My ‘Odyssey’ Odyssey, Pt. 1

It’s just after midnight, and I’m lying in a very bare hotel room exactly 355 miles away from my bed, wishing a showing of Jaws on cable will drown out the gentlemen with their camp chairs and grills on the sidewalk outside the building.

If the noise weren’t enough to keep me up, I’d have the watchful anxiety spurred by an earlier run-in with some in-room bugs (2) that I let Courtney kill (because equality) to chase the sleep away.

So, as you can tell, I’m basically Odysseus.

In reality, I'm here because of Odysseus. Tomorrow night, at 10:15 on the dot, I’ll join the pop-culture moment and finally see Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey on glorious 70mm IMAX. I got a taste for it at this same theater — the IMAX Theater at the Indiana State Museum in Indianapolis — last year when I drove all those miles to see One Battle After Another.

This time, I brought (dragged?) my favorite travel buddy with me. Don’t worry; she’ll thank me later, I’m sure of it.

I must say, minor noise complaints and insect-related battles aside, it’s been a great trip so far. An uneventful drive, despite a few too many 4-plus-dollar gas station signs and one reckless dickhead who swerved over in front of me and then proceeded to dispatch his passenger to flip me off, presumably for the grave offense of driving the speed limit behind an 18-wheeler in the right lane.

So, basically my very own Scylla and Charybdis.

The highlight, without a shadow of a doubt, was a late dinner at Tinker Street.

Y’all. Get thyselves to Indy, and grab a reservation.

Fantastic service from the second we arrived. They started our meal off with a complimentary pour of champagne.

Drinks: featured cocktail of strawberry cucumber margarita (hers) and a picante margarita (his).

Appetizer

Fried chicken breast on a hoecake, sitting in crème fraiche and jalapeño honey, topped with pickled red onion and black sturgeon caviar.

Mains

Hers: Scallops

U-10 Scallops, Sweet Corn Maque Choux, Whipped Lemon Ricotta, Basil, Chive Oil

His: Center-cut ribeye

Cajun Spiced Spaetzle, Summer Squash, Remoulade Sauce, Pink Peppercorn Ricotta, Scallions, Sweetie Drops, Chimichurri

Dessert

Banana Pudding: Sugar Cookie, Brulee Bananas, Vanilla Whipped Cream + two espressos

End result? We had to be rolled out of there, but we were so happy about it.

The gents on the sidewalk have calmed down, but now it sounds like Fast and the Furious 17 is filming outside with some legit street-racing levels of engine revving from the road. (In case you haven’t picked up on this yet, I did not spend top dollar on lodging this trip; thanks a lot, NASCAR, for driving up the cost of a room this weekend.)

OK. The shark just capsized the rowboat, ate that guy, and almost got Brody’s son. These will be the gentle sounds that lull me to sleep, god willing.