Senior Pantalones #5 – The Best Offense is a Good Detour

Finally Chris has won the title of Senior Pantalones and evened the score at 1 among all participants. He was responsible for plotting Detour #4: Santa Fe which we all agreed was a great 3 hour break where we got to walk around and take in the culture of New Mexico. Chris also found Tortilla Flats where we ate good blue corn enchiladas for dinner. All around, he did a great job blazing our trail for the day.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief that Dr Feelgood didn’t win the title for the second time so we wouldn’t all be losing to a minivan. When asked why it’s taken him so long before the first time he was named Senior Pantalones, Chris said, “Dr. Feelgood is tough competition.” To celebrate his victory, Chris got a tattoo and like any respectable Senior Pantalones, he didn’t wince in pain once.

Score:
Brendan: 1
Chris: 1
Dr. Feelgood (Minivan): 1
Mark: 1
Matt: 1
Dan: DNP

Senior Pantalones #4 – Dr Feelgood

Leaving Memphis, Tennessee at 10am and arriving in Amarillo, Texas at midnight meant that we spent the better part of 14 hours in our trusty steed “Dr. Feelgood”. We named our minivan after a blues singer who entertained us for hours at the Blues Hall on Beale St in Memphis. In addition to being an extremely reliable chariot so far, he offers the amenable accessories of satellite radio, a DVD player and an XBOX that we hooked up the Friday night before we departed from DC. Dr Feelgood made what could have been a rough day on the road into “A day in the living room but with a phenomenal view”. We watched Live Free or Die Hard, four episodes of Always Sunny in Philadelphia, listened to the kickass 90’s Alternative Rock station on satellite radio and a few episodes of This American Life (thanks Keith!), and played Halo on XBOX.

Miles Traveled as of Tuesday: 1700

Score:
Brendan: 1
Mark: 1
Matt: 1
Dr Feelgood: 1
Chris: 0
Dan: DNP

Senior Pantalones #3 - Where Friends Come to Meat

Through his diligent planning efforts Matt has captured the title of Senior Pantalones for Day 3. He complied a list of all of the restaurants featured on Food Network’s Diners Drive Ins and Dives that they could possibly hit our trip so we would know the best local places to eat. The planning efforts paid off when we ate at Tom’s BBQ in Memphis where the food was damn tasty. Later that evening Matt teamed up with Mark to win a “Contest of Strength” over Brendan and Chris.

Matt would like to thank his family, his hunger and Jesus for this great victory.

Score:
Brendan:1
Mark: 1
Matt: 1
Chris: 0
Dan: DNP

Senior Pantalones # 2 - We're conquering the south like General Sherman

So far we've had clear winners for Senior Pantalones. Mark won the title for Day 2 of our trip for suggesting that we take a detour along our course to visit the Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg, TN and taking on a long stretch of road. His driving shift took us through 3 states because we had to go through Mississippi and Alabama to get back into Tennessee after our detour. Lynchburg is so far south in Tennessee that it was faster to dip back south and than head directly west.

Mark complimented his actions with a collection of priceless quotes.

Mark, after a long night out in Nashville:
"We're conquering the south like General Sherman".

Matt: Where should we go to hang out on Beale St after dinner?
Waitress at Blues City Cafe: There is a cool Irish bar called Silk O'Sullivans. They have a large outdoor area and there are goats in the bar.
Mark: They have Ghosts in the bar????

Tour Guide at Jack Daniels Distillery: Now I'm going to lock us in the barrel house.
Mark: Why is she going to lock us in here?

Congratulations Mark.

Score:
Brendan: 1
Mark: 1
Chris: 0
Matt: 0
Dan: DNP

Next stop: Graceland

Senior Pantalones #1 – Have You Met Us?

On a day where everyone drove and everyone shared the decision making, it looked like the collective awesomeness of the group would make it hard to single out Senior Pantalones. We pulled into Nashville around 7pm with a clean van having driven through rain for most of the day and went to hunt down some food. Our dinner of sub-par pork BBQ sandwiches at Rippy's, Yazoo Nashville microbrew beer and live country music was capped by writing Brendan’s cell phone number on the check for our waitress while he was in the bathroom.

Throughout the night while we enjoyed country music and drinks, Brendan keeps exchanging text messages with a mysterious person. Using his insider information, he is able to deftly navigate us to cool bars like a Nashville local. Sunday morning when we woke up and rubbed the crust from our eyes, we asked Brendan who told him about the bars we went to. He said he was getting tips from a random Nashville number that kept texting him. Clearly Brendan left an impression on our waitress when he suavely ordered “A pulled pork sandwich with french fries”.

Congratulations Brendan on your lead off Senior Pantalones victory!

Score
Brendan: 1
Chris: 0
Mark: 0
Matt: 0
Dan: DNP

Senior Pantalones: A Daily Quest for Awesome

Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em was a dominant album in 1990 topping the music charts for 21 weeks straight. The nation was wrapped in MC Hammer's rhymes as he danced his way into our hearts with his flashy trash bag pants. For nearly half a year, Hammer was "Mr Pants".

While it's unlikely that any hip hop albums will be released by the crew in our van during the course of the trip, that's not to say that great things still won't be going down. A winner will be announced each day in our Daily Quest for Awesome as one of us gets to wear the 24 hour title of "Senior Pantalones". The honor can be won for any significant accomplishment such as eating the most food at dinner, driving the longest stretch of road of the day, successfully pitching a tent, buying the most rounds of drinks or being the most accurate on the shooting range.



The privileges that come with being dubbed Senior Pantalones are many and include everything from deciding which Arby's we stop at for lunch while driving, having first choice of who he wants to share queen bed with, to deciding where he goes in the line up of hung over morning showers. Similar to how they help individual achievement stand out in the Tour de France, our Senior Pantalones will have to carry around The Trophy of Glory, a 8 inch marvel of marble and plastic topped with a gold-painted hot rod. You can't get a beautiful trophy like this anywhere, no way. You have to go Goodwill to buy them.

The person who has accumulated the title of Senior Pantalones the most over the course of our trip will take home The Trophy of Glory as our Champion. Keep checking in to see is leading the Senior Pantalones and by all means, please gamble on this competition.