thought of mixing plantains and enchiladas. Somehow it works.
Back at the hotel I watch Rome (my father and I had separate rooms). It was awesome as usual. Octavian has become far more repulsive. Pullo has become far more badass. Vorenus has become far more destructively emo.
After Rome I tottered down to the bar to put back a few. Coffees that is. Nice dessert coffee that slides down the throat. At the bar, I begin chatting up the bartender, who looks to be in his late 20’s.
The final interesting conversation of the night:
BT: “So, touring College of Santa Fe I guess?”
M: “Yeah, I see it tomorrow.”
BT: “It’s a really good school. I had a friend who went there. He majored in film and got tons of exposure by the time he graduated. ”
M: “How expensive is the city?”
BT: “Very. Not as bad as some but pretty bad. You’ll need a job if you like to shop.”
M: “Crime?”
BT: “Well…stay away from drugs here. I’ve known people who got into stuff around here and died.”
M: O_O; “Well thank you, nighters!”
BT: “Is that some Texan thing?”
So endeth my first day in Santa Fe. More to come later.