Franklinsanity

4:35 pm, somewhere outside Denver, on the way to somewhere inside Kansas.

Here’s the thing about traffic:  it’s always lame – but it’s especially lame when accompanied by an urban sprawl.  It also doesn’t help that a giant earth mover that is towing some kind of super heavy metal box as it pounds dirt flat, so it can be paved over for more highway, is moving faster than we are.

Traffic wasn’t so bad heading into a river valley on I-80 in the Rockies, for instance.  Although the dogs did not agree – they really, really wanted to attack a white-water-rafting party they could see out the window.

“Enough with the musings on traffic, jackass, how was Colorado?,” you are probably asking.

A fair question.  The night was a little rough.  Here’s the breakdown:

• Fried from an eight-ish hour drive through the Utah desert (stark, somewhat terrifying and unfortunately devoid of Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef; of course those movies were all shot in Italy), we rolled into Breckinridge looking forward to what we thought would we one of the 2 high-class parts of our trip:  the Lodge at Breckinridge.
• Instead, let’s summarize our reaction as:  impressive website, underwhelming real-world experience.  For starters, while it’s indeed atop a low mountain, facing other high mountains, it’s so new that it’s basically standing in a dirt clearing – which this time of year is pretty muddy; the rooms are tiny; and the bathrooms tinier.
• Basically, the room at the Sheraton in Salt Lake City put the Lodge to shame.
• Also, Kelly got bad altitude sickness, the dogs had cabin fever, and the kids were overtired.
• Where the Lodge wins, in fairness:  super dog friendly (they write the dogs names on a chalkboard in the lobby when you check in), a cool lobby and a very good, kid-friendly, mountainside-perching restaurant.
• Unfortunately, within minutes of sitting down, Ted had decamped to the bar to watch a Cubs game, Kelly went to go barf or lie down or both, and Quinn and I were left staring at each other, waiting for our food – meaning really that I was quietly yelling at the Empress to not spill her water for the fiftieth time.
• Food was great, however, and the service friendly.  We were all in bed by 9:30, though, even the dogs – in a room, which this time was about the size of our car.
• Up at 5:30 with altitude-and-wet-dog-induced asthma, and because I had at least 2 hours of work before a conference call worth interrupting vacay for.
• Enjoyed the lobby; drank Gatorade and coffee, finished my call, and rednezvous’d with the fam, who had pawned the dogs off on a mountain-dog-fitnes-hiker person.

More to come – really, the best part.  Stay tuned – same Bat Time, same Bat Channel.