tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8502872024-02-28T13:02:12.868-06:00the static quoI feel more like I do now than when I got here.fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.comBlogger551125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-12990933512834477592022-05-20T13:17:00.001-05:002022-05-20T13:19:14.626-05:00Operation Lily Get - Cardinal<p style="text-align: right;"><i>Written live, posted much later. So yeah, it's not Wednesday right now.</i></p><p>I think today might be Wednesday. I did not sleep well last night, thus firing on a few cylinders short of a Prius with bad batteries. The drop down bed was comfortable, the temperature was not too hot or too cold. Pillow was just right. None of that helped. I don't remember this from last time, but I felt like I was about to roll out of bed and fall six feet to the floor. There is a strap/webbing system in place to prevent that, but confidence in safety measures doesn't make you feel less apprehensive. Also, how many people end up hanging upside down and sideways from their bed because they rolled out and got caught by the safety straps?</p><p>Once I got to sleep I kept waking up. I would get right back to sleep, but that doesn't help. Although I would look at the clock and think "oh good, I have two hours to sleep yet!" I do remember hearing the kid in the roomette depart at Indianapolis in the middle of the night. So an interrupted sleep, to be sure.</p><p>Also, I snore. Or I used to. Or sometimes still do, ask my wife. When I was in boot camp, other recruits commented on my snoring - from the other end of the squad bay. When we went to the field, I would be constantly woken up by the fire watch. Everyone takes turns as fire watch making sure no fires happen or we don't get attacked. But in the field the additional task of keeping the unit from alerting the enemy - thus waking up anyone who is snoring. The theory is that they'd go back to sleep and not snore. Not so much for me. And finally, in language school I had neighbors who commented on my snoring - and the walls were thick cinder block impenetrable walls. So yeah, I snore.</p><p>But now I have a CPAP, which is a machine where you wear a mask and it creates just the right pressure while you breath so the flappy bits of your throat don't do their flappy snoring noise. It's quite effective, and I can't sleep well at all without one. Which means I get to pack it when I travel. As long as we're going way off the rails on the story.. I actually have an older machine I use for travel. It's a bit smaller, light, uncomplicated. And now the mask seal is broken. No problem, I'll swap out a new one. Nope. I have fifteen extra masks for both machines but none would solve the problem. So I packed my "good" daily machine. Turns out that was good, as the power cord is massively long, much longer than the "travel" machine. This came into play when I decided where to plug it in. Rather, which of the two power outlets in the corner by the mirror do I want to use? Of course it's diagonally opposite of the location of my head when I sleep on the train. Thus the long cord. The other problem is that there are no shelves up there. There's a little pleather bag you can put your glasses and phone in, but it's no bigger than a shoe. So where to set up the machine? It's about the size of a small tackle box, so I turned it into my snuggle bunny. Right next to me in the very narrow (but long enough for a tall person!) bed. So trying to avoid sleeping on it and overheating it or something made the whole rolling thing even worse.</p><p>All in all it worked out logistically, I just didn't sleep well. There was a time change in there somewhere, so I lost an hour too.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhvX_HBKl-i1M6Bg97e4na6gfeqyQWRKRi4pW_TBVSjdBgrYsLXCOgTikDg-aXkjheiWql3BLbcMf7cqDGXCfHriJr3vCHp0IXJq49g8UXfgfEq_Yy2LxV4cnQ7aXF8Ff59tjLUaxgrFhWK6xpeNQ9OcY--92JzoXAK83jidXy_aKQNyDhpbA" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhvX_HBKl-i1M6Bg97e4na6gfeqyQWRKRi4pW_TBVSjdBgrYsLXCOgTikDg-aXkjheiWql3BLbcMf7cqDGXCfHriJr3vCHp0IXJq49g8UXfgfEq_Yy2LxV4cnQ7aXF8Ff59tjLUaxgrFhWK6xpeNQ9OcY--92JzoXAK83jidXy_aKQNyDhpbA=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Random: Amtrak "personal tissue product" is thin enough to read fine print through it.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><p></p><p>Breakfast was coming at eight, so I had an alarm set early enough that I'd be up and dressed and ready to talk to a stranger. As usual, I woke up before it, but not long enough to get back to sleep. So I looked out the window. It was a bit gray, and very flat. Not flat like Iowa, where it's fields and you can see for miles and miles. This was an insinuated flat. There were trees on the horizon, farms and roads, but something about it all made sure you knew you were in Indiana.</p><p>Breakfast came and there I was, appearing chipper and happy to speak to a stranger. Standard breakfast sandwich and coffee, etc. No peaches, but they would have been cut horizontally. As I used one creamer and had one left over, I noticed it said "made with real cows milk." I'm not going to go down the road of wondering what other animals produce milk, etc. (Yeah, I get it, goats. But you know what I mean.) And it made me think about the percentage of animal product that gets thrown away. I'm guessing it's not a low percentage.</p><p>We finally started to see hills. Growing to be mountains before long. I got to see a town or two, including a road that went 45 degrees up one of the taller hills. And when I say 45 degrees I'm guessing, but I'm guessing low. It was like a cartoon. I can't imagine getting up or down that in anything but the toughest of vehicles. Heck, coming down would be an exercise in control of chaos. You brake, you slide. I thought about that for a while. And now I want to drive up that road -- on my scooter.</p><p>The scenery got more and more spectacular. The only hitch was the fact that I wasn't on that side of the train. I had a view of the scenery from about 50 feet, and it was either greenery rushing by.. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dwjwiG8nj0QJDLPNObu2jjUygPgiZflfbpKh4ZaunbXbifhcisEel-WPAUnMpRzD2iatFWvJrId3g' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><p>or rock outcroppings rushing by..</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxu4PCLW-rRyg6W4bJO0mkg6JtAaQqFAlO2BlBa4cl8VPmgpywaUNJE1eXCCCt5V2o5_095JQlIjA' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><p>Or a combination of greenery and rock outcroppings rushing by. I tried to make the best of it and there were a fair amount of interesting things to see. There's a particular plant they have that I'd like to look up because it's funny looking. There are railroad ties piled at regular intervals. Sometimes we'd cross a road. One of the things I wanted to see on this trip was the New River Gorge Bridge. It's billed as one of the highlights on this route. And I've played a video game in which you're in a post-nuclear Appalachia and that bridge is in the game. So I'm sure I killed more than a few zombies on and from that bridge. But today I was looking at railside shrubbery. So I went to the vestibule between cars, where there is a prominent and very clear sign saying "no standing in the vestibule" but I did anyway, because I'm a bad-ass. (Unless someone had come along, in which case I would have been out of there like lightning!)</p><p>I did get to see the bridge from the correct side of the train, but it was just a bridge way up high. Now I have to crack that video game open and compare the two...</p><p>Eventually we got to a bridge over the river and the tables were turned. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dzspCD-fIfTKGpUAqU07c1_9RAR__Q-ZLEULdEtQKsnKLndA4EGlKP4cYg47TO4UrXKbkyW7z9mlQ' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><p>The couple across the way who had the great view so far and squandered it doing crosswords were now looking at a wall of green or rock. I could see the river, trees, hills, birds, everything! We love watching raptors at home, and I'm well versed in Bald Eagles and even Golden Eagles, but a little less confident on hawks and such. But they had very large brown eagle like/hawk like creatures that I just couldn't identify. They even flew in groups! Will have to look that up for sure.</p><p>I got some video, mostly of things rushing by. Photos from a moving train through a double pane window with the sun shining are another matter completely. I went for the volume method and hope there are some decent shots in there. The very best way to see something interesting is to put the camera away. And as soon as you take it out, you're going to go into a tunnel. Many of the more interesting homesteads are isolated, so you don't know they're coming until you see them. As I was typing this, we suddenly came upon a town that had some pretty crazy homes and storefronts, but just getting the camera turned on made me miss it. At least I saw it, I guess. Though I am likely to forget it within 15 minutes.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiIS-UwCgpb2gqFrtmH8qJUbTVewbBvJMPW4TLW7_V3eGFg7TVg0IBw_Q-T_Ov7YqIKFE1EjfRybE2uUDfcoQ3SEIkLk8pilgVlRQZ6wEgzrAqbJKEGmppXkMl9MDxL7g2k-6ZgoYJOS4OmTkkKC6PynKnxbM4ckDe2edgvAeEmbL5sDoOkag" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiIS-UwCgpb2gqFrtmH8qJUbTVewbBvJMPW4TLW7_V3eGFg7TVg0IBw_Q-T_Ov7YqIKFE1EjfRybE2uUDfcoQ3SEIkLk8pilgVlRQZ6wEgzrAqbJKEGmppXkMl9MDxL7g2k-6ZgoYJOS4OmTkkKC6PynKnxbM4ckDe2edgvAeEmbL5sDoOkag=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>When the river was at it's most exciting, and the hills were nicely pronounced, it seemed like it turned into vacationland. So many campgrounds and places were people had parked their RVs semi-permanently, and on the maps I was seeing summer camp after summer camp slide by. One store that looked at first glance to be a farmer's supply shop turned out to be an "Outfitter" that catered to those just passing through. And so many restaurants and coffee shops.</p><p>As time passed, we got out of the busier areas where towns have a dozen or more streets, and moved into what my father used to call the "Wild and the Wooly." I never really understood what that meant, but it does capture the situation quite well. Forests, gravel roads, few towns or houses, etc. Remote. I would see gravel roads that I couldn't imagine two cars passing on. They also didn't do bridges for those roads. When it came to a brook or creek, the road just went right through it and if the water was too high or you didn't have a vehicle that could splash through, you were out of luck.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Homes</h3><p>There was a good variety of homes and home types. Some were really large and fancy with the driveway that loops past the front door. Others were simple, neat farmhouses. </p><p></p><p>And there were trailer homes. I think I may have more respect for them now. I thought of them as trashy and dilapidated. Unkempt and harboring at least one vehicle with no wheels up on blocks. But down here where winter wasn't created to kill you and tornadoes don't hang out in river valleys, a trailer home seems fairly efficient. I would see great collections of them, neat and pretty with a nice modern car parked in a proper driveway. Sometimes they would be a bit weather stained, but they still looked like they were kept up fairly well. This is not to say there weren't some solid cliché makers. Imagine the worst, and there you have it. It did make me think though - what do people from down south look for up in the northern states? We associate large drunk people in lawn chairs in front of crappy trailer homes with the cartoon version of the south. But what do they think of us northerners? I'm guessing they're looking for the flap hatted buffalo check shirt wearing "dontcha know" fellow ice fishing - maybe even in summer, somehow.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiEnnsUo1EF0Vnys-XHUlJU7DBL7pmOVnv_TUA01v60R1YjIu4zxPgVDVXflC104rjSaSuam9IqWReHNuovl7GrrvUmudE4HH-H8Ds1I4ObQ4VqXOKfBCiu8X-9OJwGmZvHmsdcnnNSZHsQeL02OLlEV0-pf5KbyEmde0FQDc7cAq0JC6uWpw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="902" data-original-width="1920" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiEnnsUo1EF0Vnys-XHUlJU7DBL7pmOVnv_TUA01v60R1YjIu4zxPgVDVXflC104rjSaSuam9IqWReHNuovl7GrrvUmudE4HH-H8Ds1I4ObQ4VqXOKfBCiu8X-9OJwGmZvHmsdcnnNSZHsQeL02OLlEV0-pf5KbyEmde0FQDc7cAq0JC6uWpw=w400-h188" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p>Is there a special kind of grass they have down here that never grows long? Or is everyone just that conscientious about mowing their entire property lawns short?</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjFWoue9wPdglsXt37TDNN75L3p5NGFYznrnsquLvImJEi1O5wmXfNr3FgvBTzEF9RwGRmoH8Q_MwPRFt-1Vvbsw14CH2n2nRalMlQR3J0riwCHxiNCnCR_fR2YxN3PCnup2MGJO1ftbIn7IYgj-bD7qAup0BGuxiLBHffVNlmTV3X1MLesEg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjFWoue9wPdglsXt37TDNN75L3p5NGFYznrnsquLvImJEi1O5wmXfNr3FgvBTzEF9RwGRmoH8Q_MwPRFt-1Vvbsw14CH2n2nRalMlQR3J0riwCHxiNCnCR_fR2YxN3PCnup2MGJO1ftbIn7IYgj-bD7qAup0BGuxiLBHffVNlmTV3X1MLesEg=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>I saw more than a few tent encampments that looked like a collection of things over many years. Granted, they don't have the worst winters, but it's still heartbreaking to think people are calling tents their homes.</p><p>I have to take a break, as this land ship has found a storm at sea.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxPI2PFI5w49CvNxn1gMY5Hx2YK52ksd6scrS8LnyA95Tgr3PkAySReB0hZD78b3Lqa9esDcM__EA' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Towns</h3><p>Passing through the towns on a rail route is fascinating. The bigger cities are pretty much what you'd expect. Warehouses and other industrial facilities right by the tracks and train yards. Sometimes you're behind a strip mall, and other times you may even be near residential neighborhoods. While you may assume those neighborhoods aren't going to be the best because there is a train in their backyard, there are plenty of times where the houses look very nice, almost expensive. I think it's related to the concept of "location, location, location" in that some cities are crowded enough that if you want something nice, but affordable, you may have to hear trains 24x7. It's a tradeoff.</p><p>Of course, there's also the rusty underbelly of America living next to tracks. The house with the barrels in the backyard. Trailer homes. Abandoned buildings. Those are fun to look at and see the graffiti, try and imagine how to get into them, and wonder how many people live and/or do drugs in there. </p><p>Tangent: I have three standing offers to my kids on road trips. Of course, now that they're older and we don't do as many (any?) family trips like that anymore, I don't think I'm going to have to pay out. The first offer is for a moose. As someone from a state that has a moose or two in it, I've always wanted to see one. (I also feel I should see an actual tornado at some point but that's a bit more dangerous.) So the offer is that if someone sees a moose, alerts me to it, and I get to see the moose, I will give them one hundred dollars. Pretty confident it was going to happen. And it hasn't so far. I think at one point I had the requirement that not only did I have to be able to see it, but I might have needed to take a picture of it. Negotiable if it happens. The second offer is ridiculous. I love Capybaras, they fascinate me and they're kinda cool looking. Also, they're the only land bases mammal that goes *to* water when in danger. So the offer was similar to the moose with a few specific points. They see it, alert me to it, I see it, I think I did require a picture on this one, and.. it has to be a wild Capybara. Not in a zoo or cage or on a farm or something. Since they're native to South America and wouldn't survive our winters, it's a pretty tall order. But when (optimism) it happens, the reward is a stunning one thousand dollars! Since it'll never happen. The third offer comes from going to and from family land along a highway with a railroad parallel to it. I had seen a "Thumbs Up" (David Choe series about hobo travel in the modern age) episode in which he and his cousin hopped trains from Tijuana to Canada. They carried a toy drum set and played in amusing situations. You can find it on Youtube, used to be on Netflix I think. Fascinating to watch them infiltrate train yards, get on trains, ride under the end of hopper cars and so on. It occurred to me I'd never seen a hobo, or anyone riding the rails like that. So another one hundred dollar bounty for calling out someone illegally riding a train. Honestly that was the one reward I had some hope of paying. Never happened.</p><p>So I was watching for hobos in the train yards, no luck.</p><p>As we got deeper in the hills, the towns changed a bit. I'm used to driving through the Midwest. If you happen to actually go through a small town (and not be routed past it by an interstate) you generally end up going down the main street. It always feels a bit sad to cover the two blocks of "downtown" and see all of the old storefronts. You can imagine the different shops back in the day, and how this was the heart of it all. This is where people came to shop, to socialize, to be among other people and not just their family or farmhands on the farm.</p><p>Now they're either abandoned storefronts, turned into residences somehow, or holding strange and unique boutiques or touristy shops. And of course at least one obligatory bar. It's not just that the towns have changed, but it's such a stark highlight of how much the towns have become less the center of the world. Now if the remaining few residents need clothes, food, or anything else, they drive for 20 miles and end up in the regional "bigger" town with a Walmart or other big box store. I understand why and all that, but it's still a bit sad. It's one of the few times I yearn for the past when "life was simpler" or some noise like that. </p><p>It's different in the hills or mountains. And even on the East Coast to some extent. In a little remote Appalachian town, there are no straight roads that can get you to a big box store in less than half an hour. They have trouble expanding the footprint of the town because of the geography, and as a result some of that "old" business remains in their downtowns. They're a bit less abandoned feeling, and while they have their fair share of the changing society we live in, it seemed refreshing to me to see those buildings, some of which are quite old and beautiful, used well and productively. It's not to say there aren't towns that have become tourist zones. The storefronts now contain businesses like expensive coffee shops, antique stores, fancy restaurants, and anything else a visitor might want to spend their time and money.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjnDk49QtB2UpF8oKP6f4jK1eAMxFpVoOK8iGB9GoUT2wg0EAeO7ACUCuZLQXe8Eot8UaK1CGAa5UE-CAHJb5HKgEId1tczw2kTlIIy52L0JcRsTYxFzGaWYCuJ-QZIgbcAkaXR8s42kqMZsmAQ8943X3DubLw_yPkkZSvF3dSjoDafSYPBlQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjnDk49QtB2UpF8oKP6f4jK1eAMxFpVoOK8iGB9GoUT2wg0EAeO7ACUCuZLQXe8Eot8UaK1CGAa5UE-CAHJb5HKgEId1tczw2kTlIIy52L0JcRsTYxFzGaWYCuJ-QZIgbcAkaXR8s42kqMZsmAQ8943X3DubLw_yPkkZSvF3dSjoDafSYPBlQ=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>You'll occasionally see a chain business mixed in, but it's not common. It's jarring to see unique local businesses with a Panera mixed in. Or worse, a McDonalds or a Dollar General store. Of course all of this is based on my extensive research and experience in these towns. Spending time looking up information and visiting historical societies to get a full understanding of the changes in society. Oh wait, no, it's all based on a dozen or so hours looking out a window at towns by train tracks. So yes, I do understand my own limitations and the fact that I'm making more assumptions than a person judging soccer moms at a suburban mall. See refund policy previously stated.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEibHIwbUJWISOrxxXOpkK9yhJbWdqUNvJXbAcbPuFQ_-JLlKBeNTu0qMe3QyE5mYsuy_hVLI5xMgDnQ4kT6mL1oTeabJJ1zZDCrJJJrjO3_as82501YgSWl_v4w6EszLDD5lbpakRB5AhSEN2qZeJBzA73H4mstGJazr9VPUpj8tIiVkAAQHg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEibHIwbUJWISOrxxXOpkK9yhJbWdqUNvJXbAcbPuFQ_-JLlKBeNTu0qMe3QyE5mYsuy_hVLI5xMgDnQ4kT6mL1oTeabJJ1zZDCrJJJrjO3_as82501YgSWl_v4w6EszLDD5lbpakRB5AhSEN2qZeJBzA73H4mstGJazr9VPUpj8tIiVkAAQHg=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Coal card and McDonalds. Contrast.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><p></p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i></i></span></p><blockquote style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>How many undiscovered buried bodies in shallow graves by train tracks have I passed on this trip?</i></span></blockquote><p></p></blockquote></blockquote><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;">Lunch was pasta and meatballs. I ordered a Coke but got an Orange Juice. That was fine, I'm sure I could use the vitamins instead of the equivalent of 12 sugar cubes and snorting a line of caffeine that you get in a cola. Also, I just saw it as further proof I was on a land ship, and that this was one ocean voyage where scurvy was not going to be a problem. I got a brownie but saved it for later, though it's still in my backpack and likely will be until it's a ball of crumbs in its plastic wrapper.</p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiYykbk4VH9MPSL7FkbP6f95knV_HeM6C6Vtaj-CTThTMjOVeJCYOXaSah-_vNoPJ65l6gwaWHcplBc2e5aG3slBgZP5jPInAWEByguP7AffUyJ2GNJANkUCpr1Tw1IwJUC7QUtz-gAOLgdMcZBXwDtqYRJrQ_tDnkeLm2kEn8KwQqh3TPtEg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="677" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiYykbk4VH9MPSL7FkbP6f95knV_HeM6C6Vtaj-CTThTMjOVeJCYOXaSah-_vNoPJ65l6gwaWHcplBc2e5aG3slBgZP5jPInAWEByguP7AffUyJ2GNJANkUCpr1Tw1IwJUC7QUtz-gAOLgdMcZBXwDtqYRJrQ_tDnkeLm2kEn8KwQqh3TPtEg=w300-h400" width="300" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>One of the desserts they offered was something called a buttercake. The attendant in my car talked me into trying one and I'm glad she did. Even if it's just to know not to eat one again. It was very delicious, I will admit. But it lived up to it's name. Each bite was like biting into a stick of butter dipped in powdered sugar. In the middle was a pudding or custard like substance that was more of a liquid form of the cake portion, only sweeter. Somehow. I could only take two bites at a time before putting it away for later, as I could feel my arteries snapping shut with each swallow. It was absolutely the sweetest and densest and richest thing I've ever eaten. Ever. I'll never have one again, but you should. </p><p>Eating helped the exhaustion a bit, even if there was no caffeine.</p><p>I think we were a bit behind schedule at that point, as during lunch the train sped up quite a bit. It was only 60 miles per hour sometimes more, but it made managing a meal on a tony table a challenge. And as we got faster, the gently swaying turned into more of a tossing and turning with the occasional scary jolt mixed in like we were being punished for something. I just kept reminding myself of how few train wrecks we hear about. We would pass through a tunnel (so dark!) or a train going in the other direction and it would be surprising, but over very quickly.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjv3_7dKqsqLNRgd6pjPETMaMZO9RFAxBl-11x0X1oMVtIyGbVH9Rag7ifVNl7iOIGOWFpmX80oxY9MyMOBbr5a6eKnGOFqSCqFE_TkOEGqb2TWkatUq4UMIQfmARq6YpsfT9B0K5jO5pmq1Xmg7xcLgO5QriMuCELeoq63B4GM14HaWHVnNQ" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjv3_7dKqsqLNRgd6pjPETMaMZO9RFAxBl-11x0X1oMVtIyGbVH9Rag7ifVNl7iOIGOWFpmX80oxY9MyMOBbr5a6eKnGOFqSCqFE_TkOEGqb2TWkatUq4UMIQfmARq6YpsfT9B0K5jO5pmq1Xmg7xcLgO5QriMuCELeoq63B4GM14HaWHVnNQ=w400-h300" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The tank car people!</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><p></p><p>As the mountains faded and we rolled through the foothills, the scenery felt somewhat repetitive, so I took to writing. Again, being on a train makes my fingers itch for a keyboard. I would look out and see farms, or white fences containing horses or cows. It was all very pretty but again, not too unique.</p><p>I was watching our arrival estimate and texting my daughter to coordinating a ride from the station. Things were looking good, maybe even a bit ahead of schedule. I was getting very ready to get off the train. We were due late enough I had dinner on the train. That's the third meal in a day. Too many meals, too much food. But it was a glazed salmon with rice and stir fried vegetables. It was all good. There was even baby corn!</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi1-64nMOR6XpqZBGT1k6CSFwjhEeMs3qiYu2MYsIMssMo5p5LXAXAPV0LfECdYyaLzNujtOzNcm8AjR2HZphTsJAz0VzEjMLs147PO_G63W-CkQCAFX0_Rn7KUPp1Kj_PFcwvHkfqJjV2gnNzxQvva5M9pn_X-sNUGtab3TGygM-KdlBQZFw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="677" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi1-64nMOR6XpqZBGT1k6CSFwjhEeMs3qiYu2MYsIMssMo5p5LXAXAPV0LfECdYyaLzNujtOzNcm8AjR2HZphTsJAz0VzEjMLs147PO_G63W-CkQCAFX0_Rn7KUPp1Kj_PFcwvHkfqJjV2gnNzxQvva5M9pn_X-sNUGtab3TGygM-KdlBQZFw=w300-h400" width="300" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>As I'm feeling more and more like this trip is coming to an end, the train stopped. Trains stop often for other trains or waiting for clear tracks or whatever. But the moment we stopped this time it felt much, much more.. stopped. Soon an announcement was coming on that said we had a bit of a delay and they'll update us with more info. The conductor sounded tired and maybe frustrated. And so there we sat. After 20 minutes of wondering, the announcement came on that there was only one track, and we had to wait for two other trains to come down and pass us on the wait to the maintenance yard. And they were running a bit late. Also, we were told that once we started up again, we would be speed limited to 25 mph due to construction on the tracks. Which was also likely the reason for the single track. We were not given a time estimate, but with every announcement the conductor sounded sadder and sadder. Apologetic, even. His sincerity made me feel like this was the first time it had happened, and it was going to be a long time before it was over. Not sure if that made me feel any better. </p><p>There is a certain kind of stress you feel when you're stopped on a journey and need to make a connection at the other end. You begin to worry, and think about what you can do when you miss that connection. But when you're near the end of the trip like I was, the stress was so much less. But now I started to worry we would get in late enough that I would disturb my brother and his family when we got there. And that my daughter was sitting in her car waiting for me and we were already an hour and a half late.</p><div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Why aren't there more country songs about waiting on a train?</i></span></div><p>We finally started moving, albeit slowly. And at some point we passed the construction and began to speed up. We were finally on the home stretch. Or so I thought.</p><p>I feel like this is where a commercial or ad should be spliced in. "Hey readers, are you frustrated not being able to find a good ambulatory surgical center for people with O positive blood types and an allergy to parakeets? Check out Dave and Max's ambulatory surgical center at... blah blah blah"</p><p>Since we were now on busy east coast tracks, they were built for speed. I hadn't seen our speed go over 79 the whole trip, but I was curious so I decided to check again. I had to reset my GPS app twice in order to fix what was clearly an error until my daughter texted me and told me that yes, we were indeed going well over a hundred miles an hour according to the Amtrak status update site. Crazy! And butter(cake)y smooth, too. It didn't feel like 50 much less twice that. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjp78KD8H-mJxAUsJJQ1VcYfDX4CctR2EuLNbUdJ0CXoIWRFA-lHNQuDL5qP7eKmWqVGwgYvf3ZiAOdp3si5Qzd2k4p-INJ7aEUt8aahl2sd_ysBlToDLW_UWHv1RcvznnqkxBoV_-wSsqkDbx35C1p6PXngf_ue1ZWCJwca8M65OewAZAUAw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="406" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjp78KD8H-mJxAUsJJQ1VcYfDX4CctR2EuLNbUdJ0CXoIWRFA-lHNQuDL5qP7eKmWqVGwgYvf3ZiAOdp3si5Qzd2k4p-INJ7aEUt8aahl2sd_ysBlToDLW_UWHv1RcvznnqkxBoV_-wSsqkDbx35C1p6PXngf_ue1ZWCJwca8M65OewAZAUAw" width="108" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>As soon as I became comfortable with the speed and how quickly it was closing the gap on the map between me and my daughter, we got another announcement. I was going to Baltimore, but first we had to pass through DC. The announcement was that when we did stop in DC we would be swapping out engines and crew. This would take at least 20 minutes, and the power would go off on the train during the process. We were allowed to get out and get some fresh air, however. So there I was, standing in the thankfully cool night air, already an hour past our original arrival time, watching the Amish walk their kids up and down the platform. Likely trying to tire them out a bit to keep them from getting stir crazy. Again, they seem to have a good amount of wisdom. I did see one father with a cell phone, which was surprising. But it was one of those 1990's candy bar shaped phones that I was surprised still worked. I guess though if you live in a society that shuns modern technology, one of those phones would be just as acceptable as a horse and buggy, or milking cows by hand every morning.</p><p>I also noticed that I hadn't been off the train in many hours, and I had some serious sea legs. You could feel the world moving beneath your feet gently, sometimes a big wave would come and you'd lean on something to support you. I love that feeling. Some of it may have been the absolute exhaustion I was feeling. Sleeping on a train is neat and all, but between that, sitting in one place for too long, and eating so much, I could have begun hallucinating small animals and it would not have shocked me. And all of this so very close to the end of the trip! I went back onboard before the boarding call, but was happy to see that while the "power" was off, our power really wasn't, and the air conditioning still worked. So I sat in a strange kind of silence waiting for the engine to start again. In the trains vs planes argument, I was not moving due to a delay, but unlike an airplane, I was still comfortable. I hate it when you're waiting for a gate or something and they stop the plane, but also turn off the air. So your claustrophobia can cook at a temperature that makes everything start to squeeze in on you. But here I was lounging on the train with comfortable air blowing and more room to stretch my legs than I ever could need.</p><p>I finally arrived, my daughter picked me up and we were thrilled to see each other. We headed out to the suburbs for my brother's house, but she did take a short detour through the heart of Baltimore to show me a church that was the original building/location of her college. Full of facts and interesting information, it was a welcome detour. I don't know what impressed me more, the nerding out on a piece of history, or her flawless ability to hold an animated conversation driving through crazy narrow downtown streets with fast cars passing and people on electric scooters going the wrong way through traffic - between lanes of cars. Chaotic, but she drove it like a grizzled taxi driver in New York City.</p><p>We did not disturb my brother and his wife, they were still up waiting to welcome us. My brother had to work early so he headed off to bed fairly soon, but my sister-in-law stayed up and chatted with us for a good amount of time. Exhausted but buzzed from the trip, it was the perfect way to relax and cool down before trying to sleep.</p><p>And did I <b><i>sleep</i></b>.</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-52908077792067900782022-05-17T20:57:00.002-05:002022-05-17T20:57:40.038-05:00 Operation Lily Get - Empire Builder to Chicago<p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Wife took me to the Union Depot at 7am after a particularly not refreshing few hours of sleep. It was really nice seeing her though even if for just a short while.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I had been monitoring the train online and it appeared to be coming in on time. With only a 2 hour connection window in Chicago, I was very worried about timing. Half an hour late is fine, but those delays that last 3 or more hours -- that would be tough. We boarded easily, and I found an upstairs seat in coach, on the left side. I figured this would allow me a view of the river as we followed it south, and maybe some Wisconsin Dells action.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>As we rolled out of downtown, I noticed "Korn" carved into the cliffs under mound park. A band from the 90's and on. Aren't they old enough they should be doing the casino circuit as "Korn, with the original bassist"? The train yards in that area were where we used to go trainspotting with Dad. I never really understood the draw until I got older, but I suppose that's how it is.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Just a bit further on, passing the area where Phelan creek leads to the Mississippi and the island across the way where Kaposia (look it up, it's interesting!) was located, I thought about the history of the city, river, state, and everything else. You get a different perspective from a train. Sometimes right on the river, other times next to a road. But my favorite bits are the lost little pieces of land right by the tracks. The train feels like it's on old forgotten trails and roads. And honestly, the rail right of way has been there since the early days of the state and territories, so technically much of the land by the tracks is (somewhat) untouched since those days.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>When we passed through Red Wing I saw <a href="https://www.redwingartwalk.com/legacy/tipi-at-bay-point-park" target="_blank">the giant teepee frame sculpture</a>. I had seen it from the river when I was making the 80 mile trek from the cities down to Lake Pepin in my tiny-ass boat. At that time I felt like I was cruising in the biggest yacht on the river. Passing the sculpture on the train and looking up that wide monster of a river, I was a little amazed I had done that. Successfully. The perspective from land and the perspective from water are so completely different.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I watched eagles and cranes and sand hill cranes and all sorts of wildlife on the river, especially Lake Pepin. And floating branches, of course.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>When it comes to river navigation there are two types of floating markers. The red ones are triangular and are called nuns. The companion green ones are called cans and are square, or look like a can. Red on the right, green on the left. (Red river right return) My extensive (not) Internet searches using the sketchy train wifi did not clarify if the cans are removed in the winter. I sort of remember they're not. At the very least they're there every day and every night. They are beaten and battered by the river, as well as any flotsam that happens to run into it. That might be a branch, a whole tree, or a stupid boater. I think of the countless gallons of water that has passed them by, but also the storms and weather, the winter cold and ice at the edge of the open water season. They're just out there. Cold metal in a cold river, sitting patiently waiting to help guide the next tow/barge combo.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>We also passed countless backyards. Some of them in the cities are neat and look inviting. Some others look like they're collecting different types of rust and the vehicles that can contain it. Some of them are just bizarre. Who has barrels upon barrels in their backyard. What are they doing with that? Besides the backyards are many businesses - factories and such. You'd occasionally see one or two people sitting at the "smoking" picnic table out back, watching the train go by. You'd see cars waiting at crossings and bikers who have stopped to look at or even take a picture of the train. How many times have I seen a plane or train or boat and wished I was on it? This time I was!</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>My spot in coach was okay. Two older ladies behind me chatting and laughing the whole way - not as bothersome as you would think. A couple in front of me mostly sleeping and cuddling. More Amish in groups of half a dozen, usually just a single family with a farmhouse full of kids. Sitting three rows back and one across is a young lady who needs to maybe take a phone free vacation. It's not actually that annoying, but it's just amazing how many calls she can make and chat with people. She sounds exactly like the "Sweet Birthday Baybeeee!" character from Russian Doll.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/N5XCnq-SOOo" width="320" youtube-src-id="N5XCnq-SOOo"></iframe></div><br /><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>For all of my planning, I have everything organized and efficient. But no wall wart. You know, the thing you plug into the wall and it looks like a wart - and you plug a USB cable into it to charge your phone? I do have a power extender that has USB ports on it as well, but that's a bit bulky. There are certainly worse things to forget.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Passing through Wisconsin Dells was amusing as usual (ghost boat!) but that might have been the highlight of the state of Wisconsin. Sure, it's pretty this time of year, but not really that diverse. Trees, fields, green, towns, etc. Milwaukee not as bad as I thought it would be, especially near the train tracks? I think I may have seen a nice suburb for the most of that experience. Lots of chain businesses.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I saw my first Amish at a fresh air stop. The wise passengers get out there and walk and stretch legs. And these Amish folks appeared wise. I've always been mesmerized by the old school lifestyle, though I get a little confused about how strict they are. My old phrase was "how Amish can you be shopping in a K-Mart" but I realize they need to buy necessities that they can't make or grow themselves. Everyone under the age of married had on the same black sneakers. This was common across pretty much all of the Amish I encountered. But my new phrase is "how Amish can you be wearing a Dora the Explorer backpack?" Though that family was traditional in all other elements -- except the dad. He had the beard, no mustache, and a hat. But it wasn't the standard square straw hat, it was a "cool guy hat" but still made of something woven. And he had cool guy sunglasses perched on the brim. He was always smiling - a smile that was genuine and made you think maybe you should just smile all the time. He also had a yellow polo shirt on and sweater. Gray pants and non-stylish brown sneakers, but he just didn't seem to be following many of the rules. This was in Chicago, and I wondered that maybe he had enough work or contact with "the English" that this was just the way he rolled.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>While we all waited in line, there were at least four different groups of Amish folk. Some in all black, others in the more relaxed black and gray, but they all had the trappings and stood out quite a bit from the random mix of urban and suburban, old and young people in the waiting area. At one point the mother (yeah, I'm making a crap ton of assumptions) from one group (wearing all black) came over to the confusing Dora family and started chatting with them. Just connecting with like minded folk. I have trouble hearing in loud environments like that, so I couldn't really hear what they were saying, but eventually recognized they were speaking in German. I wish I had paid more attention in language class in high school. Fun fact - the Pennsylvania Dutch are not Dutch. They're originally German. But German in German is deutsch. So somewhere deutsch got confused for Dutch and there you have it.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>(Google told me that's how it's spelled, and yet it's marked as misspelled. And when I look at the options for changing the spelling, guess what's first? Dutch. Point made.)</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I needed lunch, so I headed out of my comfort zone (seat) to the lounge car to get some food. The lounge car is the modern equivalent of the observation car, with bigger comfortable seats facing out the large windows. On the lower level is the "café" where you can get snacks and microwaved fare. THe nuked pizza looked like a grade school cafeteria in the 70's tried to make pizza but instead of a lunch lady they had a janitor. And maybe dropped it on the ground. The hot dogs however, with the right level set on expectations, are awesome. Last time they were Nate's but this time they were Hebrew. Large dog, buns reasonably less rubbery than they could be. Again, I think expectations have so much to do with enjoying a train ride.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>The couple in front of me were Amish. Seriously, I'm pretty sure they shun air travel, so trains are the way to go. Technically trains haven't changed all that much since the "olden days" so I could maybe see it as a traditional technology. I knew they were a couple because she had the bonnet color that indicated married (white, I think?) and they were clearly a couple. But young. He was probably 20something but on the low end, and hadn't been able to grow a beard out fully. She looked like she could be nineteen. I wondered if they fell in love and had a dream Amish wedding, or if it was an arranged marriage. How awkward would that be? I hope they were in love. I saw another couple later with a baby and they didn't even look twenty. That must be so hard, married with a kid and you're really just starting out in the adult world. That's a lot of work and pressure. Watching one of the older mom's working her butt off to tend to the army of children I thought about depression and how in some societies it's something you can live with and work on and get support for. But in others "suck it up" is the rule. I'm not saying it's like that with them, but it gave me pause to think about the pros and cons of both their lives and ours.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>We ended up coming into Chicago on time, and I went to the "important people" lounge because I have a sleeper car ticket. Free pop and snacks, comfortable and plentiful seating, and a place to store your luggage so you can walk around the block or just wander the station. Or sit in the comfortable chairs and work as hard as you can not to fall asleep. I'm tired. So tired. I was worried I'd wake up in the comfortable chair and my train would have been long gone. But I didn't, and when the train was announced, I headed off to the gate.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>My train is the Cardinal, which dips through the Appalachian mountains before rolling back up the east coast. It's supposed to be the most scenic route in the system, but the more I read I realize people say that about every route pretty much. It'll be great, no doubt.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>The lines to board the train were long, but mostly just waiting to be let into the train area. Once we got moving it was game on. Since I was in a sleeper I was in one of the first (or last, actually) cars so it was a nice short walk. I got settled into my roomette and really let the appreciation sink in. I could burp out loud and nobody would hear it. And I wouldn't hear anyone on their phone. Also, full meal service is part of the ticket, so I had the vegan enchiladas for dinner - the same thing I had last time because it was so good! I was also awarded one alcoholic beverage for the trip. Which is cool, since they're pushing ten dollars and I wasn't going to pass that up. I don't normally drink but thought a Corona would go well with the meal, and it did. Ordered breakfast at the same time, and it's going to be delivered at eight in the morning, so early alarm again it is. But that's actually good, because the really amazing (read: mountains) start at about that time. If I'm too tired I'll nap later on the trip. Yeah, right. I'll probably just keep adding to my sleep deficit like a politician adds to the national deficit.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Spent time as the sun went down writing, and eventually the porter came by at nine and set up (lowered) the bed. I can still it in the seats and chill, the bed is just like a lowered ceiling. Can't see much outside unless we pass through a town, so it may be an early bedtime for me.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>It was an exhausting day, but a good one. I just pushed through and acted like a normal human being, and now I can crash hard. I only had one anxiety attack mid-day as I was worrying about connection times, but it passed. There's only so long one can pretend to be a person. So we'll see how long that is with me.</p><div><i>Also, I'm checking these posts for spelling and such, but I'm really tired. So if something is wrong, figure it out. </i></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-44698131965052534852022-05-17T18:54:00.004-05:002022-05-17T19:06:49.398-05:00Operation Lily Get - Why I love Trains<p> <span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Why do I love trains so? Well first of all my father worked for Burlington Northern. He was in the information processing department -- aka computers. And that was back in the 70's. I have fond memories of going in to his work and having a computer punch-card made for me with my name on it, just for fun. I also remember seeing all the computers - my current laptop possibly being more powerful than all of them combined. </p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiMyT_ld5rP-KR4pjtQ7xpRq97Imk_MANqI1OQlsKhMbW4gERgZnHgCtjyuW6Ptv7JkjNomvJ3oiyAooRS4G2uN0omOpeohVw_k12D--I4_4aC1I3Ny7Jx51lgHWbaXM95WyDGsbFWkZW0r4WR_9SLJilPGL1jMp3wtm7G2PkcH6AkIjAxjNw" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiMyT_ld5rP-KR4pjtQ7xpRq97Imk_MANqI1OQlsKhMbW4gERgZnHgCtjyuW6Ptv7JkjNomvJ3oiyAooRS4G2uN0omOpeohVw_k12D--I4_4aC1I3Ny7Jx51lgHWbaXM95WyDGsbFWkZW0r4WR_9SLJilPGL1jMp3wtm7G2PkcH6AkIjAxjNw" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alligator looking to the left. See it?</td></tr></tbody></table><br />He also had a jacket which was the traditional green Burlington Northern color and the logo - which always looked like an alligator head to me. A little scary, but more fascinating than anything else. Dad used to take us down to the trainyards just out of downtown, and we'd park and watch the trains. To a seven year old, this was a little low key and not exciting. Boring, even. But as a (dorky) adult I now understand the fascination.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiymgN4_ISV9WT9GB88HW6rZYfy6Cytb5O-t_25SGLWpay2vGVd5ptRsGUaghX2oOfipON1q7zs8AFo6bj3nsCcj39j7m7eTje0vx_sTPNkYHRmSUN_IGH82K4Q4xyzPWqqBAhir2iC00Nij7dC37qeBiySesjaMs_TqykSRMmjdsKTAV_qwA" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiymgN4_ISV9WT9GB88HW6rZYfy6Cytb5O-t_25SGLWpay2vGVd5ptRsGUaghX2oOfipON1q7zs8AFo6bj3nsCcj39j7m7eTje0vx_sTPNkYHRmSUN_IGH82K4Q4xyzPWqqBAhir2iC00Nij7dC37qeBiySesjaMs_TqykSRMmjdsKTAV_qwA" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Like this but without the "Joyce" patch.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Growing up we had an aunt (great aunt?) in Chicago, and my mother, my aunt and I would take the train to visit the great aunt. Each of the kids in the family had this opportunity, but for some reason I got to do it twice. It always involved the Empire Builder, and to a fourth grader, it was an amazing and wonderful adventure. We would talk to the ACTUAL CONDUCTOR - how cool is that? He taught us how to walk on a train. Look straight ahead and walk with your feet as wide apart as possible. We would go to the snack car and get.. snacks. We'd sit in the observation car, as it was called at the time. Big domed windows and lots of light and views. Some vague memory in the back of my mind is yelling something about crosswords, but I have no idea what that memory would be.<p></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>On one of those trips we were in the observation car and the train had stopped in the middle of nowhere. I saw a man in a red and white striped shirt (Waldo's grandparent?) running across the field. Being a precocious little nine year old I said "Hey, there's a guy running across the field" to which the rest of the car snorted or giggled or scoffed or laughed at the imagination of a child. And then someone saw him too and said "Hey, there's a guy running across the field" at which point everyone was interested and looking, etc. I think this was my first really significant experience learning that kids just don't get listened to.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I don't know that we found out what the deal was - someone said someone jumped in front of the train, but I think the delay would have been much longer than 20 minutes. Later as I was going from one car to another I think we went through a tunnel or something, as I passed our seats and went into the last car on the train. Apparently that was crew only -- and the guy with the red and white shirt was there! I was admonished and went back to my proper seat. I never told my mom about the admonishment part. But it was events like those that really made taking the train more interesting than driving or flying.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>That's the memory element.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Logistically, I think I could go on for an hour and a half, which also happens to be the flight time from Minneapolis to Chicago.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>But as far as cost goes the ticket prices are close enough that monetary cost isn't totally a problem. It's the time you burn. Train time is 8 hours. So it's a little slower. But the train station is beautiful and vintage/classic and sparse and uncomplicated. No metal detectors, no huge crowds (because, well, train crowd) and when you board you pick the seat you want (in your assigned car) and just chill. No seatbelt. (Another thing they actually boast about) No need to put the tray tables up. The massive space between seats means you're never compressed by an overweight man in front of you reclining all the way back. And as long as we're talking about reclining - airplane seats recline back somewhere between an inch or an inch and a half. Pointless, pretty much. Train seats, however, recline about a foot or so, so you can really lean back and chill. And the space between seats means you still have more room behind a reclined seat than you do in a full space on an airplane.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjEZdwutwAgwHyaPX5JgY3OfGyCA3ih2ex_2JsVazHtwet1DkDBlQCBmvc4lmIDnSHoHOlnKRxX4ROT7mVUeFjswg41eEo6I97c9mrGgP7cR0YoSZRgLjprVu0Zp2lV6XJ1bq1-EbX_xrWEPK44WXvASb9S0VVCvTjIdD7YGZiZcSmzZRjrIg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjEZdwutwAgwHyaPX5JgY3OfGyCA3ih2ex_2JsVazHtwet1DkDBlQCBmvc4lmIDnSHoHOlnKRxX4ROT7mVUeFjswg41eEo6I97c9mrGgP7cR0YoSZRgLjprVu0Zp2lV6XJ1bq1-EbX_xrWEPK44WXvASb9S0VVCvTjIdD7YGZiZcSmzZRjrIg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Union Station in St Paul</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I mentioned no metal detectors - there aren't any. And apparently carrying a weapon on the train is legal, according to the Amtrak literature. Except flintlocks or other black powder guns. They have to draw the line somewhere, after all. But there were Homeland Security agents all covered in flak jackets and Velcro, cargo pants and military shades. (By military shades I don't mean officially issued shades, but the stereotypical wraparound "I have a goatee and a pickup truck with a bumper sticker that has profanity on it" type.) <p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgRVYSP1Qp3uNgY-hakCY-bh7EE6m6k7RQAe_xyJQj6Os-gW9xy0otFKTGDxhLEHFhQdcXAder2FSix3vKOXa0IYj9HjFQNwba900to4QwpdSb9zz2jFVlcXLtLMcuoImQUne9oz82MUBqiRqjAh3vgTSO2aNiPmc6RHQlZE0FQ598k4D-9dA" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1200" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgRVYSP1Qp3uNgY-hakCY-bh7EE6m6k7RQAe_xyJQj6Os-gW9xy0otFKTGDxhLEHFhQdcXAder2FSix3vKOXa0IYj9HjFQNwba900to4QwpdSb9zz2jFVlcXLtLMcuoImQUne9oz82MUBqiRqjAh3vgTSO2aNiPmc6RHQlZE0FQ598k4D-9dA" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From the movie Zero Dark Thirty</td></tr></tbody></table><br />I did feel a little bad for them, as the senior citizens and other train nerds offer a pretty minimal threat. I can imagine if you screw up working for homeland security they'll send you to Union Station in Saint Paul.<p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgUq5jWbmKl_YmXkNNQSNNDzji3W4Fxa0OIvWOYXsZUs4JgDnFXnyhQ9grxuBLkYc13ojN1t2dZe-VeGKnmbf5jL4iKswWuVQA80R7g8wZDngQ46Kc5Z-_-5Le1yCOqDKZ5j9MJ5-1jRPr2kgxdrbXDRTk7fnCB648aoiMnZ47fa0t46HzQFA" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="1204" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgUq5jWbmKl_YmXkNNQSNNDzji3W4Fxa0OIvWOYXsZUs4JgDnFXnyhQ9grxuBLkYc13ojN1t2dZe-VeGKnmbf5jL4iKswWuVQA80R7g8wZDngQ46Kc5Z-_-5Le1yCOqDKZ5j9MJ5-1jRPr2kgxdrbXDRTk7fnCB648aoiMnZ47fa0t46HzQFA" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Security with their tinted SUV</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Speaking of passengers - nobody is boring. You know on an airplane where there are interesting characters but more often than not it's businessmen and pretty people and so on? Yeah, I know, I'm generalizing. See the money-back offer earlier. But the people I'm seeing on the train - wow! From the different types and groups of Amish, to the senior citizens, to the strange looking guy who may or may not be carrying a gun (but not a black powder rifle!) you'll be hard pressed to find someone who doesn't have an interesting story. Being an introvert I'll never know them, but if you have even just a scrap of normal personality, you can find people everywhere to talk to. From the lounge and dining cars, to the coach seats (that aren't in a "quiet car") if you want to, you can get to know everyone so much more than maybe you even want.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiAxQsfTvTljmxSZY5zjtydPZMkP-c1rgz6YYFJ4G1cFjGfVovzlM2PIy-V8p7DMvvbHyneu1vKtx5yr1eMTQVJzANnV22DI03_HXD_93AJG3vH0Rcj_2vtonhgErG9YPIX3HL1iAsIpYvUWApIX9fcBPS6s2lj5ggTcF-djYsJ96WDXUKpMg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="677" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiAxQsfTvTljmxSZY5zjtydPZMkP-c1rgz6YYFJ4G1cFjGfVovzlM2PIy-V8p7DMvvbHyneu1vKtx5yr1eMTQVJzANnV22DI03_HXD_93AJG3vH0Rcj_2vtonhgErG9YPIX3HL1iAsIpYvUWApIX9fcBPS6s2lj5ggTcF-djYsJ96WDXUKpMg" width="180" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So much tastier than it looks!</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>While I waited in line for a hotdog I realized one of the reasons I love the train. They're land ships! My love for and fascination for the sea is thwarted by living as far from an ocean as you can. So taking a cruise liner across the Atlantic to the UK, sitting on deck chairs with a blanket on your lap and tea brought to you by a man named Jeeves while chatting with glamourous movie stars isn't really feasible. Nor is stowing away on a cargo ship with the animals being transported in cages but being discovered by a deckhand with a heart of gold who brings you meals and ends up becoming a lifelong friend while you both laugh at the antics of the monkeys being shipped to zoos. Not that I have extremely specific scenarios in mind or anything.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjhlMtk2xk5aG0RdzORAJRs8udX13Exn0VfGG7UFyTjIECRB9P-LySQVbnP8TqMw32u9JBw3Yc_X-Yt0ZfSV6abQn2Gp2Vde3n4Ot7wwhxa4F5gVjmjNe9J9T-N689fRHWZKzYawc5nsn_58AMKt1HvbEvVZfLaiRaOa9nWrgEY-OSLDJ0INw" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="3000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjhlMtk2xk5aG0RdzORAJRs8udX13Exn0VfGG7UFyTjIECRB9P-LySQVbnP8TqMw32u9JBw3Yc_X-Yt0ZfSV6abQn2Gp2Vde3n4Ot7wwhxa4F5gVjmjNe9J9T-N689fRHWZKzYawc5nsn_58AMKt1HvbEvVZfLaiRaOa9nWrgEY-OSLDJ0INw" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Glamorous Ocean Travel of Days Gone By</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Taking a train is, in many ways, like taking a ship. The scenery is something you don't usually see from a car or airplane. It rocks gently (or not so gently) and has roles from the dawn of travel like conductor, porter, engineer, food microwaver. And it's slow. People complain, but if you have the time, why not?</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-14912192937452426062022-05-17T13:41:00.000-05:002022-05-17T13:41:08.449-05:00Operation Lily Get - the Setup<p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>My daughter has completed her first year of college. At the beginning of the year we drove together in her car to move her out to Baltimore. Someone had the bright idea -- not sure if it was me or not -- to take the train home. So I did. And it was amazing. I had a roomette from Baltimore to Chicago. I had time to wander Chicago a bit. And I had a coach seat from Chicago to Minneapolis. Full story at this link: <a href="https://fnirt.blogspot.com/2021/08/operation-lily-put-day-1.html" target="_blank">Operation Lily Put</a></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>And now that she had rocked her first year, it's time for her to come home. So we're doing it backwards, but this time with a little flair. Coach from Minneapolis to Chicago, with a nail biting 2 hour stopover in Chicago, where I board a roomette on the Cardinal bound for Baltimore. I'll have a couple days in Baltimore to stay with my brother and his family -- including the adorable toddler. I was told she might find my concertina amusing, and my brother's wife even approved of and loved the idea. So I'm bringing the concertina and working so hard not to forget it on the train. That would be devastating. I wanted to bring the kiddo a toy accordion but couldn't find ours from when the kids were young, nor could I find it in any brick and mortar store. Just as well, since online I'm seeing them for $50! or more. For a toy squeezebox.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Speaking of adult children, my other daughter just graduated college in Iowa! I am proud for her accomplishment - through COVID and a derecho (land hurricane) that hit their area. Other daughter flew in and the in laws drove down from up north (and west a bit). The wife and the three all piled into our car (truck? crossover? minivan for people who hate minivans?) and drove 4? or 5? hours down to the college for the graduation. That's a squich under 300 miles. So we'll round that up. Total mileage for May: 300 mi.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>It was a wonderful graduation and we had a picnic in the state park on the river, and it was really lovely. The graduating daughter had an apartment in Cedar Rapids and had mostly moved out of dorm and into apartment with roommates. But she was going to come home for a week before settling into "Adulting" for the rest of her life. So the return trip not only included the original gang, but another passenger and their luggage. So we have myself, my wife, my youngest daughter, mother-in-law, father-in-law, graduated daughter and accompanying luggage all in the car for another four and a half hour trip. Oddly enough it went fine. Having that many people in a vehicle can be .. tricky. But we made it home just fine. Total mileage for May so far: 600mi.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>One of the perks for my daughter coming home was that we were going up to my wife's family land. 200 miles, 3 1/2 hours. And back. 200 more miles, 4 or more hours. (Wife was going to nap, so she approved my "take back roads for scenery" route. A bit longer, but when driving it's so nice to do something different. Total mileage for May so far: 1000 miles.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Oh wait, the graduated daughter lives in Cedar Rapids. So back to Iowa we go. Oh wait, the graduated daughter is moving into an apartment for her first time. U-Haul to the rescue! Unfortunately, you're not supposed to drive the trailers over 55 mph, so I checked the "avoid highways" button on Google's directions, and away we went. Only a few gravel roads, but it was so much fun to go through all the little towns and such. And you know how on the interstate superhighway and you get behind someone going well under the speed limit in the left lane while using cruise control to pass a large truck over the course of fifteen minutes - when you're trying to maintain 10 or 15 over the speed limit? Or the guy who comes flying up behind you as you're trying to pass a truck over the course of 15 minutes using cruise control? Yeah, none of that fun happens on the backroads. </p><p>Yes, you're going to come across some farming monstrosity, or a slow moving pickup truck. But they're going to turn off the road within minutes or miles. And on the way back even though I didn't have a trailer, I took a similar route. And I was alone. Rarely saw other cars, no traffic backups, etc. And I went through every small town in those 200 miles. I will say I was thrilled to turn in the trailer in Cedar Rapids. Noise, speed limitations, and horrible banging when you go over a bump all got annoying after a while. Oh and there was a "sour spot" instead of a "sweet spot" at about 35 miles an hour where everything just wanted to bounce around and make noise and push and pull on the car and so forth. Getting back on track - driving 200 miles in each direction - Total mileage for May so far: 1400.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>I was getting tired.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>So I arrive home and need to immediately pack for the next journey - the train! 14 hours after I got home, we're at the train station in Saint Paul and I'm boarding the Empire Builder. When I talk about mileage and such, I'm including the train trips. Yes, I'm not driving. Yes, there is a lounge car with hot dogs and treats. Yes, the seats in coach are ridiculously large and comfortable and there's even power outlets. But it's still sitting for 8 hours and craning my neck to look out the window at the sandhill cranes and rural backyard junk collections. So I'm counting it. If you have a problem, as always you are welcome to a full refund of all of the money you paid for reading this blog post.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Total travel mileage upon arrival in Chicago will be 1800. But that's in the next post..</p><p><br /></p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-84762119768295770772022-04-12T17:24:00.002-05:002022-04-13T12:11:01.573-05:00A little philosophy..<h3 style="text-align: center;"><i><span jsname="YS01Ge" style="max-height: 999999px; color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;">"No matter what the truth is</span><br style="max-height: 999999px; color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;"><span jsname="YS01Ge" style="max-height: 999999px; color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;">Hold on to what is yours"</span></i></h3><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i style="text-align: start; font-size: 18.72px;"> </i><i style="color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;">Yes, "Hold On", 90125</i></h3><div><i style="color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;"><br></i></div><div><i style="color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;"><br></i></div><div><i style="color: rgb(77, 81, 86); font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start;"><br></i></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">"Is it possible to know the truth without challenging it first?"</h3><p>That's my therapy question for the week. I write a "paper" and drop it on my therapist and we chat about it. I guess I wasn't expecting a deep philosophical question, but I'm game.</p><p>First, what's true? I think many people go through life not actually knowing the truth. The simple minded who are swayed by political marketing and propaganda spend quite a bit of time thinking they know what the truth is. But in reality those machines they believe in are actually working against them. Managing the economy in a way that the poor remain poor, overseeing the justice system so the criminal remain criminal, fund our school systems so the children are molded to become those who follow the propaganda. While that's all a bit of an exaggeration, it's not too far from the truth. And there's the truth again. We don't even really know when the truth isn't the truth.</p><p>Thinking smaller, at the personal level, can we know the truth? Is my spouse faithful? Is my employer working to grow my career or just get the most for the least out of me? The people who sells us things do it so well we may believe in something that's absolutely untruthful in the hope of getting a good deal. Or even just believing them to get by, live in a house, drive a car, use their products - often because there is no alternative.</p><p>Sometimes we believe in things we know are untruthful. It could be for our own personal benefit, or because believing it will allow us something like a purchase of a home at a price only one company can offer you. Or needed a car badly enough that you buy something used from someone questionable. But these are things we need badly enough that we overlook the untruths that accompany them.</p><p>The exceptions are those things we can prove. We can see honestly. We can understand well enough to believe. Gravity exists. Nobody lives forever. Fire burns. You are going to get pop up ads on web sites. Children rarely grow up to be us or the people we imagined we wanted them to be when they were born. Snow is cold. When toast falls it lands on the buttered side. Of course you have to believe in science to believe these things, but even the doubters are pretty much in agreement on gravity and pop-up ads.</p><p>In short, knowing the truth comes at us in a few different ways, and can be very difficult. Things we know are true, things we actually believe are true (but aren't) and things that we know are untrue but we believe in order to live our lives like we want to. I suppose there are also things we know to be untrue that we don't believe, and in some cases act against. Fight for the truth past the untruths. This can be done simply by voting, or more difficultly by pursuing the untruthful and working to bring them down or expose their lies.</p><p>So is it possible to know the truth? I would say for the most part, no. In few cases can we break something down, research it, understand it well enough to truly know the truth. That's the tricky part, isn't it? Those people who believe in politicians who are actually working against them don't and in many cases simply can't know the truth. Honestly faith is more substantial than belief. At least with faith you have a confidence that brings you happiness, real or imagined. And that brings us back to either being ignorant or believing in something blindly. Not the truth.</p><p>I will say that in our closest relationships, our faith is most often correct and associated with the truth. I know my spouse is faithful. Many companies are at least transparent enough that you don't imagine they're in business for you, but for themselves. So you don't imagine they are fully trustworthy. And are okay with that relationship. Even in our relationships with ourselves, I think there are many truths that we acknowledge, even if they're not pleasant. Sure, we ignore enough of them and fool ourselves well enough that we don't see the truth. My hair isn't thinning. From this angle I don't look overweight. Drinking too much is fine, there's no problem there. </p><p>Clearly the truth is complicated. And often up for debate depending on who's side you're on.</p><h3 style="text-align: center;">So can we truly challenge it? And what does it mean to challenge something?</h3><p style="text-align: left;">In the case of science, challenging could mean study, research, and experimentation. In relationships it could come from communication and experience. In the case of a purchase, it could be reading reviews or test driving something. Not guaranteed to always reveal a charlatan, but often generates enough confidence for us to believe in that truth. I really wanted to put believe and truth in quotation marks there, but then I'd have to go back and do it to about a third of all the words I've written so far.</p><p>In our hearts, especially when it comes to challenging the truth in ourselves, it takes a special kind of honesty and humility to confront our own truths. It's difficult to face some of the truths we have inside ourselves when we don't want them to be true. In those cases it's possible you can't even challenge those truths. Either from personal unwillingness, or personal disregard. And the latter could be something we're not even aware we are doing.</p><p>For everything in-between we may not be able to challenge those truths. We don't have access to the group producing them, or we aren't educated enough to understand an issue well enough to challenge it. Often we don't think we can challenge something because it has such popularity, power, or a long history. I can't challenge whether or not a college degree is required because I've been raised to believe it is essential. I personally didn't find out the truth that you can live a happy and successful like without one until I dropped out of college. Granted, it made life more difficult and less predictable. We usually find ways to live our lives as well as we can, regardless of the advantages we don't have - or do have.</p><p>But to ask if you have to challenge the truth before you can know the truth? I don't think that's the case. I've never tried to defeat gravity, and yet I fully believe in it when I fall down. Once a month I could ask my spouse if they're being unfaithful in order to know that truth. But in that case the challenge is going to likely cause a problem in our relationship. That comes from trust and respect.</p><p>It might come to faith and truth. I can't challenge the true political motives of someone I am voting for. I can research and get opinions, but there is always a layer underneath the public face. So I need to have faith in the truths my politician of choice shares. For the most part. You can always have a lack of confidence in some of the things someone says, yet still believe in the overall picture. I didn't believe the person I voted for in the last election had all of my best interests at heart. But I did believe they we working from a position of good intention, or at least the intentions I wanted or thought were good.</p><p>So I will say you can know the truth without challenging it. But you have to understand that knowing is actually more of a belief than a concrete truth. End of philosophy paper.</p><h3 style="text-align: center;">But now to speak from a therapeutic angle. </h3><p style="text-align: left;">I think knowing your own truths is important. I also think you often don't realize your own misguided truths or lies. It takes someone else to point them out or raise the question of their existence. A wife telling you it might be time to hit the gym more often. A therapist probing your relationship with your mother and how that may have shaped some of your beliefs. Or even a mirror showing you the gray in your hair and the wrinkles by your eyes. </p><p>When it comes to challenging those truths, that's a completely different ballgame. As I said earlier it requires understanding parts of yourself that you don't know about or don't want to believe are true. So someone usually has to help you understand things that may be issues or problems, coax the specific belief out of you. They need to hold it up and show you and make you understand that this is something that is real or true. And hopefully they will then proceed to help you deal with that truth, understand it more fully and see how it's affecting other parts of your life or personality.</p><p>Honestly I think that's why I believe everyone should see a therapist. You don't have to be broken to need a bit of fixing. Nobody is so perfect that they couldn't use some introspection with the help of a professional who can see things and help repair or adjust to them.</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-32075710133126726582021-11-27T18:20:00.000-06:002021-11-27T18:20:08.804-06:00The interrupting *and repeating* piano<p> One of my father's passions was woodworking. He could build almost anything, often indestructible and useful items. The square stools he build for my three siblings and me are still in use at the cabin. They've withstood my family growing up, but also my children, my sister's children, and countless guests. They will outlive us all.</p><p>We all spent our own long hours working on things with Dad in the ever expanding workshop in the basement. Once furnace adjacent, it eventually spilled out all around the boiler, and into another room. I loved the belt sander, was deathly afraid of the table saw, and thought the grinder was the best fireworks show ever.</p><p>In his workshop he had a radio, and listened to the classical music public radio station. Come to think of it I don't remember where the radio actually lived, as I never would have turned it on myself, and certainly wouldn't have turned it off, or - God forbid - changed the station.</p><p>But he had small speakers that he would collect. The kind that came with a turntable/radio/tape deck sort of system, never super high quality, but enough. And he would put them in the ceiling spaces in the workshop. So wherever you were, you would hear this music coming from nowhere and everywhere.</p><p>As kids we didn't "get" classical music. So we referred to it as "Dad music" and never with an appreciative tone. He played classical music in the car, in his workshop, on his stereo upstairs. To us it seemed like it was everywhere, always waiting to jump out at you and bore you to sleep.</p><p>It was rarely loud enough to hear outside of the basement, but there was one weekend day where we all heard it and commented on it. It was a simple piano piece, and it was repetitive. Like, on a short loop. I think the common concern was that someone had a record that was skipping and just playing the same handful of notes over and over.</p><p>His explanation was that it distinctly wasn't the same notes over and over. It was the same notes but just a little different every time. I thought the idea was dumb, got on with my life, and never really thought about it until I was older.</p><p>Now that I am turning into my father in age and interests (thankfully not hair loss!) I appreciate the things he did when we were young and ignorant. And one of those things is the music. I have a limited knowledge of classical music, and I don't profess to know much about different composers, performers, or collections. But in the very recent months I have been listening to a few pieces, and from those finding a few more. Most of them are similar to the modern pop/alternative music I listen to - moody and dark, or minimalist and out of the ordinary. In other words, not generally popular in large numbers of listeners.</p><p>One of the pieces I have grown to love just a little bit more with every listening is Górecki's Symphony No. 3, Op. 36, also known as the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. It is a symphony in three movements composed by Henryk Górecki in Katowice, Poland, between October and December 1976. You know, when Poland was a happy place to live in. It's obviously steeped in the oppression they felt, and the hopelessness of a country trapped by another. In other words, it's perfect.</p><p>It is dark, somber, builds to wonderful hills of emotion, and rolls back into valleys of sadness. Beth Gibbons, one of my favorite singers from a band called "Portishead" performed it with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra. She even learned how to sing in Polish for the album. There is a great review on Pitchfork (<a href="https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/beth-gibbons-henryk-gorecki-symphony-of-sorrowful-songs/" target="_blank">link</a>) and a great article from the New York times (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/09/arts/music/how-a-somber-symphony-sold-more-than-a-million-records.html" target="_blank">link</a>) telling the story of the 1989 London Sinfonietta recording that popularized the piece - and the composer - and sold over a million copies. Which is quite a feat. By February 1993, it had reached No. 6 on the British pop charts. Crazy.</p><p>It's possible my father heard a version of the symphony, but I don't know. I also don't have a firm grip on the exact genre's and pieces that he loved the most. It's another regret I have, that I never discussed the music with my father that would eventually be able to elicit more emotion from me than any brooding goth pop piece. Hoping my family can give me a better picture, but so far it's just been mentioned of composers and such. Nothing specific enough that I can listen to it and feel my father listening at the same time.</p><p>I am not going to go on too much about the music itself, but Spiegel im Spiegel (lit. 'mirror(s) in the mirror') is a composition by Arvo Pärt written in 1978. It's a ten minute song, but I can (and have) listened to it for hours. Sometimes when I listen it brings me deeper into my dark depressions. But other times it can lift me up and make me peacefully happy. Was this the kind of thing he would have listened to? Would have have hated it, loved it, or just not noticed it?</p><p>I have found my own favorites, and will grow that collection, I'm sure. And I've searched for that repetitive piano piece, but so far haven't found it. </p><p>But I sure would love to listen to that piano piece again as my current me.</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-50237777038880460572021-09-29T11:02:00.004-05:002021-09-29T11:05:11.793-05:00The interrupting piano<div style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 24px; margin: 0px; text-align: left;"><span face="Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", sans-serif" style="color: white; font-size: 15px;">When I was young, my father used to play the piano. He didn't know how to read music, and it was all chords. If you didn't listen closely you would think it was the same song over and over again. But after hearing it for years, I realized it was just the base for his real music. During the holidays, you would hear classic holiday tunes float gently through the sound. Like he was using his music to seek out and play what was in context.</span></div><div style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15px; line-height: 24px; margin: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="color: white;"><span face="Roboto, Helvetica Neue, sans-serif"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />When his mother died, it got dark. More bass, harder on the keys, mournful and sad. It was reassuring to hear my father grieving in some way, as he didn't express his emotions often.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Courier, monospace;" /><span face="Roboto, Helvetica Neue, sans-serif">We were stupid kids. We would be wanting to watch TV, so we had to hold huge headphones close to our ears with the volume turned up. It was loud enough that the vacuum was less annoying. And we took it for granted.</span></span></div><div style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 15px; line-height: 24px; margin: 0px; text-align: left;"><span face="Roboto, Helvetica Neue, sans-serif" style="color: white;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Nobody learned how to play like he did, as unique as every person. Nobody recorded even a sample of it. The house has been sold long ago. My father died decades ago. I now play music and think of what we have lost. But I can still feel the passion, the joy, the whimsey in his music. It's in my head like an unfocused picture. I can't see the details but it can still remind me of how much I now love his playing.</span></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-90480488450795449332021-09-05T11:51:00.001-05:002021-09-05T11:51:06.382-05:00More than you ever thought you could learn about concertinasI'm reading The anglo-German concertina, a social history, volume 1" - it's a daunting book of hundreds of pages of fascinating information. At least to me. You wouldn't think there would need to be multiple volumes, but there are two so far. It goes into excruciating detail, and then does a deep dive on each point. <div><br><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</div><br><br><div>I really didn't think I could read all of it, so I was just going through and reading the captions and looking at the pictures. But I kept finding myself going into the text to get a better explanation of the illustrations, to the point that I was just reading everything. So I went back and just started over. I figured I would skip the minutiae as needed, as one doesn't really need to know the history of a specific concertina maker in England who was the apprentice to an apprentice. But of course, once you get into the text you're led to that information in a way that makes you want to know.</div><div><br></div><div>There is fascinating trivia, but also valuable history such as the origin of the names of the types of concertinas. A quick summary: There are two most common types of concertinas, the English and the Anglo. Of course that would be confusing, since they're the same definition. But as it turns out the English built concertinas were custom made and only affordable to the upper classes. When the Germans started building them cheaply in factories and exporting them to England they were called German concertinas. But they were cheap and low quality. So the British sellers asked the Germans to make theirs look more like the English (6 sided, not 4) and eventually people were asking the custom concertina (English) makers to make high quality German concertinas. Because they wanted buyers to know they were of the higher English quality, they started calling them Anglo German concertinas. <span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px;">When the world wars came, Brits didn't want to buy anything German, so it was shortened to Anglo concertina. There are enough differences between the two types that they need those distinct names, and thus they live on to this day.</span></div><div>Telling the tale isn't enough, so research into the incidences of the word concertina in all manner of sources reveals trends and such using graphs and tables.</div><div><br></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px;"><br></span></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px;">Ok, so you might think that's a bit too much information but those are the points I just love. There are other stories and descriptions that include historical documents, quotes from literature, and even legal documents.</span><br></div><div><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px;"><br></span></div><div>To illustrate a decline in profitablity of concertinas buskers, they include a court transcript of an alimony dispute. The husband was making less than he was when alimony was determined, and wanted it lowered. They brought in experts and other buskers for their testimony. It doesn't sound like a big deal but they were making the equivalent of $50,000 per year just by playing concertinas on the street. Victorian London had so many different types of buskers that the book describes each distinct type. When you think that's enough and you want to move on, the next section turns out to be detailed descriptions of each type of busker with further evidence and so forth. The section on blind people who are getting around the anti-begging laws by playing concertinas poorly is particularly fascinating.</div><div><br><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</div><br></div><div> While there were some street musicians who were quite skilled and made good money there were also street musicians (of all instrument types) that simply played poorly so people would pay them to move on. They even go into the distinction of different types of reporting on the quality of busker. For example the upper classes thought it was coarse and obnoxious so they reported it as being a public nuisance. The middle and lower classes, however, found it to be a fun distraction from things like public transportation or simply carrying on down the street. So they actually liked it.</div><div><br></div><div>I won't go on because I'm sure this is far more information than any non concertina playing person would want on concertinas, but to me it's mesmerizing. Every amusing story or interesting fact makes me want to pass it on to anyone who will listen, and I think things like "I should do a concertina history podcast so the kids of today would watch!" (since they don't read) and then I realize it's probably a bit too obscure.</div><div><br></div><div>Unfortunately the reason I'm reading right now is that my tremor is bad enough that doing things on my phone is tricky, and I'm even just voice transcribing this post. So here I am with the last thing I am able to do, and it turns out to actually be satisfying.</div><div><br></div><div>Sounds boring but it's fascinating. Pictures taken right out of the book with no proper credit given. :)</div><div><br><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Announcements were made, but it was horribly hard to understand them. I figured out that the line wasn't for my train, so I went into the outer waiting area and found a squeaky bench to sit on. I had forgotten to get any more snacks or drinks, so I headed out to find a shop in the station, when I saw there were pop machines by the door. They had the little touchless icon, and I'd been using my phone to pay for everything so far, so I thought I'd give it a shot.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFPi5ceypX8P0VvAPwI6m7gvjhq3eBVQMh4GUn-azN49Ls6cGvehc5CM-uFDFsH7E42agEadGMf3bVsbxJtEH2bgx922JXyCTiL1kOkg0Ys2vFDyc4xFSS18DKGcPra_QYAb-w/s4032/20210828_125525.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFPi5ceypX8P0VvAPwI6m7gvjhq3eBVQMh4GUn-azN49Ls6cGvehc5CM-uFDFsH7E42agEadGMf3bVsbxJtEH2bgx922JXyCTiL1kOkg0Ys2vFDyc4xFSS18DKGcPra_QYAb-w/w480-h640/20210828_125525.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Worked like a charm, and I got a nice cold Diet Pepsi, delivered to the receptacle by a robot arm and everything. I remember back in the 90's hearing about the fact that some scandanavian country, I want to say Finland, had everything hooked up to their phones. They could literally get something from a vending machine just by using their phone. Incredible! And here we are, just thirty short years later and we're able to do the same!</p><p><br /></p><p>I had a long diatribe about the Amish passengers. But decided just to summarize. I don't know their story, but it's got to be hard trying to be low-tech and having to interact with our modern systems. I will admit I was having some serious Handmaid's Tale flashbacks. And while waiting in the Longest Line Ever, some kind soul decided to let them cut into line. And then they let someone else cut in front of them, and my particularities about queueing just tweaked a bit.</p><p><br /></p><p>I was, however finally cool, thanks to some giant fans in the waiting area. They didn't announce my train but clearly nobody knew what the line was queueing for, so I got in at the end. By the time I was worried about how long the line would take, and how many people were in front of me vs departure times, the line began to crawl forward. As it turns out nobody knew if it was for our trains or a different one, but we all queued and by the time I got to the front it was a line for anyone with a ticket. I get through the front of the line and am directed to a train and from there guided into the right coach. A little crowded, but really not bad at all. My fears of having to fight for a bad aisle seat were unfounded, and we're almost to Minnesota and nobody is sitting next to me.</p><p><br /></p><p>Amtrak is serious about masks. Got a gaiter, or a bandana mask? Fail. Shield instead of mask? Fail. Haven't got your mask over your nose? Fail. They were handing out generic masks to people who didn't have the right kind on, and I was very impressed at how clear they were.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY1C5oxvdrEQ5U2si5yTazxrhHhOJvNBXTOBsa3xmEhn3tXfufDBP-iboBv3zQPn0qkiIVB44rnaIY7B7Unl4UZNHl5EBrg9YPL3jFyBW0fGV4N_6tZD4IIJvn7wp_Pqz5m9gC/s4032/20210828_142101.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY1C5oxvdrEQ5U2si5yTazxrhHhOJvNBXTOBsa3xmEhn3tXfufDBP-iboBv3zQPn0qkiIVB44rnaIY7B7Unl4UZNHl5EBrg9YPL3jFyBW0fGV4N_6tZD4IIJvn7wp_Pqz5m9gC/w480-h640/20210828_142101.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>After the train had barely started, they had a long announcement reiterating those rules, as well as clarifying behaviors. Like, keep the mask on unless you're eating. But if you're drinking, you should be able to keep it mostly on. If you're eating, you literally have to be taking a bite of food. Chewing? Mask on. Breathing between bites? Mask on. Most everyone was compliant, though someone at the check-in line had gotten animated about their gaiter not qualifying. It did seem like the Amish folk had a problem with their giant beards.</p><p><br /></p><p>When we got to Milwaukee it was sunny by had clearly just rained. I'd been watching storms go across Minnesota and Wisconsin, and eventually we found one. Some stiff wind and a huge downpour, but it didn't last long. It is now raining extremely hard. I have every confidence trains are hard to blow over though. One of the best things about travelling. If it's raining, you're likely to drive away from it or pass through quickly. Before long it was golden sun again and green fields of Wisconsin. We stopped for a bit of a delay as the power had gone out and the signals weren't working. Whatever community that was, they figured it out quickly, and we were back on our way. I don't care, as it's my last leg. But it wouldn't be a train journey without some kind of delay.</p><p><br /></p><p>We did pick up more passengers in Millwaukee. I tried to do my best "you don't want to sit next to me" attitude, but that doesn't work very well because I'm polite. Someone paused and I was typing fiercly and they moved on. I think they may have read the previous posts and knew I would be clicking away for hours.</p><p><br /></p><p>Headed off to the observation car to see what was up there, and it was fairly full. I had no interest in sitting in there though, as it was a nice open area with comfortable chairs and had a good community feel. Meaning everyone was chatting with each other. Check, please! I figured out that the snack car (diner car? club car? food getting car?) was just down the stairs and rolled the dice. Thankfully, it was a straightforward system. Attendant behind a counter/glass and options on the wall. A hot dog, cheese plate and a Coka later and I'm back on my way to my seat. So technically I got a Chicago-sourced Hot Dog. They were making announcements about people with reservations in the dining car at various intervals. So clearly there was another food getting car, but I wasn't interested.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhTYZiEKmJYGPLUei2OvjHHRg2NPIUz2AUUHrTZLSgw0rDLao1qEPdB-7M0l_E1CFBA5NDpw2vUxbTPRtzgb5Y4cHPgv7SzD5z0Te1MKyp2tGYG8eCHrVSbpDbhBtASYxlEJ2L/s4032/20210828_173655.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhTYZiEKmJYGPLUei2OvjHHRg2NPIUz2AUUHrTZLSgw0rDLao1qEPdB-7M0l_E1CFBA5NDpw2vUxbTPRtzgb5Y4cHPgv7SzD5z0Te1MKyp2tGYG8eCHrVSbpDbhBtASYxlEJ2L/w640-h480/20210828_173655.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>A little more writing, some chatting with my sister over Facebook, and half of Driving Miss Daisy helped me pass the afternoon.</p><p>At the Wisconsin Dells stop we got to see the same Dells businesses Lily and I saw on the way east. And the actual Dells, of course.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-fnHbm10m961KXvVUCyf3ya1DAUGB522W7va1KhdbxhiN77lCIdnlkvo_pFutNkVXZoOspOZA96RbE44dq_lvYU791OmXPgVmQv7h-MG0NZp-6L3yCKAzrNDh4fqdnfYA2cGY/s1699/20210828_180550.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1265" data-original-width="1699" height="476" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-fnHbm10m961KXvVUCyf3ya1DAUGB522W7va1KhdbxhiN77lCIdnlkvo_pFutNkVXZoOspOZA96RbE44dq_lvYU791OmXPgVmQv7h-MG0NZp-6L3yCKAzrNDh4fqdnfYA2cGY/w640-h476/20210828_180550.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ghost Boat!<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFS6tSK3I0TtsLBfN45hu5jgED-Z1y_iwfRH9eKR-c3fiPlU3oH0xxVCegTZh1YkNw947nolhvWhYMi1EmYbt0niLV09artEIq4uwms7olZpYX4igERkYmGOvD8MeuGYUZZA_O/s4032/20210828_180554.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFS6tSK3I0TtsLBfN45hu5jgED-Z1y_iwfRH9eKR-c3fiPlU3oH0xxVCegTZh1YkNw947nolhvWhYMi1EmYbt0niLV09artEIq4uwms7olZpYX4igERkYmGOvD8MeuGYUZZA_O/w640-h480/20210828_180554.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>There was no wifi on the train, so I was tethering off my phone just enough to listen to music and save drafts of the blog entries. The previous train from NY to IL had wifi, you just had to accept their terms and you were in- but it wasn't very fast and streaming was not a viable option. My phone had fair coverage, but the more rural it got, the more the signal dropped out. The things we have to put up with when being zipped across the state at 70 miles per hour.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1V3bd-EM2-LCdlcoN4imFt1-x8A-KNgOY3_eFSJYWye35PQOfRkFgOo-67z316AvM82RkYynAxAcefBF1F51MDgio6uJrmJr6VhueFy8Iu2t7JAWTatUW_nlcWjtmeq9PqyIc/s4032/20210828_173701.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1V3bd-EM2-LCdlcoN4imFt1-x8A-KNgOY3_eFSJYWye35PQOfRkFgOo-67z316AvM82RkYynAxAcefBF1F51MDgio6uJrmJr6VhueFy8Iu2t7JAWTatUW_nlcWjtmeq9PqyIc/w480-h640/20210828_173701.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wisconsin looks like this</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMiqKmlZn4M5B-4N1km1nFXn8PCtVZ0vO8kla0UHGjsOHXhkOyhTAjGVYUqfRSi-6Cn47VsJXw6BtaaG2lgBfhsM-sAFCEcVGP4qm3-FiiH9THYvOnvB_3MEKWM33wzOweYcJ1/s4032/20210828_173713.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMiqKmlZn4M5B-4N1km1nFXn8PCtVZ0vO8kla0UHGjsOHXhkOyhTAjGVYUqfRSi-6Cn47VsJXw6BtaaG2lgBfhsM-sAFCEcVGP4qm3-FiiH9THYvOnvB_3MEKWM33wzOweYcJ1/w640-h480/20210828_173713.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wisconsin also looks like this. Over and over again.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p><br /></p><p>I had been advised back at home that when we get to Tomah that was my cue to score a seat in the observation car. I wasn't into that, but I had picked a seat on the advised side of the train, and since I was in the upper of a double floor car, I figured I'm high enough to enjoy the scenery.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1CTYbqsE0_yKlnkvyWPfCMAmUnaVFvB3vT9Opv4FxFokjlOlBvg3iFTtAwwiHfrTyUwgbfCClUX7piAFwiGsvI3TBp_U12rXWipLleDI3R_N0mt7x0op4VRfzu-5ue-oQ9yRP/s4032/20210828_193253.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1CTYbqsE0_yKlnkvyWPfCMAmUnaVFvB3vT9Opv4FxFokjlOlBvg3iFTtAwwiHfrTyUwgbfCClUX7piAFwiGsvI3TBp_U12rXWipLleDI3R_N0mt7x0op4VRfzu-5ue-oQ9yRP/w640-h480/20210828_193253.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>I can't help but think about the Hudson river as we cross the Mississippi. It's not just coming home to Minnesota, but to *my* river. The trees look right, the islands scattered in the channels look right, even the surface of the river looks right. The Hudson was an amazing river because it was so pretty, and I'd read about the ships and boats both large and small that had plied those waters for the first time. Men rushing to find the next location for a fort or trading place. Wars between men of all different nations, going so far back in the history of the country that some of it happened before it was even a theory: The United States. When I look at a river I love to look at it through the eyes of the men who saw it hundreds of years ago. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiJvKHj3WPqZ4eOsXVCRChA-tTRli2oI5eEQOKOB_hl9kH1qFhO0gXflrQQnc9wL0MlUcqzYjbQyd0oPH5wQGBRPOnnO2JqDT-SnL0JppUmT3hBCoICdj_5i_0NcnWZDKag_vJ/s4032/20210828_193421.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiJvKHj3WPqZ4eOsXVCRChA-tTRli2oI5eEQOKOB_hl9kH1qFhO0gXflrQQnc9wL0MlUcqzYjbQyd0oPH5wQGBRPOnnO2JqDT-SnL0JppUmT3hBCoICdj_5i_0NcnWZDKag_vJ/w640-h480/20210828_193421.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Imagining how far we are from the things of man, and any hope of rescue should something happen. Also of the people who called this home, and used the rivers and forests as their own highways from community to community. I think of our neighborhoods and what the land must have been like before houses and streets. Before time was measured and hardship was shared but routine. The light is fading, and we're not likely to have much of a view of Pepin, at least the top end of it. And I've seen this river a hundred times, it's nothing new. But it's the something old about it that I really love. For so many years the water has been slowly slipping down the Mississippi, just as it has the Hudson and every river creek and brook in between. It also marks the halfway point of the country, in many ways, and reminds me that I've just gone from this place I call home all the way to the ocean and it's long history - and back to mine. Taking the train home has been fun, but I forgot to think about it's own history. The generations of families taking the train to their homesteads. The traders and business people travelling by train on the exact same path I just took. Their rides weren't quite as comfortable as mine, but I'm sure they were a hundred times more exciting. And even though I'm not journeying to make my mark on the world, or my fortune, or even a simple existence for my family,</p><p>It's so good to be home. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-14507635292690761082021-08-29T15:51:00.002-05:002021-08-29T15:51:33.946-05:00 Operation Lily Put - Heading Home: A slight diversion, or, how I got heat exhaustion<p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: center;"><record scratch> Short walk? I don't think so.</h3><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEQKX9VyaPsEt_90hJDxuiLWYZuGpk3GpY2EbRPg3JSMHJ_SnBStJ_zon0aLX8eAFtXQyjZg972bzPpOUIp2sQvAgPnqAiL15giUVOaE6HK7MT43yyvfMlfLvrvFqQaPOsQ8UY/s4032/20210828_105521.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEQKX9VyaPsEt_90hJDxuiLWYZuGpk3GpY2EbRPg3JSMHJ_SnBStJ_zon0aLX8eAFtXQyjZg972bzPpOUIp2sQvAgPnqAiL15giUVOaE6HK7MT43yyvfMlfLvrvFqQaPOsQ8UY/w480-h640/20210828_105521.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pretty Architecture!<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>My little family has a proud tradition of taking the four of us (me, wife, two kids) on Legendary Death Marches. We've done it so often it's hard to think of examples. I know we did one in New York when we had at least one baby and my mother with us. All I remember from that one was darkness, bright headlights at a highway tunnel, and having to cross that street. But seeing the Statue of Liberty from afar in the cold dark night was worth it.</p><p>And apparently I just whipped up a Legendary Death March myself! At some point I realized Route 66 starts in Chicago. So I looked it up, and the intersection wasn't too far off. Maybe 6 blocks? Less than a mile. Ok, almost a mile. But I had plenty of time and it was nicely air conditioned in the lounge as I planned the trip, so I thought it would be pleasant enough to go outside. Outside, by the way, wasn't pleasant enough. It was blast furnace hot with the sun turned up to full blast. Humidity so thick it felt like I was in Baltimore again. I am really ready to be back on the tundra, or at least in familiar air conditioning.</p><p>So here's where I went, complete with pictures:</p><p>Walk down Jackson Blvd a few blocks and cross the river on a cool lift bridge.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghOh81RpUnCidTx-qs2JU39LMc3hN5iGastZ48wcmZmJId8UL7GOOWuJA4xIZ2w70MQWdkhNWWd_JjfgHeg8KSTXq5sxyF0fR6xNXK8s3wVQKKX3uTLvr1y9O9S43OXNbm46rw/s4032/20210828_102408.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghOh81RpUnCidTx-qs2JU39LMc3hN5iGastZ48wcmZmJId8UL7GOOWuJA4xIZ2w70MQWdkhNWWd_JjfgHeg8KSTXq5sxyF0fR6xNXK8s3wVQKKX3uTLvr1y9O9S43OXNbm46rw/w480-h640/20210828_102408.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>I saw many tourists, but also some random sketchy looking people who looked like they were doing risk probability math in their heads.</p><p>But they didn't bother me.</p><p>Also, I had my "I'm from the city" face on, the one that would make Mom think I needed a hug.</p><p>I realized while waiting at a light that I am directly under the Sears Tower/Willis tower, and took a picture as a selfie without the self because it was too tall to aim at.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd4ZiLd4nQmeAv0WwIGsbdbRr2-rp2CXmQcCIR8dUCPlKKyD6kwoktF5Hd8xRSx9p-AggQhtQTyHLWp0kTrWjfhf0P1kxBsBkoil3gJEF9BBz6cVUtOb05ysmNG4LG40OARPlk/s2944/20210828_102524.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2944" data-original-width="2208" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd4ZiLd4nQmeAv0WwIGsbdbRr2-rp2CXmQcCIR8dUCPlKKyD6kwoktF5Hd8xRSx9p-AggQhtQTyHLWp0kTrWjfhf0P1kxBsBkoil3gJEF9BBz6cVUtOb05ysmNG4LG40OARPlk/w480-h640/20210828_102524.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Walked another couple blocks to Calder's Flamingo, a "Monumental 1974 abstract sculpture" and the location of the free cigarettes mentioned previously.</p><p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXUCirigCJtnfaIFlo8jOR7LTPgScnAt0fCYYUwHBXE9JaR6Chyphenhyphen3akUS6tpNUjs_VeJsI7-3rqXT6HIeYGdEY86S5WjLEBGbKaQ7PFUviTaGJf8ufrlCogMyM94pMQhjDLdiDg/s4032/20210828_103350.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXUCirigCJtnfaIFlo8jOR7LTPgScnAt0fCYYUwHBXE9JaR6Chyphenhyphen3akUS6tpNUjs_VeJsI7-3rqXT6HIeYGdEY86S5WjLEBGbKaQ7PFUviTaGJf8ufrlCogMyM94pMQhjDLdiDg/w480-h640/20210828_103350.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Also I'm pretty sure a shot like this was in <i>Ferris Bueller's Day Off</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>I remember being very impressed by the sculpture when I saw it, and have always wondered when people don't know Calder.</p><p>I guess I thought if someone could make something that big and impressive, everyone would know who they were.</p><p>Continuing on I pass by The Berghoff, the only German restaurant in Chicago.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC8sy_9PAUFTN_t-0OwYyG76c2jqguW3ExXyffZstuVFCti14wWtKHtnshAYtovk4sg9JCxPQJnFSZvKGKtQJ_LOclmP2QJIK0jXlED9diXpgKsS8XB5FO9E4LJ_pee8ArdD2L/s4032/20210828_103439.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC8sy_9PAUFTN_t-0OwYyG76c2jqguW3ExXyffZstuVFCti14wWtKHtnshAYtovk4sg9JCxPQJnFSZvKGKtQJ_LOclmP2QJIK0jXlED9diXpgKsS8XB5FO9E4LJ_pee8ArdD2L/w480-h640/20210828_103439.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Saw the Art Institute of Chicago ahead and there were street signs talking about a Banksy exhibit somewhere.</p><p>I'm not sure if that makes me happy or sad for Banksy, to be honest.</p><p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaawrRDA-494HxIxNGlWj1KRsPAweHmWGL3APNRxGjHX3r9HprnWGmpabEW1rAwTx7N3C7Ysajk1HclY4JBippa6D6ZuyjnMrlQtBDoKSgSPBoa65eXvfJlwjQ_jZpqXz0QaJ/s4032/20210828_103854.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaawrRDA-494HxIxNGlWj1KRsPAweHmWGL3APNRxGjHX3r9HprnWGmpabEW1rAwTx7N3C7Ysajk1HclY4JBippa6D6ZuyjnMrlQtBDoKSgSPBoa65eXvfJlwjQ_jZpqXz0QaJ/w480-h640/20210828_103854.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You're going to want to come back to this image later in the post. Specifically to locate a detail on the left side of the image.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>Saw the Lions, not too crowded, but it'll get worse.</p><p>I saw a sign I'd seen on the east coast that interested me.</p><p>It was the handicap logo, but had an energy of motion to it.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcMI7iuwlkh1fMVH1Se7qt0JeUykv0KIw9W1lplANgW02pkeuu9HnrRI5D-fB7-z0Sunn9CJ1fSds2s9MpfEXAzI80VSSOjfitRMUv0akSeshW2sXNBHMhTHPzgXksbSHrDkCi/s4032/20210828_104028.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcMI7iuwlkh1fMVH1Se7qt0JeUykv0KIw9W1lplANgW02pkeuu9HnrRI5D-fB7-z0Sunn9CJ1fSds2s9MpfEXAzI80VSSOjfitRMUv0akSeshW2sXNBHMhTHPzgXksbSHrDkCi/w480-h640/20210828_104028.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>I took a picture of this one as I wanted to remember to look it up and see what's happening there.</p><p>Turns out it's trying to update the old logo and verbiage for better inclusivity for all disabilities, etc. which I'm fully supporting now.</p><p>Ok, I figure if I've come this far I should go far enough to see Lake Michigan, right?</p><p>So on another block or two and there it is!</p><p>Unfortunately, I forgot to get a picture of the largest lake within hundreds of miles, so here's a picture of me at Lake Michigan in 2005 looking like a goofy dad for the kids.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKH49c-eE6LO-ZYPvXgXSUif11o8zo9qV8HI52iHczCwNXhRWwNCMfgPW0UfjgtgEpHZ9jgmbEzCSvkZde02VaxsoGcrKFguXLWc4-75VAMtS-6KJrDQvdYYBRH_yDNszS_jcc/s640/050807-1207-15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKH49c-eE6LO-ZYPvXgXSUif11o8zo9qV8HI52iHczCwNXhRWwNCMfgPW0UfjgtgEpHZ9jgmbEzCSvkZde02VaxsoGcrKFguXLWc4-75VAMtS-6KJrDQvdYYBRH_yDNszS_jcc/w640-h480/050807-1207-15.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Oh wait, something said Millennium Park.</p><p>That's where the mirror bean thing is, isn't it.</p><p>Fine, another couple blocks, past fountains and gardens, mass yoga in the park, etc.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG7Gu2CQhZyvgmUidYkbOXfY0EKPp8YY4y2h4rDnUizLLy4K7pDaWJ6sB7S371W2G3NDD7Hd0RsL8jk6pDjFMPwR1GP7JSARSghOjZUc3h4buc_E4w_aZI2Y_PFuxY5HqbV-GZ/s4032/20210828_105142.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG7Gu2CQhZyvgmUidYkbOXfY0EKPp8YY4y2h4rDnUizLLy4K7pDaWJ6sB7S371W2G3NDD7Hd0RsL8jk6pDjFMPwR1GP7JSARSghOjZUc3h4buc_E4w_aZI2Y_PFuxY5HqbV-GZ/w480-h640/20210828_105142.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVMeYlp6XPkZFpMDfwy7XHxv4swr1LLlXs8UiljhqcoFOYlNopfQDQhpHM7didtdaCKVUOiXuLvx2xpFnbkOF7j-QOI7NcL02Ku0gUn6LQ8xm-EIJ0BPeGAfNTQ0LR2hIcmUUw/s4032/20210828_104914.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVMeYlp6XPkZFpMDfwy7XHxv4swr1LLlXs8UiljhqcoFOYlNopfQDQhpHM7didtdaCKVUOiXuLvx2xpFnbkOF7j-QOI7NcL02Ku0gUn6LQ8xm-EIJ0BPeGAfNTQ0LR2hIcmUUw/w640-h480/20210828_104914.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Oh and there it is, all reflective and so on.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh97qLJb5UNn0gfrkFSwugFBaox7AqHP7kUVSM2HMcwXRaS2f7g6jkeRc2-htbBK0a3iX8fhrnqH5GI5nx8hCrz8YwN_iSluyDZVjJRmvd3X8uUsGsMX_gNu7sMiRR_MXZXFFw2/s4032/20210828_105040.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh97qLJb5UNn0gfrkFSwugFBaox7AqHP7kUVSM2HMcwXRaS2f7g6jkeRc2-htbBK0a3iX8fhrnqH5GI5nx8hCrz8YwN_iSluyDZVjJRmvd3X8uUsGsMX_gNu7sMiRR_MXZXFFw2/w640-h480/20210828_105040.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>Didn't even go up for a boring selfie, just "click" the camera button and keep walking.</p><p>This made me think of something interesting.</p><p>When you go see something famous like this, which has been photographed so, so, so many times, what makes you think your camera phone is going to be better than anyone else's, much less professional photographers?</p><p>So I propose a new way of doing tourism: The Google Image Search Tour Philosophy.</p><p>When you get to something like the bean, rather than taking a picture, do a google image search for it.</p><p>Pick the best image that most closely resembles the bean on that day, and save it.</p><p>Boom. Perfect picture and you're not even in the way of it.</p><p>Yes, there are some limitations, like not having your child Scout, Tyler, Ashley or Siobhan in the picture when they're five years old.</p><p>But that's what photoshop is for and they didn't even want to be in a picture.</p><p>So now you've just saved the whole family the resulting grumpiness and then tantrum because your son Ruttiger really didn't even want to go on this trip in the first place, and now you're taking a picture of him and he's not at all happy about it, etc.</p><p>I think this concept has legs!</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmxRqqpPUJfZfhnE_7iO062RelFam-OiIGVEsDaJL8H-C38CfqQl1VM8migogxLVJr0dDbBLyjFqT_IBXXYV-S6nP2oteBhu0SmfWWuY0uMtfqQVQJltnNYYbGfnTBwyQonF4/s4032/20210828_105521.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmxRqqpPUJfZfhnE_7iO062RelFam-OiIGVEsDaJL8H-C38CfqQl1VM8migogxLVJr0dDbBLyjFqT_IBXXYV-S6nP2oteBhu0SmfWWuY0uMtfqQVQJltnNYYbGfnTBwyQonF4/w480-h640/20210828_105521.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You saw this image at the top of the post, but it really illustrates the fact that there is a ton of beautiful architecture but after a while it all starts looking the same.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Got some pictures of cool Chicago Architecture, and finally made it to Jackson and Michigan, where Route 66 starts. Except Jackson is a one way in the wrong direction.</p><p><br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgu5fFYL65ebJ8ZWfXQoBhdzHeKKxL1AzIirYCbqZsgM9yaOrskyswGOOGcm3HksSOJE35Q_eMKyZdyBuO-FTQX3T3F0BSftvBrii2d71lqaF2nYZJ5-RFSaO4L7tbMEZR1LDRB/s4032/20210828_105703.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgu5fFYL65ebJ8ZWfXQoBhdzHeKKxL1AzIirYCbqZsgM9yaOrskyswGOOGcm3HksSOJE35Q_eMKyZdyBuO-FTQX3T3F0BSftvBrii2d71lqaF2nYZJ5-RFSaO4L7tbMEZR1LDRB/w480-h640/20210828_105703.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br />I eventually found a sign, and it said it was the END of route 66.<p></p><p><br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3ZinalOS3xRZn4IiwdIWUT4w6o_OlDBzlRR1EOq35BAkueOy094fUdRXVcO08c07Ox3CKESFiHq-XiXUiM3PixOkNdTqGm8nq9Qh3l0OYLIySrJ67bVioYg0uecXGoEmCdMfl/s4032/20210828_105810.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3ZinalOS3xRZn4IiwdIWUT4w6o_OlDBzlRR1EOq35BAkueOy094fUdRXVcO08c07Ox3CKESFiHq-XiXUiM3PixOkNdTqGm8nq9Qh3l0OYLIySrJ67bVioYg0uecXGoEmCdMfl/w480-h640/20210828_105810.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br />Weren't you supposed to "motor west?" Not on that one-way the wrong way! I had an internal conniption about that for some time, until I was looking up street names for this entry and noticed that Adams goes the right way, and apparently it has a "Historic Route 66 Begin Sign" Not only was I dumb enough to be confused, but I actually had to walk past it. And what do you know? I actually got a picture of the <i>back </i>of that Mother Hubbard when I was admiring the Banksy posters.<p></p><p><br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwOr1KHZKt1yKN2MZqQH3JdpEyV8Z3hg56Zq2eIWUFBGfZ-PMkfXcJuEVnf3EPPykHMhP3f4UYxtqBa5ISebuR_Q9WofPjq9KkOqL_idNAoMK98QXYRkbotqAHkpo1YN_r6Ue-/s844/detail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="844" data-original-width="807" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwOr1KHZKt1yKN2MZqQH3JdpEyV8Z3hg56Zq2eIWUFBGfZ-PMkfXcJuEVnf3EPPykHMhP3f4UYxtqBa5ISebuR_Q9WofPjq9KkOqL_idNAoMK98QXYRkbotqAHkpo1YN_r6Ue-/w612-h640/detail.jpg" width="612" /></a></div><br />I just spent an awful long time on google maps verifying that this is indeed the sign that indicates the beginning of route 66. Thus allowing us to motor west, much to my relief. I'm an idiot. It's not like that was the<i><b> Only Reason I Went On This Death March!</b></i><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsF4DSIUp1078oUzOCMYb4hWAT1OoScQBjI6DnJV1Al6PQt_RKr0W5-StX5BWolovgeU3ek9eAxILWf6zuq4mCDTGvv05JuBdqvUz23Do0EKNLtLNw75QOAb_N5hXNkiLaK3aK/s4032/20210828_110810.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsF4DSIUp1078oUzOCMYb4hWAT1OoScQBjI6DnJV1Al6PQt_RKr0W5-StX5BWolovgeU3ek9eAxILWf6zuq4mCDTGvv05JuBdqvUz23Do0EKNLtLNw75QOAb_N5hXNkiLaK3aK/w640-h480/20210828_110810.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>On my way back I got a classic image of being under an El. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeR5M-WJWx1-J9uX9NA3xhPQWMID3H5iL016uOHfmlmNPatBEXP-w8cLfiYm6ug8Lh0g21vB8E7Xqk33Ayldphd8mpqpeKDMwXbiRLF52YKSokMPVlkLQ9vMK9yE-SuBvwsDB2/s4032/20210828_111314.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeR5M-WJWx1-J9uX9NA3xhPQWMID3H5iL016uOHfmlmNPatBEXP-w8cLfiYm6ug8Lh0g21vB8E7Xqk33Ayldphd8mpqpeKDMwXbiRLF52YKSokMPVlkLQ9vMK9yE-SuBvwsDB2/w480-h640/20210828_111314.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p>By this time I was completely drenched in sweat. And possibly starting a sun burn. Jeans for the train good, not so much for the 2.7 mile walk I just took. I was starting to feel a bit.. ethereal? Every once in a while a crosswalk would have a constant heavy wind, and that would cool me enough for a few blocks.</p><p>I know it's not all of Chicago, but that's an awful lot of iconic Chicago items. </p><h1 style="text-align: center;">And I did all of that (2.7 miles!) in 45 minutes. </h1><p style="text-align: center;">I checked the timestamps. That's an average of 3.6 mph.</p><p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEianf6W_xmBsduYECrnGdbes6jzjyYnwvFuhhcsl8flKvGMU1rf5JvpU8OTQlBI6K5mCEKFu5OLCvbggoYlYyJSUkgeUH79bfQrdeoZv7zWvu1qmbMn6eaNZS7QtUQ5bDM8cJ-l/s4032/20210828_111502.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEianf6W_xmBsduYECrnGdbes6jzjyYnwvFuhhcsl8flKvGMU1rf5JvpU8OTQlBI6K5mCEKFu5OLCvbggoYlYyJSUkgeUH79bfQrdeoZv7zWvu1qmbMn6eaNZS7QtUQ5bDM8cJ-l/w640-h480/20210828_111502.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />But by the time I got to the main entrance at Union Station, and headed down the "Untouchables" stairs (or not, remember the mirror trick) I thought I might tumble down them light the stroller in that movie. But I was fine, and also discovered that the air conditioning in there was super cold! I sat on the furnished benches and tried to concentrate on cooling off and maybe drying a bit. Just as I thought I might have it under control, a drop of sweat falls from my face onto the floor, as if scripted.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv9DYnPJleFSS7Ac7kz5AKnVkQmC9xMuZkPHFHJyRBvZBaceAFT5VrO7k6zI60uQMTK6vd7CPyLcgRfT9j5ErzhCJgP6sTFzCdVZy9fdc4eZArgFS_u9_zq4eBfviwXF-GBorA/s4032/20210828_111626.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv9DYnPJleFSS7Ac7kz5AKnVkQmC9xMuZkPHFHJyRBvZBaceAFT5VrO7k6zI60uQMTK6vd7CPyLcgRfT9j5ErzhCJgP6sTFzCdVZy9fdc4eZArgFS_u9_zq4eBfviwXF-GBorA/w480-h640/20210828_111626.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>Went to the nice lounge, got a clean shirt out of my big suitcase, changed into it in the bathroom (in a stall!) and found a place to sit, try and continue the cool down, and write some travelogue. It wasn't until I was changing my shirt that I realized I hadn't put my mask back on. So I just paraded through Union Station looking like an anti-masker. It's things like this that will make me want to just abandon all of my stuff, taxi to the airport, buy an expensive ticket and just fly home rather than show my face again. Good thing I'm wearing a mask, nobody will recognize me. But I was fine, and appreciated the fact that I had a nearly full water bottle.</p><div><br /></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-42156169545684952012021-08-29T15:13:00.003-05:002021-08-29T15:13:38.470-05:00Operation Lily Put - Heading Home: The overnight train ride<h3 style="text-align: left;"> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4_PcIEP5xsKD5xRBBlgXwGn7JORASdo-uIzH9o52i19pBF7RHDvSRTiS-ifAIU05yi1EQYNijNUW1MSMlF-0SLzIttemMH6pfGYC2MNdvNa8WDfx8N7CkRFvpUJfKz5_np_mW/s600/ezgif.com-gif-maker.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="338" data-original-width="600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4_PcIEP5xsKD5xRBBlgXwGn7JORASdo-uIzH9o52i19pBF7RHDvSRTiS-ifAIU05yi1EQYNijNUW1MSMlF-0SLzIttemMH6pfGYC2MNdvNa8WDfx8N7CkRFvpUJfKz5_np_mW/w400-h225/ezgif.com-gif-maker.gif" width="400" /></a></div><br />Saturday (with some Friday night mixed in)</h3><p>I climbed into my top bunk -- and I mean climbed. I don't know how anyone less mobile than me would do it. Wasn't sure if I wanted to sleep in my clothes, or set up a whole bedtime thing. Decided on sleeping in my clothes, as they had already been sweated through a couple times, and I was going to need to change them in the morning anyway. There were too many pillows, and two Amtrak blankets that were so nice I considered stealing one of them. The bed itself was fairly comfortable, and there was a seatbelt/web on the lower half so you might not roll out of bed. Except there wasn't a barrier on the "top" half and I spent a lot of the night worrying I was about to go headfirst out of the bunk. It ended up being really almost too warm and by the end of the night I was in full pajama mode. I didn't pull out the CPAP because there really wasn't anywhere to put it, and I didn't want it to fall off. Also, I was alone in the roomette and couldn't hear anything from the other roomettes all day, so I figured if I snored it would be okay. Just couldn't sleep. My legs wanted to run a marathon, my brain wanted to go to sleep, and my instinct to survive was trying to be as close to the window as possible so I didn't fall off. Ok, maybe it was all the caffeine after 4pm. I am old, after all.</p><p><i></i></p><blockquote><i>[Correction: Turns out I was backwards. You climb up to the rack and then head into the bed, so the webbing to keep you in is focused on the upper body, and the slightly narrow portion of the bed is where your feet are. Also makes more sense that you would climb "up and in" rather than "up and try and get your legs turned around and in." Thanks to a discussion with the wife about the arrangements. I think I'll bring her with me next time so I don't sleep in a bed wrong again!]</i></blockquote><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvt3nzqJxTVq6OKeTpGsq0NOpg_9ZuNT91MdafXUsRuzPQusSrCIAOKL8Nr-312O12mL_sV9cEmqERz7qrcQLvwg1J5umsWTQeodMCqPOcZIn2scyOyd2NWpJfEHS-rJqC2X7P/s4032/20210828_073228.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvt3nzqJxTVq6OKeTpGsq0NOpg_9ZuNT91MdafXUsRuzPQusSrCIAOKL8Nr-312O12mL_sV9cEmqERz7qrcQLvwg1J5umsWTQeodMCqPOcZIn2scyOyd2NWpJfEHS-rJqC2X7P/w640-h480/20210828_073228.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Me, in bed. Loved the Amtrak Blanket! Oh and to the right on the wall is a little purse-like thing you can put your glasses/phone/whatever in while you sleep. Conveniently placed for those people smart enough to sleep the right direction in the bed.</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzIwDfn1nxuzc9Ii2clA0gSCaooXsxfhoJ3udPfmKf6xWKwxefAcAIZwRnJird58dEsYzivbKWk3OoPzvtR5bY1T6iIBksIXai17RntmtlD6_AjkaIeT1cWdvIKko_EYLNlPW/s4032/20210828_073219.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzIwDfn1nxuzc9Ii2clA0gSCaooXsxfhoJ3udPfmKf6xWKwxefAcAIZwRnJird58dEsYzivbKWk3OoPzvtR5bY1T6iIBksIXai17RntmtlD6_AjkaIeT1cWdvIKko_EYLNlPW/w640-h480/20210828_073219.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Above: Spot for luggage, but mine got to sit in a seat.<br />Below: Curtains over the door and window to passageway<br />Left: One of the webbing straps to keep you in bed</td></tr></tbody></table><p>The train was pretty quiet beyond the train noises - no loud neighbors or people in the hallway. The rocking of the train was actually quiet nice and I didn't feel too nauseated. I woke up way too early many times. Finally checked the clock, as I was sure my 7am alarm was about to go off. It was 3:15.</p><p>In the end I feel like I got about three hours sleep, but don't think it's the roomette's fault. Got out of bed groggy and not wanting to interface with humans, so breakfast was out. I really wanted some coffee, but wasn't willing to put in the actual work to get any. So I had free bottled water and three mini tootsie rolls. Breakfast of champions.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3CvZDehLBoYQSCh1jm9ugyl50MZzR-FuDqKirWvo_KHnOqjqrjMoVRslC6u6oq2-Q5e-rV2AeYLZuajxP2ixusvQMSlIF0jWe2doe5o02SMMWGvgv-iLdl3eMzu4oLFMuE9Op/s4032/20210828_072706.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3CvZDehLBoYQSCh1jm9ugyl50MZzR-FuDqKirWvo_KHnOqjqrjMoVRslC6u6oq2-Q5e-rV2AeYLZuajxP2ixusvQMSlIF0jWe2doe5o02SMMWGvgv-iLdl3eMzu4oLFMuE9Op/w640-h480/20210828_072706.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The view from my upper window when I woke up. Bad angle, motion blurry, partially out of focus</td></tr></tbody></table> and it's one of my favorite pictures from the trip. I also feel like it resembles the paintings my great-uncle Pitt used to create.<br /><p>Here's a quick tangent to describe where I sat most of the ride..</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_bu44OGQrReTwIIumAT6rDcCoh86AJ417KJGSOB8BQTWqOCRyk9Sp-zrrExUR6gQhkkFPgPymBy949SDzyyOKZ0YHK9E0kQmTevIRnqoZlZvDxTu-c7N84Ey9myimLJuXcclf/s4032/20210828_075045.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_bu44OGQrReTwIIumAT6rDcCoh86AJ417KJGSOB8BQTWqOCRyk9Sp-zrrExUR6gQhkkFPgPymBy949SDzyyOKZ0YHK9E0kQmTevIRnqoZlZvDxTu-c7N84Ey9myimLJuXcclf/w640-h480/20210828_075045.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>On the left, the long curtain is over the sliding door. You can lock the door from the inside but not the outside. The next curtain covers the window to the passageway. All curtains were heavy, had velcro to make them stick to the opposite velcro on the frame, so you could really feel the privacy.</p><p>Top to bottom in the middle: Mirror with hand towels and lotion soap. Below that, on the left are attendant call buttons and flush button for the toilet, and most importantly two full AC power outlets. On the right side of those is a fold down sink.</p><p>You can see my mask and one of the free water bottles on the extremely useful shelf, which doubles as the second "step" up to the top bunk. Below all of that is the toilet. The illustration on the wall explains how to use the space-toilet. It's pretty straightforward, much like an airline toilet, but one layer above the toilet lid is that reddish countertop. It folds up for toilet use, but when down it's a handy place to put things that you respect so little you would put them on a toilet. It did not smell like a toilet or smell at all, and the fact that it was by the curtains meant you could hold the curtains more tightly against the wall to avoid anyone seeing you - but you didn't have to, as the curtains were rock solid. To be honest, if I hadn't seen it on the layout map of the room in my research, I could have completely missed that there was a toilet there. So handy to have your own though!</p><p>Opposite the toilet was a wall with speakers, light switches, and other sundry items. On the far right you can see a curtain, which when pulled back revealed the upper window. Above the seat you can see a line running down the wall. That's the track for the bed. When it was time to set up bedtime, a handle on the "ceiling" of the roomette pulled the top bunk bed down from the actual ceiling. When it was down, you could still use the chairs, etc. but couldn't fully stand up. In addition to the top bunk, the main seats could be slid together and folded back, then a second mattress went on those. When that was set up you would still have a foot or so between the bottom bed and the door. Tight fit, but workable. For one person it was just gadget heaven and I loved it. If I were sharing the roomette it would have to be someone I am intimate with, as it's a small space. But not <i>get </i>intimate, because those beds were tiny!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij-ODdVH0mPdKP8KsIBDIHjbvTTF9FoouHYRlzE2DXEYGlwqSfI75qzGJaXcz5bMD1eqev5alHe0I98oCBMk1aqCmGBUCBNtuuBIHxuYc-7OMHiOzrYPzkcKnbZ8agOqEMNeOZ/s4032/20210828_094653.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij-ODdVH0mPdKP8KsIBDIHjbvTTF9FoouHYRlzE2DXEYGlwqSfI75qzGJaXcz5bMD1eqev5alHe0I98oCBMk1aqCmGBUCBNtuuBIHxuYc-7OMHiOzrYPzkcKnbZ8agOqEMNeOZ/w480-h640/20210828_094653.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6h41l8G2MlVqrq6MIKGvUWV_tqJ4s4RHQ_nPKDImq5pYdNJhNCePtOOt9iyigQxs5UJFUWBqu_yjJSFH3nYgqVHmD-mIdLEo_dAvc2b-B7lZR4O6-dIqqDqiKijqTRoncBHEQ/s4032/20210828_094424.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6h41l8G2MlVqrq6MIKGvUWV_tqJ4s4RHQ_nPKDImq5pYdNJhNCePtOOt9iyigQxs5UJFUWBqu_yjJSFH3nYgqVHmD-mIdLEo_dAvc2b-B7lZR4O6-dIqqDqiKijqTRoncBHEQ/w480-h640/20210828_094424.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p>Finally in Chicago, now it's the normal drill. Get large suitcase through impossibly narrow hallway and break into the fresh air of the terminal. Hot, humid, diesel-ey fresh air. I notice there is a large group of Amish-like folks getting off the train. I don't know what exact flavor they are, so I'm going to call them Amish. I'm sorry if that's wrong and I offend anyone, but to be honest they're not going to be reading this if they're any good at spurning the technologies of the "English."</p><p>Made my way to the Grand Hall, because I really enjoy seeing beautiful station architecture, and it seemed like a good place to start. I don't remember being there before but it was indeed impressive. And they even had benches for the unwashed masses to sit on! Looking around it occurred to me that the stairs from the movie Untouchables was probably nearby, and it turns out they were right behind me. Ok, so I don't know if it was the north stairs or south stairs, but they're identical except for the orientation. So if I did get it wrong, please hold your computer up to a mirror when you look at the image. Way too lazy to check for myself.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih-T0Bn1ouVvIWVtcw3_jTSU1O7zZUxT0Jd-Q4s-KE9WPG57YPvs5Inu1rUUGq8-DZQNhRr4d0TkqM-YFP-otEa2ir4yjlE7vrCLFmPhsfAosoqM6gNeSpb4Iam4csih_sF0cq/s4032/20210828_094412.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih-T0Bn1ouVvIWVtcw3_jTSU1O7zZUxT0Jd-Q4s-KE9WPG57YPvs5Inu1rUUGq8-DZQNhRr4d0TkqM-YFP-otEa2ir4yjlE7vrCLFmPhsfAosoqM6gNeSpb4Iam4csih_sF0cq/w480-h640/20210828_094412.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p>Found a Dunkin' Donuts and got a Latte and a breakfast sandwich, rightfully thinking the three tootsie rolls weren't probably enough. I also found the special people lounge right off the grand hall, as well. It wasn't anywhere near as nice as the one in New York, and there were a lot more people who had access. But it was a clean, well lighted place and they had lots of couches. Honestly it was worth it just to have a place to leave my big suitcase while I waited. It was a 4-ish hour layover and I had some time to kill. I noticed that even sitting still on a comfy couch I could still feel the train rocking back and forth. That continued on through my layover and now I'm back on a train typing this, so I don't know how long it will last when I get home!</p><p>Even though I was tired, I thought I might take a walk outside. Just a short one, maybe see some architecture. What could go wrong?</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-29011132531111866482021-08-28T15:48:00.001-05:002021-08-28T15:48:11.784-05:00Operation Lily Put - Heading Home: Connecticut to New York<p>Buckle up, this post going to be a bumpy (though hopefully amusing) ride!</p><p>It's Friday - time for the great train ride! I'll be going from Stamford to Penn Station, and transferring to the Lake Shore Limited. That will take me upstate New York then straight west along the bottom of the great lakes to Illinois overnight. Coming into Chicago the next morning, I'll hang there for a few hours and get on the Empire Builder, and a mere 19 or 21 or 43 hours later, I'll be home. Well, in Saint Paul. But close enough!</p><p>I've been on my share of trains in other countries, and they're neat and all, but there is something super romantic and exciting and adventurous about a train journey in the United States. <i>(tangent: An Irishman and a Texan were talking and the Texan bragged that you could get on a train and not get from one of the state to the other in less than two days - to which the Irishman said "So? Our trains are slow too!" Not sure why it's an Irishman.)</i></p><p>When I was little (like, 9 or less) my mother and aunt and I took the train (Empire Builder) to Chicago for a few days to visit their aunt. My great aunt. But we just called her Aunt Lil. <i>(Oh! I just saw a connection - though Lily isn't named for my great aunt Lil, but partially for her great grandmother, my wife's grandmother, who was, of course, named Lil.)</i></p><p>I can see that this post is not going to be very focused. Already two paragraphs in and they're actually just short sentences followed by random stories and jokes. (I'm on a train, in my own space, I've eaten an actual meal, and the curtains are drawn. Mask off and there might be a little bit of Jameson to keep me and my luggage company. You're welcome.)</p><p>Back to my childhood.. I know I did that trip more than once, but the most memorable was when I was in fourth grade. Mom pulled me out of school for a couple days and I remember feeling quite conspiratorial, like I had just been legally truant! The train station was literally Midway between the Twin Cities in a new (then) building. It was like going to the airport, but without security. Or airplanes. The train was huge and impressive and had a very distinctive smell. It was the smell of train, add some actual cooking diner car, get everyone to smoke cigarettes, booze up half the breaths of the passengers, and maybe toss in some Old Lady Perfume for good measure. That assembled creates the magical scent you could only get on a train in the 1970's. Now you have to remove the actual food in the diner car and swap in microwave meals, take away the cigarettes altogether, and minimize the booze. But you know what? It still smells like train!</p><p>We would go to the diner car and eat on white tablecloths while all of the food and dishes rattled around, or we would go sit in the Vista Car and look at the scenery passing by in full color, 3D surround-sound. At one point the train stopped and there was an unidentified delay. I saw a guy running across a farmer's field and said "hey there is a guy running away from the train across that field" - to which everyone shushed the imaginative nine year old. Not five seconds later some adult genius says "Hey there is a guy running across that field" like it was brand new news or something. Anyway, I'm not exactly sure why he was doing that, but we had apparently hit someone and he was going for help? If you add two and round up then it's actually half a century ago, so some details may be fuzzy. So we end up waiting for a long time while they sort things out and my Mom got to explain what suicide was to me. But I remember it being a beautiful blue sky puffy clouded day in the Vista Car, so it was a fun tragedy or something. Later I was wandering the train like you would let a kid do unattended in the 70's (not that I'm about to Boomer Rant about how we used to eat asbestos and formaldehyde for snacks and *we* turned out ok. (But we did)) -- and we must have gone through a tunnel or something, because I didn't see the "stop here, don't go past this unless you work here" sign and wandered into what seemed like an office on a train. The guy from the field was there! Everyone turned to look at me and tell me to go back, I wasn't supposed to be there, etc. and I slunk back to my adults. That's about all I remember about the train, so it must have made an impression on me.</p><p>We ended up getting to Chicago just fine, and saw Aunt Lil. She told me about how she used to make gloves in a factory, how she had a daughter named Madonna (or Mona?) who had died when she was a teen or something - which felt like TMI for a nine year old, but there was a portrait on the wall, so.. We got to stay in an actual Chicago apartment, and I don't think I'd even been in an apartment like that before -- there was a back door! On an apartment! Leading to stairs and trash! It did not seem as glamourous as Bob Newhart's apartment, but it was the right city and that was enough for me. The trip was fine - we went to a German restaurant and Mom made me get milk with lunch and I wanted pop and the milk was gross. It's possible I just took the kids to the same restaurant a few years ago on one of our family trips. After all, how many German restaurants are there in Chicago, right? We passed some art that was car bumpers welded into the shape of a horse and Mom took a picture of me, bowl cut bangs and my fanciest nylon disco shirt (with snaps, not buttons) that had collars big enough they could just touch the tops of my shoulders. I loved that shirt. But it was a different time. We also took the bus, which was a disappointment after the "el" which seemed like a subway at times. I thought when you were in a subway you were supposed to be old jaded and cynical and not smile, so I put on my best apathy face. Mom thought I needed a hug and completely blew my cover as an authentic subway rider. But the bus was crowded and just like our buses, so it was annoying. And then mom got cross with Aunt Mary because we needed to go another three blocks -- but Mom called her out on it and she clarified that it was three "hundred (100 addresses) blocks" so that meant more like nine blocks. I'm almost done here, but my favorite moment and most seventies thing ever is my last memory of the trip - we were going to go up the Sears Tower (did, don't remember it) but in the plaza outside they were giving away these cute little 5 cigarette sample packs to people, and my adults made me go get two more because they were free. WHAT? Apparently they'll give more samples to the nine year old because he's wearing an amazing shirt? Also, the train ride home to Minnesota was boring because we didn't hit anyone. We did go through a town called "Tomah" which sounded like a made up name to me. Apparently tonight's rambling narrative is brought to you in the style of Allie Brosh - look her up, she's awesome.</p><p>As I was saying, it was a Friday in 2021 and I was going to train home. The trip from Stamford was fine, comfortable even. Not too crowded, and I got on the right train. Much like my daughter I go through all of the possible "oh shit" scenarios before I do something, and this one had a whole bunch of them, mostly involving getting on the wrong train and ending up in some kind of Borough. One of my concerns was that I would get on a train going the wrong way. I've got some cardinal orientation issues these days, but was really confident (because I looked on Google Maps) that the platform I was on had trains going north on it. And I wanted to go south. Didn't help that they had departure times, random destinations, but no train numbers on the status signs. It seems like that might be one of the more important pieces of information, but what do I know? My town only has three trains in it. Much to my surprise, after a few northbound trains, my train showed up going southbound. I know they know what they're doing, but it just seemed dangerous to me to have trains going different directions on the same tracks. I have enough trouble trying not to imagine the first scene of "Unbreakable" every time a train speeds up, I don't need to know there is potentially another train headed straight for us.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRdqkKY_wrFo3xSwP7IpxBPqdnMSULYUlqoVZ-e3n_lC7gTepaD5ypuFsyDWzgVOKLXLmnovR0-kJPSmZWWm-joxBbyXVbCwDK4ky07RelwzSAcwmkp7Q1nwXnLaMkEEu8oLyI/s4032/20210827_125108.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRdqkKY_wrFo3xSwP7IpxBPqdnMSULYUlqoVZ-e3n_lC7gTepaD5ypuFsyDWzgVOKLXLmnovR0-kJPSmZWWm-joxBbyXVbCwDK4ky07RelwzSAcwmkp7Q1nwXnLaMkEEu8oLyI/w640-h480/20210827_125108.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Where am I again?</td></tr></tbody></table><p><i>Which reminds me. I'm not easily scared, but when you're on a train ticking along at Amtrak miles an hour and another train goes past you on a neighboring track at Metro miles per hour, it makes this huge WHOOMPH and then whooshing sound and scares the bejeezus out of me. Still kinda cool though.</i></p><p>Comfortable though (snooty snort here) coach seating, it felt odd on this trip not to have a seatbelt. But I guess seatbelts don't help much in train crashes. But no cup holders. I had a Big Gulp sized iced latte (which apparently is just a Pumpkin Spice latte without the Pumpkin spice, but they made it special for me) and needed a place to put it. So I let it sweat all over my leg. Seriously though, why is that detail even worth mentioning?</p><p>I was well informed and sought out the "quiet car" - which is one of the best things ever. When someone tells you about the quiet car, they always relate a story of someone getting forcibly removed for taking a phone call. But it's always a friend of a friend, so.. Another philosophical point - I got on a train with a very large suitcase and at no point did I pass through even a metal detector. At Penn station I was amazed at the number of different law enforcement types I saw -- not number of officers, but number of different agencies that had many officers and big guns wandering around. And yet here I am on a train with any kind of bad thing in my luggage you could imagine. I fact, you could even say "bomb" on a train and I'm sure they would just find you a mixed drink with that word in it, instead of kicking you out, putting you in an orange jumpsuit and taking you to Cuba. Long story short, I sure did like that quiet car.</p><p>Regardless of my mental state of late, I can always go into problem solving mode when I travel. It's a logistical mindset and it allows me to get from point A to point B with the most efficient, least anxiety causing method available. This is my state for the next two days, and I have a feeling I'll sleep for a week when I get home. But the beauty of that state is that it allows you to do things you normally wouldn't. Like ask for a custom Latte at a Dunkin Donuts while a clearly deranged woman next to you argues about the "$3 drink on the sign just give me one of those" with the manager. Or reply to a truly scary authentic East Coast Irishman with a "no shit, right?" because you're in travel mode. Also, if I have to talk to an official or clerk or ticketing agent in public I just pretend to be my brother, talk like him, act like him, etc. Works every time, because he doesn't wig out if he has to talk to another human in public. But I digress. (it's what I do)) So the romance of travel helps overcome social anxiety. Kinda neat.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXIBXIULoWUsNL84zmbLKzHR2fWIkkUhzS5kQ5Txrjfn_LUKYbMDd7LNrYzUMuBSesyZ1Kt-e5TA1pUst7ZQmYgGGosQ51IkbmWH-E42zL4lDS0iyOFGuyiMaeqm4AMmR8Pa6/s4032/20210827_133313.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXIBXIULoWUsNL84zmbLKzHR2fWIkkUhzS5kQ5Txrjfn_LUKYbMDd7LNrYzUMuBSesyZ1Kt-e5TA1pUst7ZQmYgGGosQ51IkbmWH-E42zL4lDS0iyOFGuyiMaeqm4AMmR8Pa6/w640-h480/20210827_133313.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>Coach seat riding into New York City (my sister mentioned this week that even though she lives near NYC every time she hears that particular string of words, she thinks of the phrase "git a rope!" from the Pace Picante commercial in the 80's. And I do too!) I hadn't really seen the skyline in a long time, and was amazed at some of the tall buildings. Yes, I saw the twin towers and the tall buildings back in the day, but they're making these buildings that are like twice as tall as everything else, and thin as rails! You'd think if they were building something that tall they'd go for the wide model or something. But those are just another one of the things I love seeing from trains. You get to see the underside of the city, graffiti and orange vest wearing workmen and all. Going into the city we got to look down into countless back yards and it was fascinating to see the different configurations, pools, driveways, and patios. Someone can have a super cool trendy urban patio with light strings and tile, and the next door neighbor has a bad lawn with a Honda Civic parked on it. And to be honest, I have to admit on hot days like today was, I watch for pretty ladies sun tanning in the buff in their back yards. Tall privacy fences don't keep the commuter from seeing your scandal! And no, I've never seen one. But I will continue to look for them, even if it's just for the 10 year old me who thinks that happens a lot.</p><p><i>Ok, so I'm already at 2500 words, which is 500 more than the last post and I haven't even gotten to Penn station. I would like to blame the siblings who said they enjoyed my ramblings for this. That and I'm stuck in a train car too early to go to bed and the wifi won't stream anything to save it's life. And the only downloaded shows I have on my phone are a bad BBC scifi drama and a movie with Matthew Modine and Jennifer Grey trying to win a sailing competition. And that's been on there for almost a year, I should just delete it. Maybe. I'll let you know how it ends tomorrow. (Update: Stunning win at the last minute, shocker) The point being you've read this far, you might as well keep going. This blog post is essentially a fidget spinner for my hands on the laptop. But aren't they all, really?</i></p><p>So I finally reach New York City ("git a rope") and get off to train to realize it makes sense that the train platforms and such aren't air conditioned, but that's not really very comfortable. I knew I was going to "Moynihan" something and found some signs on the floor pointing away from All Things Leading to Air Conditioning, but I followed them anyway. I end up in a beautiful concourse that to be honest reminds me of the old pictures of Penn Station but maybe passed through a couple of "don't remember it very well" filters, but there are iron beams and glass and open spaces. I liked it. It was the Moynihan Train Hall, and it was a large open area that promised retail shops and conveniences.. some time in the future. After all, it's the cities newest grand civic icon, as the first google result will tell you.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHMm1Bw6zlCpZINRvE1om1FCr2FdC5YTep1beeH2VQRySP-KlZUfxpUL4-Knv91mxfCR1yrz5OEi1M-zNGYlsEWCHmc2Sbocld1TjPKUI7TkjWgHwBsXT5_jppiCYm1l8LOkn/s4032/20210827_134751.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHMm1Bw6zlCpZINRvE1om1FCr2FdC5YTep1beeH2VQRySP-KlZUfxpUL4-Knv91mxfCR1yrz5OEi1M-zNGYlsEWCHmc2Sbocld1TjPKUI7TkjWgHwBsXT5_jppiCYm1l8LOkn/s320/20210827_134751.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt5s90rk6AzOZEml4b0nGMoHUw6zwJ1K7GpGmH7BUHVoafg5knP9wQfHMKFu6M6nPHP0vsimwqpQiGZHijyFFlf9A9MIay0ZU1DoKKpBpYZE6pAF83yy1RZDf-r6R5RTE0fBKz/s4032/20210827_134754.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt5s90rk6AzOZEml4b0nGMoHUw6zwJ1K7GpGmH7BUHVoafg5knP9wQfHMKFu6M6nPHP0vsimwqpQiGZHijyFFlf9A9MIay0ZU1DoKKpBpYZE6pAF83yy1RZDf-r6R5RTE0fBKz/s320/20210827_134754.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>It's a beautiful terminal, except for a few things that make you realize it's an evil expression of the modern age. There is nowhere to sit. If you want to wait, you have to prove you have a ticket and then you get to go into a glass box that looks like the smoking section of an old Denver airport, except you can see through it and it doesn't smell like (not cigarettes!) burning cigarette filters. Also, all the murals showing the shops that are going to be there some day don't actually have shops in them yet.. so it's really just a large room you can only stand in. But the light through the skylights in beautiful! (One of the "future food" places had the name "this must be the place" <a href="https://lmgtfy.app/?q=this+must+be+the+place+mormons">https://lmgtfy.app/?q=this+must+be+the+place+mormons</a>)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn6qn6GlxBx8McukBMFewnxRx8uwRZgzFczgOGZldBj1TTy3vKQzwsMBSD8n0op5yYX3Ygqw9zW6uU2dOvUsWVNW8dNjUXfaMxkhWvnsx15j3Ec_bORr2VPcznyoNau2E6fNUR/s4032/20210827_135242.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn6qn6GlxBx8McukBMFewnxRx8uwRZgzFczgOGZldBj1TTy3vKQzwsMBSD8n0op5yYX3Ygqw9zW6uU2dOvUsWVNW8dNjUXfaMxkhWvnsx15j3Ec_bORr2VPcznyoNau2E6fNUR/w480-h640/20210827_135242.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>One of the first things I wanted to do was go outside, breathe fresh New York air, etc. Found an exit and popped out. Hot. Beautiful view down the streets with the Empire State Building front and center. Posted to Facebook, as one does. While I'm doing this I'm hearing a monologue from a guy that if someone wrote it and put it in a movie would be described as "heavy handed, unnatural, not believable, and too clichéd for any decent script" - lots of colorful words and accusing "some guy" of things, etc. He's a large balding man in an orange shirt, wiping his brow actively due to the heat. I'm trying not to stare but also working on a way to take a picture without looking like I'm taking a picture. Meanwhile I look up and see three guys in Hasidic outfits coming through the people picking them off one by one with some question. One gets to me and says something but too many awesome concerts at First Avenue means I can't hear anything in a loud spot like this, so I just went with "no, sorry" and he left -- meanwhile loud guy says something even louder and I look over and he locks eyes with me. So now he's going to say something and I have to acknowledge it. Great. He's going "Am I Jewish? Do I look Jewish?" and holds out his heavily tattooed arms. I'm about to lose my mind. Are those swastikas? Is this white power? Lord take me now. Closer inspection shows green shamrocks, etc. and a very Irish guy. So I give him "no shit, right?" and try and shrug it off while looking then back to my phone at Facebook and a top ten list about bad pajama commercials. Apparently it worked. He laughs and heads into the terminal. I get a picture on the sly as he's going in. In Apocalypse now there is the phrase "never get off the boat!" and I am now thinking "never leave the terminal!"</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEBDSj1JFZvZ1TrXLeRrtNegYp768V4YjeIxLQ0PmAIrc1gHHualDNa9c3NviFNhHL134XTjNkStuqa8fWDwA5BQWyTy8HoMwbaVUVNpFi6SIzloSAFT4TjAPS-X39As8P-6G1/s4032/20210827_135645.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEBDSj1JFZvZ1TrXLeRrtNegYp768V4YjeIxLQ0PmAIrc1gHHualDNa9c3NviFNhHL134XTjNkStuqa8fWDwA5BQWyTy8HoMwbaVUVNpFi6SIzloSAFT4TjAPS-X39As8P-6G1/w480-h640/20210827_135645.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p><i>Sometimes I think long posts like these are going to convince someone I'm bipolar, since they're so manic. But anyone who would do that stopped reading right around the "disco collar" story, so it's just you and me, friend. Thank you for reading on. The fact that you've gotten this far means you care. Or you're stuck on a train and bored too. Please copy (DON'T SHARE) this to your Facebook wall and you will receive an email from a Nigerian Prince as a reward. Christ, we've just gotten to the terminal?</i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhHgXwgCK2ZwAtkNeqa7JWra42D8DSRYeq3jvc6NfzfSt_MLESC1UK1fqAXUBL10l96yVSpk3exTf2mV_amKhOyw_XoIiiP_XB8JarUDbPyGu9AjxVKeeFlR1A346CPOQWCwD/s4032/20210827_140354.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhHgXwgCK2ZwAtkNeqa7JWra42D8DSRYeq3jvc6NfzfSt_MLESC1UK1fqAXUBL10l96yVSpk3exTf2mV_amKhOyw_XoIiiP_XB8JarUDbPyGu9AjxVKeeFlR1A346CPOQWCwD/w480-h640/20210827_140354.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p>I remembered that because I got the "roomette" option on the train to Chicago, that got me into the Special People Lounge. So I headed up there and somehow it felt *more* air conditioned, which was really helpful later. I sat in a tall yellow high backed chair and enjoy my pretension while trying to figure out my next move. I was actually quite tired, as I hadn't slept long or well the night before and my biggest fear was falling asleep in the incredibly comfortable chair and then waking up nine minutes after my train had left. So I thought about looking at things in the area. I had a bunch of apps that I was going to use on the drive out, but didn't, that had "interesting things nearby" features. What I found was an article about "the old post office" - which was directly across from Penn Station, was built forever ago, had a huge open air atrium in which they had vacuum tubes to speed mail from place to place. It ran most of the mail for Manhattan and had the whole "rain and snow" quote on it's block long façade. (Great band name: Block Long Façade) I was trying to figure out where it was on the map but it was very confusing. It gave the streets, but it would have been (I think?) the building I was in -- but it was an old entry so maybe they razed that building to put this one up. Which sucks, because the old Penn Station looked cool and they destroyed it for a sports venue, and to destroy such a beautiful post office for an Amtrak lobby is just.. sad. (Keep reading! It's not so sad!)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDJryAEYoR_ru53tDxb_BWUdraOQI4aPJpkXqwqZimsaGmythfe5nC7qvBM7iDloSZ1Tkyr_v3JYsYrdm85QnJmTZ3Hrw09wkCEtlWDXwDcCUZWJz7b-3F-l7f4d9qRpNV7LzP/s4032/20210827_140307.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDJryAEYoR_ru53tDxb_BWUdraOQI4aPJpkXqwqZimsaGmythfe5nC7qvBM7iDloSZ1Tkyr_v3JYsYrdm85QnJmTZ3Hrw09wkCEtlWDXwDcCUZWJz7b-3F-l7f4d9qRpNV7LzP/w640-h480/20210827_140307.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p>I was nervously looking up information on roomettes when I came across another "tips for Amtrak" list that mentioned you might want to get your own snacks for cheaper, and that you can bring alcohol and drink it on the sly. So I thought since I had almost an hour and a half I had time to resupply. Before the trip I got a giant bag of tootsie rolls and a giant bag of pink/red starburst, and they've been sitting unopened in the outside pocket of my suitcase for 10 days now. So I needed more, clearly.</p><p>Looking up Penn station it seemed like they had some shops and food places, so I'd go over there. I didn't want to go outside because it was stupid hot even though it looked like it might rain. But I think I figured out I could get there through the underground hallways. So I headed out! I thought about asking if there were lockers I could put my massive rolling suitcase in while I adventured, but didn't want to talk to a stranger - even as my brother - so I figured it would be fun and efficient to carry/drag/wheel it across the noisiest terra cotta the Moynihan people could find. (Note: I did not just document the wormhole I just went down that involved the actress Bridget Moynihan, mistaking her for the actress (Stana Katic, was in Heroes (another wormhole "save the cheerleader save the world")) in Castle, realizing via IMDB she was in "Prey" which was then misidentified as a made for TV movie about a John Sanford novel, which was set in the Twin Cities. You're welcome.)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ZoUvWRRc8j1LyMyWUk-50BfR5QGTUDC9OHptzXFA81yx6pTRpHkPFjDQmO-t_Xg05T2FRcQCZYkPhI53mrxKqnLJZ2-Subosifa9mcMvU4rFd3Bo-bCZ11exWXvW1ohyphenhypheniCBq/s4032/20210827_145604.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ZoUvWRRc8j1LyMyWUk-50BfR5QGTUDC9OHptzXFA81yx6pTRpHkPFjDQmO-t_Xg05T2FRcQCZYkPhI53mrxKqnLJZ2-Subosifa9mcMvU4rFd3Bo-bCZ11exWXvW1ohyphenhypheniCBq/w640-h480/20210827_145604.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><i>There was a noise in the hall of the train car just now and for a moment I got paranoid and thought the not-porter (see below) was going to bust in and say "Dude just stop typing nobody cares!" -- it's like a boring middle aged man pretending to be Hunter S Thompson, except without the drugs. Although the Jameson bottle's cap is stripped so I'm going either have to finish it or pour it into my flask that I forgot I brought. And the train is not going to allow me to do something so precise. Don't worry, it's not a real bottle of Jameson, it's a tiny one I got at a Penn Station Liquor Store. But it cost the same as a large bottle, if that helps! (I'm re-enacting the opening scene of "Jewel of the Nile" as Kathleen Turner getting drunk on airplane bottles of booze with her cat. Great movie. Her winter coat in South America reminds me of taking heavy winter coats to pick up family at the airport who are winging in from Mexico. The pain is real.) If it helps, I'm now reading things and deleting them because you don't care about the chef who dropped everything to show a nice old man where the other part of the lounge was. (Or.. do you? <evil grin>)</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCj5LQrMq83_P9R_mJoI6MAtyNHBzTnXRG9kQ0cvQoAqZMcSxoJ-MDuAHuKm9pO_ET7AFeAMyooPDEzhY7156e6GIwaxk5Vtj4L7S-nGuFp9uV1wKQwzJPpY8W01FhaSQ-aVhE/s4032/20210827_174530.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCj5LQrMq83_P9R_mJoI6MAtyNHBzTnXRG9kQ0cvQoAqZMcSxoJ-MDuAHuKm9pO_ET7AFeAMyooPDEzhY7156e6GIwaxk5Vtj4L7S-nGuFp9uV1wKQwzJPpY8W01FhaSQ-aVhE/w480-h640/20210827_174530.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i><p></p><p>Turns out those hallways and concourses are also not air conditioned, so I got so sweaty I felt like I'd just taken a shower. I did find the wine and spirits place after looping around twice, was very intimidated by the amount of wine you could buy for your subway ride, and got the Jameson. I also ended up also paying $9 for a sandwich that is still in my backpack, uneaten. Might eat it now though, sounds good! (I did, it was.) It was fun going through the crowds and seeing all the different State Troopers and Train cops and Actual Military people who were guarding the subways. There were highly skilled buskers, lost tourists and jaded city folk. I saw homeless people sleeping in the midst of enormous crowds, and thought about COVID and how I was wandering amongst the most people I could, in the most international spot I could, with just a little mask covered in "ships in bottles."</p><p>The best thing that came out of the trip for supplies, besides getting supplies, was deciding to bite the bullet and go outside to get back to Moynihan. It was Very New York out there. Hot and humid, with the smells of street food carts, and clueless tourists standing in everyone's way, taxicabs unloading in the most inconvenient places but somehow getting away with it, and finally seeing that HUGE post office building across the street. Where the Moynihan hall was. And it all started to make sense. The entry I'd read (which talked about how 90% of the old post office was abandoned) was way outdated, and the post office was actually the new Amtrak lobby. I was happy to have seen the façade and all that, so my idiocy was actually well excused. <i>(4,000+ words now. That's 8 pages of single spaced text. Seriously.)</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhot9pSscntivshrqW8kulROZnJOemNKCPv2tLre2OevxsGdX_t6GJMusmSyHNOWE4oaNRMao7M2qBbWkX3Xk1qWE4H5e92Fcnrlc2dBwEjEv2vq5dl9M6ydep6pG2EF7Y6TFEc/s4032/20210827_145205.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhot9pSscntivshrqW8kulROZnJOemNKCPv2tLre2OevxsGdX_t6GJMusmSyHNOWE4oaNRMao7M2qBbWkX3Xk1qWE4H5e92Fcnrlc2dBwEjEv2vq5dl9M6ydep6pG2EF7Y6TFEc/w640-h480/20210827_145205.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i><p></p><p><i>The train just turned off. Lights, engine noise, power outlets, everything. It's not even 10pm local time. Should I be worried? Nope, went back on eventually.</i></p><p>After all of this I had a full backpack, supplies, had sweated completely to the core, and was now waiting for my train to be announced. Sooner than later it is, and I make my way down to board. So much more I could go on about in dealing with strangers finding the car and everything, but suffice to say, I found roomette 004 on the somethingsomething2 car. I was really excited about this part of the trip, because I'd only ever been coach on a train except that one in Germany that was so cold the guy checking passports commented on it. I've seen them in James Bond movies, and North by Northwest (which actually refers to going north on Northwest airlines, now Delta, a Minnesota company!). I had splurged on this option for a few reasons. Things like "I don't like other humans how can I avoid them" and "let's make taking a train cost more and take longer than an airplane." Also, if I was going to have to sleep on the train, I wanted my CPAP and didn't think it'd be cool or inconspicuous to snap into my face hugger mask in the middle of a coach car.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgOulZHXCMRKUcfVg1lyHhBgVxDmque8qf2aOP1prSIMw1ZNiYzOtVZNq_l4SBIWuL-W-KVPb1Lhfqol4hyphenhyphenOX0TWl5g5oc9Avfhx4zdZ1dMSHtfjoPTBMJ-bT_7BJh9Q6xOIPa/s3648/20210827_154759.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3648" data-original-width="2736" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgOulZHXCMRKUcfVg1lyHhBgVxDmque8qf2aOP1prSIMw1ZNiYzOtVZNq_l4SBIWuL-W-KVPb1Lhfqol4hyphenhyphenOX0TWl5g5oc9Avfhx4zdZ1dMSHtfjoPTBMJ-bT_7BJh9Q6xOIPa/w480-h640/20210827_154759.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>So I had a roomette! I'd done research but really wasn't sure what it would be like. It ends up it's like half a sleeper cabin. Two chairs facing each other, a small space and then a sliding door to the hall. Curtains for privacy, all sorts of lights that are hard to figure out how to turn off, and can be transformed into two beds in the form of a bunkbed. No space for luggage, but I just put the Giant Suitcase in the seat facing me and piled the pillows on it. It's like my "Wilson from Castaway" except with pillows. To be honest it does make me feel less lonely. One surprise was the fact that they managed to fit a hidden toilet in the roomette. I actually went and did a bunch of online research to make sure it was something I was allowed to use, and not just a "used to use those, but not now" kinds of things. So cool. There were bottles of water waiting at the seats in the CUP HOLDERS, but still no seatbelts. While the train has an "always masks on" policy, I go rogue and take it off once the curtains are closed. Yup, I'm a rebel. The not-a-porter comes by (something online told me they weren't porters anymore but I can't remember what they're called now) and gave me the lowdown on some stuff, but left enough unanswered questions (Can I use that toilet? When you say you could bring me my dinner was that something you expect to do or would I be putting you out? How often do I have to talk to other humans? etc.) that I wasn't sure about a few things. The dinner part was the worst, since I was actually hungry for the first time in a few days. </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAgr-teIB2kLUmYRD_7U9twNhnfhIHPTwFOW-CkvjlJC6XjUfcd38GegGpqWECkJPRygGOq5MMrAbD_IQ0SvrG3JzDxTn8wRsc_g04iniuxIooepZdDlgCopRyHR2IZ0xSFF0e/s4032/20210827_175053.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAgr-teIB2kLUmYRD_7U9twNhnfhIHPTwFOW-CkvjlJC6XjUfcd38GegGpqWECkJPRygGOq5MMrAbD_IQ0SvrG3JzDxTn8wRsc_g04iniuxIooepZdDlgCopRyHR2IZ0xSFF0e/w480-h640/20210827_175053.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">As you can see my Pillow based travelling companion doesn't know how to wear a mask properly.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>I had worn jeans even though it was 102 heat indexy outside, because I knew (from Germany) that trains could be horribly cold. So when I found a thermostat I cranked it all the way down and I'm waiting to see if I can get cold, much less dry the sweat. No luck so far. One of the things I was worried about - and came true - was getting this expensive spot on the train and being on the wrong side. And yes, I was on the "wrong" side. So I wouldn't be on the Great Lakes side to see the awesome water. As it happens, I was on the Hudson River side, and by the time we got anywhere near the finger lakes much less the great lakes, it was full dark. So I got to see the Hudson, and it was amazing! I had recently finished listening to the 12 hour audiobook about Everything Fur Trading, and the Hudson river was a big part of the history. It was much wider than I thought it would be, and had all manner of interesting boats to look at. I may be missing the great lakes, but I got to see the Hudson -- Palisades and all! Those suckers are *tall*.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVYOReq-nHq6hz885ynbe1cx0vm7_xMq4NxBx5IOJdElgr7t2JeMx1UKvv-fwEbRCXNlTvaWIdAXmsAfiNqd1nnpgNLRyM_y6uaCERHkcPbiZTu0BWLDNBAFuuHdKhslbJT3cD/s2400/Screenshot_20210827-155803_Camera.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="2400" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVYOReq-nHq6hz885ynbe1cx0vm7_xMq4NxBx5IOJdElgr7t2JeMx1UKvv-fwEbRCXNlTvaWIdAXmsAfiNqd1nnpgNLRyM_y6uaCERHkcPbiZTu0BWLDNBAFuuHdKhslbJT3cD/w400-h180/Screenshot_20210827-155803_Camera.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sometimes my phone seems a little "too" smart Wasn't even aiming at the coke bottle</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu9ZGJrfBxTxrUir5e2YquQN2x_556P5EIXTLaMUxSgH1zm-SXJTptMAC9iTOaEC-gqqMXBCPRy_dIu1r-kIWt7pKWMmMGhKC0xf2w5z5yT1p7tZDD_aJdq9UH0OG27cgluJj/s4032/20210827_164940.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu9ZGJrfBxTxrUir5e2YquQN2x_556P5EIXTLaMUxSgH1zm-SXJTptMAC9iTOaEC-gqqMXBCPRy_dIu1r-kIWt7pKWMmMGhKC0xf2w5z5yT1p7tZDD_aJdq9UH0OG27cgluJj/w640-h480/20210827_164940.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9ppsdLOG7I1Uomq6q3Z7aJtvFrR_XuZ_WEHg3qY8cpGiu19vg8ven3GbxmtzsJgRW550_wPSh4pWni2W9QDHQldq5nwa3U4PBzCISHTQ3_ndvxFdRAAxXGDL8f1BZkapzqmSQ/s4032/20210827_160554.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9ppsdLOG7I1Uomq6q3Z7aJtvFrR_XuZ_WEHg3qY8cpGiu19vg8ven3GbxmtzsJgRW550_wPSh4pWni2W9QDHQldq5nwa3U4PBzCISHTQ3_ndvxFdRAAxXGDL8f1BZkapzqmSQ/w640-h480/20210827_160554.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Palisades<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUZi9AHAaGy-Uk1cQ_NeWS2kElPzy1WhBPHfHOFOCQ9Q2M0rxFNKnYTwPVltnBWASblODPnAp5nEW8hrE_ddsfg2uvYzx04Nh2FXE6m1NtEwcURHWb1S3S5LAKec3Jpr7SAC8h/s4032/20210827_163633.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUZi9AHAaGy-Uk1cQ_NeWS2kElPzy1WhBPHfHOFOCQ9Q2M0rxFNKnYTwPVltnBWASblODPnAp5nEW8hrE_ddsfg2uvYzx04Nh2FXE6m1NtEwcURHWb1S3S5LAKec3Jpr7SAC8h/w640-h480/20210827_163633.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjchI8MRbI_eeACpB3tY9fBj5rFl9-yXM4RE5gUymQD7gD9-hsd4mM2FOgSABOk3uyfSreQ7gO-ZLK-WiQxjJNQUoBSlbrxDCcmBAjZ5_3Rcb6RDHk7xc3zAf-jLP_fpOW_3k-s/s4032/20210827_173939.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjchI8MRbI_eeACpB3tY9fBj5rFl9-yXM4RE5gUymQD7gD9-hsd4mM2FOgSABOk3uyfSreQ7gO-ZLK-WiQxjJNQUoBSlbrxDCcmBAjZ5_3Rcb6RDHk7xc3zAf-jLP_fpOW_3k-s/w640-h480/20210827_173939.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghP2e6otLgnyI1c7bkRdR0aZWnuqA6TrmhwwVcxD8W9l-ay7XGRHIh8V6IrnhDR7g6zHxp_63TB694k7545Z9zIBfdqU9VjD2_XlxnmpJ0FO4L7VENwfKNgYumhs00SsN2m3o5/s4032/20210827_173436.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghP2e6otLgnyI1c7bkRdR0aZWnuqA6TrmhwwVcxD8W9l-ay7XGRHIh8V6IrnhDR7g6zHxp_63TB694k7545Z9zIBfdqU9VjD2_XlxnmpJ0FO4L7VENwfKNgYumhs00SsN2m3o5/w640-h480/20210827_173436.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvHmqsLzAS8Ae8E4Bq1_5GgYfxFwtD7Qtc7KXzNl7ojCKTVyfBdGtZTEGAblxyEp4ETQ0s0cKoev82rgOWFXd8paCfUY-FRAb8k3iw3eAIoKm7HogIE_7oGMVNiyThNwHTvtOd/s4032/20210827_172843.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvHmqsLzAS8Ae8E4Bq1_5GgYfxFwtD7Qtc7KXzNl7ojCKTVyfBdGtZTEGAblxyEp4ETQ0s0cKoev82rgOWFXd8paCfUY-FRAb8k3iw3eAIoKm7HogIE_7oGMVNiyThNwHTvtOd/w480-h640/20210827_172843.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>We passed Sing Sing prison, West Point, Saugerties Lighthouse, and so many very cool points. Some I knew, some (most) I had to look up. Got some lousy pictures, but pictures never capture awe in the right way.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTArcwTMEPBtrgA97ty1BK6r_BSxUbngVkUgd1d5cwRdxCrxziHFcXXfFMM2HFWphW-sE0BqLEO16cDCsOjeZfxBCnFVOLXvyWxo_Zco_WFGrf4CEs0d81YC6lrc-E6FXJ7NGa/s4032/20210827_171200.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTArcwTMEPBtrgA97ty1BK6r_BSxUbngVkUgd1d5cwRdxCrxziHFcXXfFMM2HFWphW-sE0BqLEO16cDCsOjeZfxBCnFVOLXvyWxo_Zco_WFGrf4CEs0d81YC6lrc-E6FXJ7NGa/w640-h480/20210827_171200.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>I was getting hungry, didn't know if the not-porter was coming back to offer to bring me my dinner awkwardly, so I sucked it up and decided to find the food place. There are diner cars and club cars and bar cars and who knows what, and I didn't have a clue what I had, or even how to order there given my meals were included in my ticket. But I went anyway! I did not meet Alfred Hitchcock in the hallway and have to intimately squeeze past him, and after two cars entered what might have been a diner car? It reminded me an awful lot of the "hey kid you're not supposed to be in here" car from 1978, but it turns out it was just a bunch of Amtrak employees taking breaks in the diner car. Awkwardly but Big Brotherly asked one of the staff at the microwave bank how to do this, and he told me if I sit down they'll come to me. It wasn't crowded enough that I was worried about having to sit with a stranger, but that was a risk. About fourteen times I almost got up and left out of confusion and anxiety, but thought that would be more suspicious than staying. And of course it was fine. Rather than the Creole dish (too many green onions) I picked the "nonspecific protein" enchiladas. Finally ordered and after a bit of a while was presented with a nice handled bag with my food inside. The guy at the table across from me had been talking to a not-porter about how he was crossing this great nation on trains and had some questions about what kinds of diner cars were standard -- and I realized I was at great risk of being approached to chat about why we're both taking the grand romantic trains of America across this great nation of ours. Never have I been so focused on a cellphone "paint by numbers" game, and he didn't talk to me.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy6wwHcgW7TyhDthi-aT_4HjWpeq1LIHPooeTwqLdjXrZMzNTdpgQRZmhHyezPxUKpSxfLimFsHDjatYLORuUaixj0gHEsCCGbyvL0UdKoz7eszZnBpAGj-LFywiLXyk4_Vd6O/s4032/20210827_172525.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy6wwHcgW7TyhDthi-aT_4HjWpeq1LIHPooeTwqLdjXrZMzNTdpgQRZmhHyezPxUKpSxfLimFsHDjatYLORuUaixj0gHEsCCGbyvL0UdKoz7eszZnBpAGj-LFywiLXyk4_Vd6O/w480-h640/20210827_172525.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>Took the food back to my roomette - actually found it again successfully! No Alfred Hitchcock on the return either. And proceeded to eat my moderately tasty meal like you would on an airplane, with one hand on your drink, one hand on your fork, one hand on the "plate" and one hand on the box of salad/roll/butter/etc so nothing falls off the tiny tray table. The "nonspecific protein" was really pretty good, and I would absolutely recommend it. Because apparently the menus never change, if you take a train in 15 years it'll probably still be available. Dinner was a success! Good news: I'm not actually going to finish the Jameson and have been watering it down for a while now, bad news: I need to navigate the in-roomette peeing exercise again. Like being in an airplane bathroom during heavy turbulence, and if anything goes wrong it goes wrong where you sleep.</p><p>After I finish eating and start typing manically, we get to Albany. The train stops and has to make a connection with another train. There is one train coming from New York, and one train coming from Boston. They meet and connect up passenger cars and continue on to Chicago. Scary math question: How fast would the first train have to be going to meet the second train? Answer: Faster than it was, because it was announced we would have to wait until 7:05 for the other train. Glance at the clock and it says 5:15. Fine, we expect trains to be late and there's a 5 hour buffer in Chicago, we can wait a bit. At least the train isn't bumping all over the place. And then it turns off. All of it. Engine, lights, power outlets, air conditioning... And I'm looking at either 2 hours in a sweatbox and no moving air, or mingling with the other (Likely friendly and chatty) passengers on the platform as we wait. Sweat lodge it is, I guess.</p><p>At some point in the trip I decided I would leave all of my manual clocks (watch, laptop apparently) on Central time and just do the math in my head. (Have I met me? Who thought that was a good idea? Past Robert is a moron.) Turns out it wasn't 5:15, it was 6:15 and the 7:05 was a wild estimate. Sweat box somewhat managed.</p><p><i>Seriously, I think I'm going to have to pull a "Stand By Me" and at the end of this long and winding wordstorm and just delete all the text and take the kids to the beach. If I save it I'll read it tomorrow and make sure it isn't just typed giggling ala Duke from Doonesbury.</i></p><p>And so we reach the end of the first day of the super train journey. The not-porter came by and set up the upper bunk, and it's technically 10 (or 11?) and I could go to bed. I might stay up and play video games a bit though. It's full FULL dark outside, though sometimes we pass a lit intersection. That warrants a honk from the train, as does many things apparently. All I can think of is the property value of everyone we pass blowing the horn. My travelling companion the piece of luggage is nodding off, and I feel like I've exorcised all of the pointless observances onto a keyboard. Enough.</p><p><i>My therapist told me journaling might be a good thing for my mental health. I'm trying to prove her wrong with 6,000 words.</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_6FCQU0POJTZ5Usvv8XxQsuAbkbAEmxXTjm7uzT_PKYoCFDEf1v6cH-Oo7z2arj1xpJkgZuXrIZWZuhtywQpvs8iATfJDg9zI5Na0OaGgmfCRvFVhDEBr1PKfrqRH2XGV1JcO/s4032/20210827_192901.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_6FCQU0POJTZ5Usvv8XxQsuAbkbAEmxXTjm7uzT_PKYoCFDEf1v6cH-Oo7z2arj1xpJkgZuXrIZWZuhtywQpvs8iATfJDg9zI5Na0OaGgmfCRvFVhDEBr1PKfrqRH2XGV1JcO/w640-h480/20210827_192901.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGaJ0zU8nbA1SVtnVbzPr_xNjjdkGFhJj-hfrJ7v8T4ZkGbHhrviDNCIHUw8LDnPIUZYobZWmNeE23Ru2_8ajVelV1VWEI5FczW6OoGRAJBVCPr4L4xxCgRopKgHlVWBDrFkWg/s4032/20210827_231257.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGaJ0zU8nbA1SVtnVbzPr_xNjjdkGFhJj-hfrJ7v8T4ZkGbHhrviDNCIHUw8LDnPIUZYobZWmNeE23Ru2_8ajVelV1VWEI5FczW6OoGRAJBVCPr4L4xxCgRopKgHlVWBDrFkWg/w640-h480/20210827_231257.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i><p></p><div><br /></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-82838500551909998822021-08-27T18:42:00.002-05:002021-08-27T18:42:32.961-05:00Operation Lily Put, days 6-10: (technically) Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut.<h3 style="text-align: left;"><i>Note to the reader:</i></h3><div><i>I have decided to completely forego literary self respect and self discipline as a rule and permanent style of writing. I did a cursory spell check, but I'm not going to groom this text. Also, I have memory issues, so I might be repeating things I already droned on about in a previous post. And I won't shut up about my daughter and how proud I am of her, so just learn to tune it out or something. I will be refunding the price of admission for anyone who can't handle that. For everyone else, Bon Appetit! </i></div><h3 style="text-align: left;">Sunday</h3><p>My brother and I went to lunch in Ellicott City, a small . It was a pretty cool brewpub, and their Rueben was on point. Hard to pass up a proper Rueben. We had great conversations and it was really nice to just chat as adults with the new perspectives we've gained as we get older. His involves becoming a father, and mine involve becoming an empty nester. Being the younger brother he always did everything before me, so this is strange to be ahead of him. His daughter is cute as a button and smart as a whip, as is mine. They just happen to be 15 years apart in age. But I think we're both appropriately proud.</p><p>We walked around Ellicott City for a bit. While COVID has claimed some businesses, they had flooding in recent years that has been hard on the downtown also. Coming from flyover country, flooding isn't something I'm very familiar with, so it was interesting to me.</p><p>I was going to my sister's place in Connecticut Monday, and was looking forward to it. As we get older we somehow get closer to our siblings, and she had been particularly supportive in recent years. I thought if I was going to start slowing down or getting bummed out about seeing Lily off, her peaceful house, smart and interesting husband, and old and friendly dog would be a good place to do it. Except there was a hurricane coming. Right off the coast, everyone is freaking out and preparing for power outages, etc. Their power company braced them for 8-21 days without power in the event of an actual hurricane. Even more, I was supposed to take the train back to Minneapolis from Stanford, and is the weather blows up their schedules, that's just so many different kinds of trouble. So it was "stand by to stand by."</p><p>That evening Lily came over from school as she had a few hours off, and just needed a bit of a break. And she wanted to see me before I left. We sat with my brother and his family and chatted. She has grown to be such a smart and mature young woman, it was more of that pride for me. And Seeing her niece toddling around reminded me how quickly they go from yelling colors at toys to being able to shop for their own food. She leaned into me and cuddled for an hour or more, and she hasn't done that since she was much younger. I could tell she was a bit overwhelmed and wanted to get some quality time in before she truly was set loose in the world.</p><p>As the time for her to leave rolled around, there was much hugging, some tears and more hugging. A few more tears and she was out the door. I didn't envy her drive back to school. So many times I would go over to my mom's for dinner or some event, and at the end of the evening I had to get in a cold car and drive from my old home to my new home. It's a cold that just cuts through you, no matter how warm a summer night might be. And sometimes those drives involve crying with nobody to hug you or even witness it. So when she went to her car I just wanted to run out and fly her to school in my arms. But that wouldn't really help, just delay the inevitable. And by the time she gets to her dorm the crying will be done, the focus will swing around back to the new school and friends, and she'll be fine.</p><p>I didn't cry like I did with Eli. Mostly because with Eli we were launching him into the empty void that is "college" with no understanding of what it meant, how he or we would handle it, much less see him again. I know more now, but it didn't make sending her off sting any less. And to add to the sad, I was jealous of her starting her adventure, and knew she was about to start doing amazing and fun and hard and tiring and great things. And I wouldn't get to see it.</p><p>I bailed on writing a long winded and witty blog post, and went to bed. Sunday I had been tired.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Monday</h3><p>Monday was much more difficult to get started. After a leisurely morning my sister-in-law took me to the train station, toddler giggling in the back seat. They saw me off and I got one last fist bump from my niece's dimply little hands. When you're little you never think of when you'll see an uncle again, but when you're the uncle you worry if you wait to long to return, they'll grow up too fast. So I tried to enjoy the simplicity of the age.</p><p>As it happens, the weather broke milder and no hurricane. Rain, maybe a whisper of wind, but nothing catastrophic. But the previous day apparently a bunch of trains had just been flat out cancelled for flooding and such. So buying a train ticket up the coast proved a bit of a chore. I was playing whack-a-mole with available trains, and finally just bit the bullet and went business class, thus guaranteeing a seat of my choice. As long as my choice was 2F. It took the edge off the stress of navigating a travel method I wasn't used to. And it turns out my seat was directly behind the wheelchair spot, and the seat next to mine was designated handicapped. Even though the train was full, apparently nobody wanted to risk taking that seat from someone who needed it - so I didn't have to sit next to a stranger! Score!</p><p>It was a four hour train ride, and I got to see some of the bigger east coast cities and everything in between. The time passed quickly and before I knew it I was at my destination. My sister picked me up at the station and we headed back to her place. I was already getting more and more tired, but being at their place was very relaxing. They live in a beautiful old-ish house (1920's? 30's?) that had a ton of natural woodwork, art they had collected over the years, and somehow no matter what time of day it was, you could always find sunlight streaming vintage yellow through a window onto a hardwood floor. Whenever I experience that it reminds me that people have been seeing that light for decades in that house, and that time just didn't move very fast from some perspectives. It feels like it might be autumn, and I should smell burning leaves and hear the engines of proper old cars driving by.</p><p>We ate homemade pizza out in the tiki styled screen porch, listened to the katydids create their racket in the wooded areas in the back yard, and talked. And talked. And talked. I told stories, some were funny and some were sad. She told stories upon my stories, and we just played "oh yeah? what about..?" for hours. As I've mentioned, now that we're older we share more with each other. I talked about some things from our childhood that I was trying to work out, and she gave me her own stories to match. It helped give me support, sympathy, perspective, and a new respect for the different lives children live - while growing up together. </p><p>My wife's family communicates via logistics. They'll discuss upcoming plans, rehash how previous experiences could have been done differently. That's not all they do, but it seems to be the backbone of family conversations. Nothing wrong with it, it's just not how my family does it. I don't know what the root cause is. Maybe it's because we have a lot of Irish and "the gift of gab" or maybe it's a love of words and the romance of a past adventure or humor, but we communicate by stories. Much to my wife's boredom, we will tell the same stories over and over again. As time goes by they might become more poignant, a bit funnier, or just a little more incredible. I think part of it was growing up and seeing my father's family getting together and doing the same thing. And to see your father and his siblings rollicking with laughter when you're very young - well, it makes an impression.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>So we told story after story -- getting so far off the original track that one of the targeted topics never even got addressed. Her husband would say "But what about Evan Wolfson?" and I'd say "I'm getting there - but I have to explain *this* part in order to explain that part!" Pretty sure I still owe him the story about the obscurely famous lawyer. Next time!</p><p>The wine flowed easily, and it kept coming out to the porch. I don't usually drink wine, but if it was in front of me, I was going to be a good guest and drink it. I think by the end of the night there may have been Irish whiskey shots? It was pretty late. My poor brother and his wife are so tired from chasing the toddler that our evenings never really went past 11, if that. But up in Connecticut the humid evening air just kept us talking and talking. I think it was 2 or 3 by the time we called it quits - never being able to come to the end of our stories, of course. Because they kinda don't have ends, we just keep living them on and on. But the vino, the late hour, the exhaustion of dropping the daughter at college, and general life caught up with me and I opened up to them about how things were going, and got a little morose, but felt all the better for giving them a better understanding of some of the things that I'm working on these days. The evening as a whole was a hugely cathartic and supportive and an experience I will remember fondly for a long time. The next time I tell the story, I'm sure it'll have another interesting element. </p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Tuesday</h3><p>Goes without saying the next day was tough. Not enough sleep, dehydration, the fact that I don't eat much anymore, and the general exhaustion really caught up with me and I spent Tuesday as a total lump, just relaxing. In the sunbeams. And the silence, except for the occasional tapping of the dogs claws on hardwood as he went to the door to watch something outside, or heard someone in the kitchen getting ice cubes. He's a total fiend for ice cubes. So they give him one or two from time to time as a treat - an inexpensive and healthy low calorie treat. Lucky! Anyway, I lounged for the day. It was a wonderful place to do it, and it was a nice quiet day. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAwbsug3PeuDcoA0G06YImgADdsLbTP2-H4035EqhXd-K7D2kn-YXoTfo3KJQjbhw5CrrcnipW3rwQVK8HZBEta_wuIhMhuayS-5cLCpHXNi1Ff3VX8qG_6streAxt9WKzUhl5/s4032/20210826_114628.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAwbsug3PeuDcoA0G06YImgADdsLbTP2-H4035EqhXd-K7D2kn-YXoTfo3KJQjbhw5CrrcnipW3rwQVK8HZBEta_wuIhMhuayS-5cLCpHXNi1Ff3VX8qG_6streAxt9WKzUhl5/w640-h480/20210826_114628.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Wednesday, Thursday</h3><p>Wednesday and Thursday both kept up the relaxed and peaceful atmosphere. We went to the coast and had lunch at a great safe on the beach, and strolled a bit along the coast as well. Went one night to a Very Nice restaurant and my sister and I played "what's the story with those patrons?" where we go into exasperating detail about how their date is going, or if it's a family or just friends, etc. All of it made up, of course. Both my sister and her husband are on hiatus and they had all the time in the world to waste with me, which I absolutely appreciated. There were more stories, more chats both heartfelt and hilarious.</p><p>One night we watched "The Dig" which was really wonderful, but a bit of a downer. And the other we watched "Bottle Shock" which was hilarious (Chris Pine's wig as the Maguffin) and had a whole romantic story arc they completely abandoned - that we all called out.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Friday</h3><p>And Friday had me going home. Not directly of course, but leaving my sister and her husband and their soulful eyed dog until the next time we or the family get together. It was such a healing and peaceful and restorative experience.</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-44950748048186063222021-08-22T20:38:00.009-05:002021-08-22T20:41:23.642-05:00Operation Lily Put, Day 5: Ground Zero<p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6r7MZC3o8rhglgTQ7ZtzIezuzeYmD4QNXiThsDcMfSHcZklTVT8ZG5kdgY30huGnyJr_SPhloURvNyjbaW_47A9LDrvNoq-tSP-TQl6c5cyA8FKe80vrPp2DAXdGwlzcHVH9V/s4032/20210822_161039.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6r7MZC3o8rhglgTQ7ZtzIezuzeYmD4QNXiThsDcMfSHcZklTVT8ZG5kdgY30huGnyJr_SPhloURvNyjbaW_47A9LDrvNoq-tSP-TQl6c5cyA8FKe80vrPp2DAXdGwlzcHVH9V/w480-h640/20210822_161039.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><br /> <p></p><p>I'll probably write more tomorrow, but Lily came over tonight and we had a wonderful evening with my brother's family. She even cuddled with me for the last two hours, can't remember when we did that last. We said goodbye with many hugs, and she cried, but I'm waiting for my dam to burst. Off to visit my sister tomorrow, looking forward it.</p><p>I'm so proud.</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-52333599291264066672021-08-21T22:37:00.001-05:002021-08-21T22:37:47.023-05:00Operation Lily Put, Day 4: The dropoff (everything begins with So)<p>No images in this post because I promised not to post any of the pictures I took today. So let's put on our imagination caps and read some attempts at 1000 words per image. If you select the description of the missing image, and do a google image search on it, sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's not funny, sometimes it's haunting. Don't bother. Also, this post is much longer and more meandering than most because of the lack of imagery. You could just skip it if you'd like. tldr: Moved in, it was fine.</p><p><b><i><u>Picture of the license plate of a Prius</u></i></b></p><p>So today was drop-off day at college. My daughter the freshman is ready. I'm ready. While everyone is a little nervous, we've planned for this day for some time, and packed everything needed. We've made lists and checked off items. We figured a list of things to pick up beforehand and lists of items to pick up a few weeks later. Her Mom is coming down to visit her after the gets settled in. Long story but I think I explained it earlier - both kids move into their dorms on the same day. The first child is now a senior in college, and if we had been able we would have just rented a $19.95 truck from Home Depot and hired a hobo to drive it to Iowa. And been proud for the expense. In our defense, when we moved the first kid to college for freshman year, once all of the boxes got into the room he essentially told us to go away, and then (as far as we know) didn't unpack anything until the week before he had to move out, at which point he unpacked everything and didn't pack it even when we went to pick him up at the end of the year. Again, I'm not worried about offending that one because they don't read my blogs and that's possibly the wisest thing they've done.</p><p>So back to the license plate. Since Lily had her own car, and we drove it out together (instead of driving her car and our family car out caravan style, which is fine since we didn't want to put the miles on it - and it would have been so much more boring than what actually happened - although I would have had the chance to drive it *back* home on every little back road between the Atlantic and the Mississippi river over the course of, say, 10-15 days.) I ended up dropping her off at college. When she was dropped off, I had no way to get back to my brother's place 30 minutes away. (Which, since it's Baltimore, was about 200 yards away) (One more aside [lie, there will be more] the dear wife had to drive to Iowa with the first born and their girlfriend, then drive alone back home on a 5 hour drive and she doesn't like driving that far even with someone else in the car to entertain her. But ended up taking an awesome walk by a river on the way home that was better than my swear-infused walk through a confusing campus.)</p><p>Anyhoo, since I had no way of getting back to his place, my brother let me borrow their Prius. Which was really quite considerate of him. Especially since he let me drive his car when he was overseas with the Army in the 1990's and I ended up losing half the hubcabs and more, but let's not talk about that. It was really nice of him. And I'm much older and wiser now, so it seemed less risky. Back to the anyhoo, I had never driven a Prius before. After a brief about how it works (press on, then drive) I followed Lily to the Target near her school. We needed supplies.</p><p>So my review of a Prius is this: I learned a lot about myself today. Apparently I have a heavy right foot and floor the accelerator whenever I come off a stop. I guess I knew that, but today really solidified it. You know how you're going to take a left turn and you have to wait for traffic to clear, and then you take a nice calm left turn and go on about your business? It's not that I *didn't* do that, it's just that I often just floor it and wedge myself between two cars going 45 mph in the direction I'm going. With the Mazda (zoom zoom) wagon and the Mazda truck (groom groom) it's not that bad, and with the new Vespa I can really get flying from a stop. Not so much with a Prius. I was driving very carefully but the first thing I noticed is that it doesn't have a ton of pickup. The dash said I was in "eco mode" which I'm guessing means it drives like an ordinary sane person but I'm not. So I got used to the very calm, very environmentally friendly manner in which it comes off the line. I'd like to think I saved the lives of a number of dolphins today. But I was impressed at it's ability to move on the highway at the same speed as normal vehicles, and the satellite radio was kind of nice to have. Although it did cut out a few times and I don't know if it was the settings or the fact that only Boomers use satellite radio anymore, but the only stations I could find were 1970's album alternatives. I don't mind Steely Dan, Christopher Cross, or Cat Stevens, but not so much grooving on Dionne Warwick. It's a generational thing.</p><p> I took a picture of the license plate when I got to Target so I could find it in the sea of Prii parked there when we were done. Not sure if that's the proper plural, but it is now. Oh and who the HELL decided to make a Target where the parking aisles are DEAD ENDS? I could get the Prius turned around just fine, but the giant SUVs around me were having much more problems dealing. Ended up finding a spot right by the door. Win!</p><p><b><i><u>Picture of a father and his daughter trying to find twin sheets at a Target (NOT SuperTarget) next to a college on freshman move-in day.</u></i></b></p><p>So I met her at the Target. I purposefully did not wear a red polo today, because I've accidentally worn a red shirt to Target before and we won't talk about the interactions with strangers that that caused. I did however neglect to realize that a "Salmon" shirt is pretty close to red and the regular employees have been pushing the "red shirt" rule for some years now. So waiting inside the entrance because the weather outside was crazy hot and humid, I felt very conspicuous and worried that someone would ask me for a cart, or where humidifiers were found.</p><p>She finally showed up and we got on with our shopping. Due to my memory issues, I used a mnemonic to remember the five things I needed to get today in addition to her list. Mask, Masher, More Power, Mueller, and Mousse. Since the only mask I have on this trip is a very colorful "ships in bottles" pattern, I kinda wanted a plain black mask so I could be a little more subtle at the college. I also was told by all of the females in my family that I needed a steamer for the wrinkled shirts I pull out of my luggage. That's a "wrinkle Masher". Since the daughter stole my Power Cell Phone Charger Brick thing, I needed a replacement* as "more power" for my phone, and I also needed some different hair product because the travel sized "cream" product I bought last week was not working for me at all. The final M, Mueller, is the last name of the friend who lent us an iPass toll transponder, and I needed to remember to get that out of the daughter's car. I promptly forgot the last two M's and spent most of our visit at Target trying to remember them. Sometimes I feel like I have dementia, but without the relief of being placed in a memory unit. Happily I got everything except the mask. Back in Minneapolis every third aisle is a collection of masks for sale, and Target bags since we charge $.05 for every plastic bag. Apparently the masking rules aren't as strict in Maryland, so no masks were to be found, and we ended up getting a Dolphin killing amount of plastic bags to contain our purchases. So much for the Prius eco saving mode.</p><p>Also, shopping for Twin sized sheets at a Target directly adjacent to a college on move-in day was not probably the wisest move. Lily even saw someone she thought she followed on Instagram among the many, many families of college children, concerned mothers and disinterested fathers. We did end up getting most of what she needed, including silverware, spatula and measuring cups. Should have thought of trash can, but who's perfect?</p><p>Time was going well until she pointed out that we had 15 minutes to check out and get to campus. My decision to leave my digital watch on Central time was not a wise one. It all worked out in the end, even if she wanted me to help her to her car with her cart. I think she was just nervous and wanted me to hang out more.</p><p><i>* It's more than you need to know, but I forgot my phone charger in her car last night, so I got smart and plugged the phone into my laptop via USB for the overnight, thinking I was a genius and it would continue to charge like it said it was charging but it didn't. So I woke up two hours early to a very strange pattern of vibrations and found out what it's like to have a phone at 0% charge. Apparently the Prius blows a fuse if you main line USB power to a phone, so I really needed another way to get the phone working. See the previous note on not having a working phone/data connection for the amount of pain I was in. But the lack of confidence in the phone meant I didn't sleep much in those last two hours, and ended up with about 4 hours sleep. Good base for a hard day.</i></p><p><b><i><u>Picture of the daughter at her car</u></i></b></p><p>So one of the concerns was that we were bringing her car on campus as well as the Prius, and we were worried the strict guards at the gatehouse would deny me access, and talked about all of the different Uber options, street parking, or leaving the car at the Target and sneaking through the woods to get on campus. Turns out it wasn't an issue, big shock. When we met in the parking lot and got ready to go check her in, I took a picture of her getting out of her car and joked that I would be livestreaming the whole event. She didn't think that was funny.</p><p>She did get pretty quiet, and I talked to her about being nervous, and we worked together to allay any fears she had. I have to say I couldn't blame her. She was going into a foreign environment, not knowing anyone, being surrounded by other kids and their nervous families who were moving in for the first time, and the student volunteers were really quite extra. One of them was cheering with pompoms for every car coming on campus.</p><p>She got checked in well, but at one point they made it clear parents had to wait awkwardly outside the registration hall. It was about 900 degrees and the humidity was near 100%, so I hung out with a bunch of other parents working on our sweat patterns and trying to look aloof while not sitting on any of the benches - which were in the sun. </p><p><b><i><u>Picture of a WHOLE BUNCH of boxes in front of a dorm</u></i></b></p><p>So after getting checked in, identified and issued a "guest pass" for me (we were supposed to turn it in after we were done, but I kept mine. For the amount of money we were paying I figured earned a souvenir. And it wasn't numbered or anything, so if someone comes up short on the guess pass count, it can't be traced back to us.)</p><p>They made the campus a one way loop (more on that later) and we were to pull up in front of the dorm where a crew of very energetic volunteers would help us unload. Now, for the first kid's college experience, we got to drive on sidewalks, and when we pulled up a whole Lacrosse or Jai Lai team of students converged on the car, grabbed boxes, and took them up to his room. In this case we ended up with an awkward Ginger guy with a cardboard box on a set of wheels. Luckily, my order was to help unload the car and then drive it back to the parking lot and then come back and help carry things. Second stroke of good luck - you know that whole "one way loop around campus" thing? Turns out the loop took me into some of the very beautiful and serene forests of this campus, past hammocks and lounging students, past impressive buildings and such, right past a security vehicle and out the back gate. On city streets, at least 90 degrees off the main gate (again) so I had to drive around and come back on campus. While that seemed a bit off-putting, it absolutely assisted me in taking enough time for the task that I didn't end up carrying anything up to her third floor room.</p><p>When I did find her she led me up to the room but in passing the ginger guy he waved and she waved back. She had now started her college career and the only person she knows is essentially a Weasley who likely didn't have anything better to do that day. Could be worse. Could be a Jai Lai jock.</p><p><b><i><u>Picture of an annoyed 18 year old in a dorm room with the same boxes but spread everywhere, while avoiding having the roommate or her mother in the picture</u></i></b></p><p>So while I waited I added a couple more layers of sweat to my already fatherly moistness, but once we got inside it was a Very Cool air conditioned dorm. We got up to her floor, but in the elevator I asked if she'd seen the communal bathroom yet and she said she hadn't.</p><p>Think about it. You've never really been away from family for more than a couple days, and now you're a literal 1,000 miles from home, know absolutely nobody except a budget version of Ron Weasley, and you don't even know what the bathroom you're going to be using for the next 9 months is like. Much less the showers, the laundry, the cafeteria or even - crap we forgot about this - the classes! I have so much respect for anyone going off to college now, or ever. Makes dropping out twice seems fairly easy in comparison, even if I had to go to Marine Corps boot camp to avoid the wrath of my parents finding out.</p><p><b><i><u>Picture of the daughter hanging fairy lights while the suitcase with all of her clothes is left unpacked by the bed</u></i></b></p><p>So as I said, when we dropped the first kid off it was literally a dropoff. Right into the void of "college" without any idea how anything was going to play out. So it was rough. Ugly sobbing in the car at a state park, but that's another story. (This might be the only time I don't go off on a tangent, mostly because I can't remember if I already have on previous days. Considering it your next birthday and Christmas present combined.) For this one, we're so confident of her ability to deal with the experience, and we know we'll see her again, etc. So it's less scary and more exciting. But the best part was that she let me help her unpack! Her roomie's mom was assembling shelves, and they were going a mile a minute setting things up, so the fact that we just had a wire shoe rack to assemble and a couple of bins of sweaters to unpack made me a little nervous. But as it turned out we were really a good team, and I helped as much as I could. It was nice to be able to turn a Target bag into a trash bag and pile all the cardboard boxes up knowing I wasn't going to have to throw anything out or find recycling. Welcome to the rest of your life dear daughter.</p><p>So it was moderately chaotic, but we managed to make her bed, set up her stuff, and she even got to work setting up things like fairy lights, and putting her place settings in a drawer. Then moving them to another drawer. And then back to the original drawer. I was just happy to be there and help. And be in air conditioned space. What I sussed about the roomie was that she was a Dungeons and Dragons nerd, wanted to pack 120 books but settled on a dozen five inch thick volumes, and her talk about being into making pancakes wasn't just talk. Lily has everything you need to make pancakes and serve them to three people. Her roommate had more than that. They'll get along just fine!</p><p>Eventually Lily hinted that it was time for me to leave and I gave her a good sweaty hug and we talked about her schedule for the next day or so. She thought she might make lunch with us tomorrow, but as it turns out it's not likely, but maybe tomorrow night. I'm due to leave on Monday, but as it happens there's a hurricane approaching my sister's place, so I might have to delay that trip due to loss of power and imminent wind death. We'll see though, as I love me a good weather trauma. I think it's likely I'll get to see my daughter before I leave though. My wife is coming in a couple of weeks once Lily gets settled in, and I think she's getting the better end of the deal, although I think COVID will keep her from being able to see the dorm. But Lily's so much more likely to be chilled out by then.</p><p><i>Update: No, she won't make lunch tomorrow, but is getting along famously with her roomie, has already made some friends, and is happily exhausted.</i></p><p><b><i><u>Missing: Picture of me getting an iced Latte at a Starbucks drive through</u></i></b></p><p>So as I mentioned, when I dropped the first kid off there was anxiety and sobbing and bitterness and hours spent looking at his location on google maps caressing my phone saying "oh he's in his dorm he's ok I wonder if he remembers my name." This time I spent a moment lookup up a Starbucks with a drive through and enjoying my drive into Baltimore. I seriously love my daughter, but have so much more confidence and understanding about what's going on this time. It was a good Latte, BTW.</p><p>So hurricane Henri is heading to my sister's place, and that might make the rest of my trip crazy, but the stress is off on the dropoff, and it's time to just settle in and enjoy hanging out with my siblings and their families. I drove the Prius back to my brother's place, no issues or incidents. Do I offer some D cell batteries instead of filling the gas tank?</p><p><b><i><u>Missing: 38 pictures of me chasing a toddler for an hour</u></i></b></p><p>So Lily was winning the "who can win over the toddler" contest by the time she left, but I was determined to make an impression. I brought a stuffed Snowy the dog from the Tintin series, and hoped that would win her over. She eventually warmed to it, counted it and an Elsa doll a number of times, and shoved it into the hen's area of a Little People barn. But didn't really stop carrying it around. Which was awesome. My brother had to go into work saving the world, and his wife was on an all-day video conference, so they asked me if I wouldn't mind watching the toddler for a bit.</p><p>So I've helped raise two kids who at various times have been more than a handful. So how hard could it be entertaining a beautiful and fun little girl? Well, apparently it's been a few decades since I've chased high metabolism energy around a room for an hour. Holy crap that was a lot of work! But I didn't break the baby and by the end of it I could get a fist bump or a high five, but I think a hug may take more than a stuffed dog and all the cheerios she can eat (and feed the real dog.) But I'm determined to be a fun uncle, so we'll see. When Mom came back from her video call, she minded the baby like a seasoned veteran, and I wondered how it could be done so easily! </p><p><b><i><u>Missing: Picture of me drinking late into the night with my brother and his wife only to find out it was 9pm when we called it quits</u></i></b></p><p>So we had a great dinner, my brother finally got home from frantic work, and we had a lovely evening. I got some serious quality time with my sister-in-law, and then some great story telling time with her and my brother. We played "oh yeah, well here's an even better story" about our times in the military in Korea, and I got to try a sidecar for the first time. Lemon margarita, pretty much. Tasty! His wife called it a day and he and I spent a long time still telling stories and enjoying the nostalgia of a shared experience at different times in our careers. By the time we'd finished out cocktails, it was time to call it a night. I thought I was reading my watch wrong, but it turned out it was only 9pm. Which to my time zone clock was actually only 8. So I went to my very wonderful guest room, turned on the computer and wrote way too many words about a very short day. Think I'm going to go back and edit this and fix spelling mistakes? Guess again. Write to you tomorrow!</p><p><i>Total words: 3,756 - so only imagine 3.75 images.</i></p><p><br /></p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-92107264364342995322021-08-20T22:44:00.003-05:002021-08-20T22:44:54.824-05:00Operation Lily Put, Day 3: Pennsylvania, Maryland <p>We left Pittsburgh early-ish. Ok, early adjacent. Fine, but it was before noon! After a stop at an awesome Starbucks for breakfast foods and an earworm of a Blur song, we headed into the city.</p><p>We agonized over the route we would take from Pittsburgh to Maryland, but to be honest there wasn't much debate. We both wanted to see cool scenery, maybe a covered bridge, and if at any time we felt it was time to hit a superhighway and boogie, they were nearby. We settled on Highway 30, which was also the Lincoln Highway. Some day I would love to drive it from New York to San Francisco, but until then I'll have to settle for sections. The first kid's college is on a stretch of it, both original and the superhighway that bypassed all the small towns it runs through in Iowa. I just love the romance of a road that goes all the way across the country in a time when doing that drive was not a common occurrence. When I do the whole thing I want to do it in a Model-T or on an Indian motorcycle. And I want a mechanic to follow me with parts and knowledge, as I would be helpless repairing either vehicle. <i>(Let's go all the way off track and mention I've been listen to the audiobook version of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, all 5,433,422-some hours of it. It's a great read but the author distinguishes between those who know how a vehicle works and can fix it, and the people who just love the idea of riding the vehicle and the moment it stops working they're completely lost. I am of the latter group. On our long distance scooter rides I had a friend who had the same model scooter, and if anything went wrong he always knew how to fix it or how badly I was screwed.)</i></p><p>We did get to go through a tunnel (under a neighborhood, Lily pointed out) and get boxed in by some trucks. It was fun though, and I did notice there were "exit" doors available in case of an emergency. Where they dumped you out is anybody's guess, as we were deep under a whole bunch of earth. </p><p>Also, the night before I had commented that Pittsburgh must have a strange experience when it comes to drinking and driving. Sober in the daylight it was difficult enough to navigate - I can't imagine someone who was drunk at night could get more than a few hundred yards before running aground. The proliferation of DUI lawyer signs says otherwise, but I still thought it interesting.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ9vQhjLNK_oio2JfijqabV7qBtiqIoOJ2WmkZcSdfeMsXQlX0tporCRGL1OzCsrpsukkEDND06XhI8W7lZBfyRKZXi2wkWQWuJpH9ufTooFQ6xn3Yj9STW-fxUP_Kd44DVmlQ/s4032/20210820_120014.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ9vQhjLNK_oio2JfijqabV7qBtiqIoOJ2WmkZcSdfeMsXQlX0tporCRGL1OzCsrpsukkEDND06XhI8W7lZBfyRKZXi2wkWQWuJpH9ufTooFQ6xn3Yj9STW-fxUP_Kd44DVmlQ/s320/20210820_120014.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div>I had planned for the route to at least give us a vista of downtown Pittsburgh, though I wasn't sure Lily would appreciate it. When we did come out of the tunnel to this view:<div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqaU-3ySG50CgfkctRgBRY0dBIEekbxWoPKN4ZuVZjSUxIgbiCEckd1OtTRDxvJeZhcWm9ZyukGlznYtA2tUJAMgHXypeXLPpLPNFLHGa9LfcDK5_j7A3hHX0R5pujGeu14_qQ/s4032/20210820_120037.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqaU-3ySG50CgfkctRgBRY0dBIEekbxWoPKN4ZuVZjSUxIgbiCEckd1OtTRDxvJeZhcWm9ZyukGlznYtA2tUJAMgHXypeXLPpLPNFLHGa9LfcDK5_j7A3hHX0R5pujGeu14_qQ/s320/20210820_120037.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I think Lily audibly gasped. It was a really great view, and it popped nicely after the tunnel. We skirted downtown on the highway and got to see some big buildings, river (and riverboats!) and some interesting neighborhoods of Pittsburgh.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyKD_NkdmbOdh2KAvo0LmeZx2RoTJaR4UW_JOqGH7bmOVccle4so_ut2scHFlfiW25M8m65CRe3FNDNRax5d3KlHrB1YW2kvaIAwE0codOXnKY6hMwm2rPdU-z6Lv_YaA-8UoL/s4032/20210820_120926.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyKD_NkdmbOdh2KAvo0LmeZx2RoTJaR4UW_JOqGH7bmOVccle4so_ut2scHFlfiW25M8m65CRe3FNDNRax5d3KlHrB1YW2kvaIAwE0codOXnKY6hMwm2rPdU-z6Lv_YaA-8UoL/s320/20210820_120926.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>I was still in my "got to sell the scenery" mode when we headed out of town on a state highway, stoplights and all. Of course Lily was up for it - she's a trooper! She said she would drive on a road like that all the time, as it's interesting and not just a boring set of lanes through trees. </div><div><br /></div><div>We saw lots of interesting businesses, and were assured that if we needed a tattoo or any part of a vehicle repaired ("ALL ELECTRICAL THINGS") we were in the right place. Occasionally we would see a sign that we thought was interesting and call it out. So many times in a sea of signs we would both be drawn to the same sign, and cheer it together in unison, unplanned. One of the best was a hairdresser called "Do or Dye" - Lily thought the Dye pun was awesome, but after a moment I pointed out that the "Do" could be short for "Hairdo" and that was even better. We were both impressed, and somewhere in the world is someone who chuckles every once in a while for having thought that up.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0_pXjf-5Bwx0VsMOh6VV2hhc-UeA3FLHSMVgVYQ9Aji6Pq30DuRTeFMcna4kfGZaCpZ5M_JjWA6hfnk2cOenL7d8AR4fFkGRZ03EoOz292xLouDnAfOiHItXIhn_idjUePzIn/s4032/20210820_124641.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0_pXjf-5Bwx0VsMOh6VV2hhc-UeA3FLHSMVgVYQ9Aji6Pq30DuRTeFMcna4kfGZaCpZ5M_JjWA6hfnk2cOenL7d8AR4fFkGRZ03EoOz292xLouDnAfOiHItXIhn_idjUePzIn/s320/20210820_124641.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><p style="text-align: left;">Our next amusement has me a bit conflicted. A number of years ago the whole family took a roadtrip from flyover country down to New Orleans. It was an epic roadtrip, and some of us enjoyed the many miles more than others. But one of the things we took back from the trip was that Eli and I had a running joke about the "Bridge Ices Before Road" signs that were all over the place. We'll still mention it at some random time and laugh.</p><p style="text-align: left;">So Lily and I picked up the same joke. We just saw so many of those signs! Initially we'd point it out, but after a while we'd ask each other "wait, which one ices first" or "is it the road or the bridge that ices first?" and on and on. So now I have the same inside joke with each kid. If either of them reads this blog I'll be in trouble. That reminds me, Lily wants a link to this blog. Maybe I'll give her "<a href="https://www.atlasobscura.com/">https://www.atlasobscura.com/</a>" and say I'm really prolific at writing about interesting roadside things..</p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmTD96j0f7lm_ojVjJFqlONXla7OCdTlbVA9SnxDwG30JJr3tR8y7jhAeVFy1AXPqsMxk4BlBJB_5g0W0qRJvRpukIF-l1RVBtIIWWmmw8p1_tHCZDLMuXymB6KLGixhMRdcDH/s4032/20210820_130039.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmTD96j0f7lm_ojVjJFqlONXla7OCdTlbVA9SnxDwG30JJr3tR8y7jhAeVFy1AXPqsMxk4BlBJB_5g0W0qRJvRpukIF-l1RVBtIIWWmmw8p1_tHCZDLMuXymB6KLGixhMRdcDH/s320/20210820_130039.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Neither of my kids are troublemakers. Lily especially so. In high school she had friends who drink, who smoke, who get high, etc. The more she saw the less she wanted to be in on it - though not judging her friends, those things aren't for her. A crucial element is the fact that she goes rock climbing competitively, on a team at our local club, and just for fun. Because of this she's in phenomenal shape, even if her hands are like sandpaper. I think it's the fact that any of the above vices would be echo'd back directly to her performance really motivates her not to try them. That said, she *is* going off to college, so we'll see. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">She does have one minor vice, and that's energy. She'll drink a Red Bull or sometimes even a 5 Hour Energy when she's on a long drive, or wants to stay up even later than adolescent dusk, which I think it about midnight or 1am. So she grabbed a blueberry Red Bull out of her bag and tried it for the first time. Normally she likes the diet because it's less sweet. I can't remember exactly how she described it but the phrases "and the stem of a tomato" and "like a flavored V-8" were definitely used. I got a great video of her fake (or not) gagging on it and laughing. Enjoy this stillframe:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixxfTQylZ6JoA0bm8iKGjElq-1Onprtt14DW9WMdunekYj1_L0WJiqAOTgZdXihHgjT1QoceqVYCamA3sh2c6-u3hFIHyEa8qAVO46bsK9BmMkVuZPMEJB60EFS4NCxta3NhcK/s4032/20210820_130350.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixxfTQylZ6JoA0bm8iKGjElq-1Onprtt14DW9WMdunekYj1_L0WJiqAOTgZdXihHgjT1QoceqVYCamA3sh2c6-u3hFIHyEa8qAVO46bsK9BmMkVuZPMEJB60EFS4NCxta3NhcK/s320/20210820_130350.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div><p>We also, unsurprisingly, saw a lot of "now hiring" signs. Like, a whole lot of them. Everywhere. No matter the job, you can have a shot at it. So every time we saw a "hiring" sign we called it out. There was a lot of calling out on this trip.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZF88O-4-xUif8A1FzxrtsXOKnfuttm8oggIY38JJUjfIDGE390mTnGJ2fPiNC_k1rqyBP4VC0a_EgrEc_BpKlZ8K5wlpNC5QQO1NWMdXx6nKQE1Gi1dOjr6ffttYaUdhMph80/s4032/20210820_131358.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZF88O-4-xUif8A1FzxrtsXOKnfuttm8oggIY38JJUjfIDGE390mTnGJ2fPiNC_k1rqyBP4VC0a_EgrEc_BpKlZ8K5wlpNC5QQO1NWMdXx6nKQE1Gi1dOjr6ffttYaUdhMph80/s320/20210820_131358.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>Eventually we cleared the city and suburbs and exurbs and ruralburbs and got to hit some hills and see some vistas. I took a billion pictures, but none of them really capture the depth, color, beauty and awe of the actual view. So here's just one:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA8cuPxKPtTwlVfdko_S4srbKuSgNFX6KFR2nXtGqnKslQqk1b340txOOjpUAd7JEaq5I2JL_w6sEtcg65zvMclZcxUOvHznrlcjCTp5VCWaNgXkX-ou_C2T4i7SgowrsWThlR/s4032/20210820_133609%25280%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA8cuPxKPtTwlVfdko_S4srbKuSgNFX6KFR2nXtGqnKslQqk1b340txOOjpUAd7JEaq5I2JL_w6sEtcg65zvMclZcxUOvHznrlcjCTp5VCWaNgXkX-ou_C2T4i7SgowrsWThlR/s320/20210820_133609%25280%2529.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>As you may recall, we wanted to see a real covered bridge, after seeing so many license plates with the image highlighted. So I did some googling and found one not too far off the Lincoln Highway. So at the appointed time we turned off the main road and headed into nowhere land. It was much nicer than the movies would have you think. We did not see hillbilly's with banjos, nor did we see endless sprawls of decrepit barns and dead vehicles. Lawns were neatly mowed for the most part, animals looked healthy, corn was abundant, and more often than not people waved at us driving by, without us even starting the social interaction.</div><div><br /></div><div>Among the interesting back country scenery we came upon a cemetery. Hello Wikipedia:</div><div><br /></div><blockquote><div><div class="wDYxhc" data-md="61" lang="en-US" style="background-color: #202124; border-radius: 8px; clear: none; color: #dadce0; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div aria-level="3" class="LGOjhe" data-attrid="wa:/description" data-hveid="CAoQAA" role="heading" style="overflow: hidden; padding-bottom: 20px;"><span class="ILfuVd" style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><span class="hgKElc" style="padding: 0px 8px 0px 0px;">The word cemetery (from Greek κοιμητήριον, "sleeping place") implies that the land is specifically designated as a burial ground and originally applied to the Roman catacombs. The term graveyard is often used interchangeably with cemetery, but a graveyard primarily refers to a burial ground within a churchyard.</span></span></div></div><div class="g" style="background-color: #202124; clear: both; color: #dadce0; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.58; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; width: 600px;"><div data-hveid="CAgQAA" data-ved="2ahUKEwjcoO7yjcHyAhU6MVkFHWWaBGgQFSgAegQICBAA"><div class="tF2Cxc" style="clear: both; padding-bottom: 0px; position: relative;"></div></div></div></div></blockquote><p>The first child was fascinated by the local cemetery (every time I type that I get closer to knowing how to spell it) and spent hours walking it and looking at graves while enjoying the nature and quiet found in the middle of the city. This is how I learned the difference between the two, and to be honest I don't think I'd seen a proper graveyard yet. So when we came upon a cemetery looking area, with not only an associated church, but a <i>second </i>church across the way, I was thrilled to witness a true graveyard!</p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkF2JvdCebGKLgK54dC-7oSR6JB3DmtCH-rZlV4LJC_B9XRU60ZuDq9na_Rka5NpveN4KHrwVQwd9A2NLOqdVkSE_35HdkLC1j6NsGiZ2J-rQ_uS6mm9ywYjyGZpKAPYd8fO1/s4032/20210820_134722.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkF2JvdCebGKLgK54dC-7oSR6JB3DmtCH-rZlV4LJC_B9XRU60ZuDq9na_Rka5NpveN4KHrwVQwd9A2NLOqdVkSE_35HdkLC1j6NsGiZ2J-rQ_uS6mm9ywYjyGZpKAPYd8fO1/s320/20210820_134722.jpg" width="320" /></a></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p>No street view, but here is <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mount+Tabor+Church/@40.1201152,-79.0049378,473m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m13!1m7!3m6!1s0x0:0x0!2zNDDCsDA3JzIwLjIiTiA3OcKwMDAnMTMuMyJX!3b1!8m2!3d40.1222889!4d-79.0036826!3m4!1s0x89cb1fe5ed1bbbaf:0x3d6a1532102e2675!8m2!3d40.1200771!4d-79.0036374" target="_blank">the google satellite image</a>. <br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8nXFmwwfb1VS_8HSWBftHnBWCmhn_7CuLdeJ8eRNGYZbkJzhuhFxKFhNQjlN734-nagjf-C9UVlLsXtq4T7aPBBxKPEaP46DxILxvYhnZQ-Nc3VEjqFRZBZ1X5KW_5K6Gc4gs//" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img data-original-height="722" data-original-width="1080" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8nXFmwwfb1VS_8HSWBftHnBWCmhn_7CuLdeJ8eRNGYZbkJzhuhFxKFhNQjlN734-nagjf-C9UVlLsXtq4T7aPBBxKPEaP46DxILxvYhnZQ-Nc3VEjqFRZBZ1X5KW_5K6Gc4gs/w320-h214/image.png" title="What are those black things? Buggies? Check it out here: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mount+Tabor+Church/@40.1201152,-79.0049378,473m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m13!1m7!3m6!1s0x0:0x0!2zNDDCsDA3JzIwLjIiTiA3OcKwMDAnMTMuMyJX!3b1!8m2!3d40.1222889!4d-79.0036826!3m4!1s0x89cb1fe5ed1bbbaf:0x3d6a1532102e2675!8m2!3d40.1200771!4d-79.0036374" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What are those black things? Mennonite buggies?</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="text-align: left;"> </span></div><div><span style="text-align: left;">Sadly, the arched entrance named it as a cemetery: </span><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-cXPbztvh8bFAA5En5RRxXZUmnh7ww_cFLPHIUlUL0MTY-Rc4xrQlwM7ZXwUMk6y8efHiPMSldFShfF-mN4YpR4Wu1GgLoifdlhsc0_Vcw-TBVI1u-nUeRdfLb_exG1kEJLVL//" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="482" data-original-width="647" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-cXPbztvh8bFAA5En5RRxXZUmnh7ww_cFLPHIUlUL0MTY-Rc4xrQlwM7ZXwUMk6y8efHiPMSldFShfF-mN4YpR4Wu1GgLoifdlhsc0_Vcw-TBVI1u-nUeRdfLb_exG1kEJLVL//" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p>I know you're getting used to going off topic, so let me tell you about the coffeetable book I want to create some day - or maybe some work of fiction.</p><p>Driving to and from Iowa from Minnesota I get bored of the main highway. You should know this by now. So when nobody else is with me and I can have my way with the map, I end up on some tiny lonely backroads. Many of them have little hamlets along the way, and the vast majority of them have a cemetery. (Not a graveyard, as previously mentioned.)</p><p>Almost every cemetery has a fence around it and a beautiful (or simple, or both) gateway with a name on it. I think about the job of the travelling salesman back at the turn of the previous century, and how they used to sell all manner of things. And in these cases, I'm guessing there was someone going from town to town checking the cemetery, and if it didn't have an archway, or the archway wasn't customized, these sales people - and in my story it's just one lonely soul - and sell a gate order to the town fathers.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQj7EajK9nZwrsxtWYnDCV-rwAzvA6LawKf9E2AAWoej4OqKKsZ_pQwx66QinZiuiTNRkyyENv7_YzBOtZXsQydY3h1EVu0TUPfUrW8Ll-tWoxhF5y4iz65rFKfYA9hMIPH5nE/s2046/20190317_105955-COLLAGE.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2046" data-original-width="2046" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQj7EajK9nZwrsxtWYnDCV-rwAzvA6LawKf9E2AAWoej4OqKKsZ_pQwx66QinZiuiTNRkyyENv7_YzBOtZXsQydY3h1EVu0TUPfUrW8Ll-tWoxhF5y4iz65rFKfYA9hMIPH5nE/s320/20190317_105955-COLLAGE.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> In my story the lonely salesman falls in love with some town's mayor's daughter, and after some sort of misadventure ends up settling down and marrying her. Or I could just be lazy and take pictures of a bunch of them, throw them in a glossy book and sell it at Barnes & Noble in the discount section that has coffee table books. Can't be any less worthy than "Barns of Rural Pennsylvania" or "Classic Cars and their owner's dogs." Please don't steal my idea or I'll haunt you like the bitter spirit of one of the people buried in a cemetery whose town father's decided not to get the pretty gate.<p></p><p>After that high minded, romanticized bit about cemeteries and the people who manage them, enjoy this bit of ten year old humor in the name of one of the roads we had to turn on:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicqJ1iWxUvLSIAQlDH3Ruxp0jpcupV4W-_4U1X9XvzhkJhAI3lscsDp9WwPwDVK5rFW3AG7If8BssoCLgR0qtZH-FxqBcGFy7BwY9jpFeBoFgNVNPebVQwHrWDRXNSj44uYAxj/s2400/Screenshot_20210820-135854_Maps.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2400" data-original-width="1080" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicqJ1iWxUvLSIAQlDH3Ruxp0jpcupV4W-_4U1X9XvzhkJhAI3lscsDp9WwPwDVK5rFW3AG7If8BssoCLgR0qtZH-FxqBcGFy7BwY9jpFeBoFgNVNPebVQwHrWDRXNSj44uYAxj/s320/Screenshot_20210820-135854_Maps.jpg" width="144" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">After not enough miles of roads through fields and forests like these..</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglLl9nMTxs6q8Bk2TKd-oGSIlo0yE50_8veVGOZwcLFQrcOACKYDwCys_7h3tj-zxEvhDKuW3sSFx5ovRAY1l2-ln0YvPk2jY6DgTWmQwllzqiUhMq4AdkURFNkiSbeeC6QA2r/s4032/20210820_140127.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglLl9nMTxs6q8Bk2TKd-oGSIlo0yE50_8veVGOZwcLFQrcOACKYDwCys_7h3tj-zxEvhDKuW3sSFx5ovRAY1l2-ln0YvPk2jY6DgTWmQwllzqiUhMq4AdkURFNkiSbeeC6QA2r/s320/20210820_140127.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Crossing this beautiful little stream..</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiskpLpm76FbUtYojsGzARv08YsQdu7AvU8W52rBeZoQGRxyg7G9NmtIQxbaEDPobIf0d8jwqQDfIrDuVWy0c2yu2B6NKjXpj2xUkhwnbTq8VeuJjvbYhlqDMewoJ0l6VQHzRNV/s4032/20210820_141140.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiskpLpm76FbUtYojsGzARv08YsQdu7AvU8W52rBeZoQGRxyg7G9NmtIQxbaEDPobIf0d8jwqQDfIrDuVWy0c2yu2B6NKjXpj2xUkhwnbTq8VeuJjvbYhlqDMewoJ0l6VQHzRNV/s320/20210820_141140.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>We found the Glessner bridge, built in 1881. We drove over it but the video of that was too big, and I can't be bothered to put it on YouTube. Just imaging driving through this bridge, but without the family taking a picture of their daughter and dog:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikDxSY2kDkRcmmnMcNNGPpyLK6TmDLgk849FJqzcP7mBXEdxKGuGEFWNxv5KGDISOA_CvdWXrmlvHlJqiVqgxR8CoPrU-YQWfbqupfgz5RCWwJZh2NUTui3M13ghEWJszbvn3t/s4032/20210820_141241.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikDxSY2kDkRcmmnMcNNGPpyLK6TmDLgk849FJqzcP7mBXEdxKGuGEFWNxv5KGDISOA_CvdWXrmlvHlJqiVqgxR8CoPrU-YQWfbqupfgz5RCWwJZh2NUTui3M13ghEWJszbvn3t/s320/20210820_141241.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div><br /></div><p>We were both too timid to interrupt, go past them, etc. I did, however, against the advice of my daughter, go get a picture of their jeep. The spare tire said "Gone Squatchin'" and it had a fun logo on the side. This is the jeep I aspire to own one day. Bonus for having orange highlights. (We had actually been following them and I was bummed I couldn't get a picture when we turned off for the bridge, but as it turned out they took the long way and we took the quick way, so we did get a private moment with the bridge.)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFM_uWa8o0Y-NVdwdhbslzhUf3QMPX4v0_DaL6LccIflwhDcjFbf2X-NjeiMFLaHZYEXldb9OB4DNKgWLiMVgm6JTrpYsy0OPsiH6CTLLJ9uYdWqpG7l9cr3Z29x5cSFbytygy/s4032/20210820_141300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFM_uWa8o0Y-NVdwdhbslzhUf3QMPX4v0_DaL6LccIflwhDcjFbf2X-NjeiMFLaHZYEXldb9OB4DNKgWLiMVgm6JTrpYsy0OPsiH6CTLLJ9uYdWqpG7l9cr3Z29x5cSFbytygy/s320/20210820_141300.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><p style="text-align: left;">Back on the Lincoln Highway, we actually passed the Flight 93 National Memorial, but didn't see any signs, so had no idea to check it out. Next time.</p><p style="text-align: left;">From then on pretty much every corner we turned there was another breathtaking view. The roads were smooth and empty, and we felt like the only people in the world. I think it was the best way to see the hills of Pennsylvania.</p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX-q3RwxvCd1qtCDArM58C3y66yw08vOKJeBtw0FRe3adJN-OAXAutQfI1cCHheR3FdBMCbSgT3D_F8IVgvpzIByB6e3l1ZsS752Zul27_gTmZY-OqSKWT0AP9IWAXRwNe0ASK/s4032/20210820_142126.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX-q3RwxvCd1qtCDArM58C3y66yw08vOKJeBtw0FRe3adJN-OAXAutQfI1cCHheR3FdBMCbSgT3D_F8IVgvpzIByB6e3l1ZsS752Zul27_gTmZY-OqSKWT0AP9IWAXRwNe0ASK/s320/20210820_142126.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXu-tSExrKZZQtt-1I5Y8FDNAx7g6F9F4dlrgXEccc4ld3td2FIh6Vxiu0nFQN4Ta8phn_aSrZjwDOQIoAvtZWJdnE42UAVBBwKtX05te0AIy7UlU5crMK11WHMfkOqJ4p7wP/s4032/20210820_143415.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXu-tSExrKZZQtt-1I5Y8FDNAx7g6F9F4dlrgXEccc4ld3td2FIh6Vxiu0nFQN4Ta8phn_aSrZjwDOQIoAvtZWJdnE42UAVBBwKtX05te0AIy7UlU5crMK11WHMfkOqJ4p7wP/s320/20210820_143415.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilZrMetxMgzn10lvg6W2Hcu-JuydPR-SJuJ4cSSxbs6Dh2T7FGsYD9bOe3gfekgpStZCknJAWugZlA6GY3Q_EH14C6adIv1W7zLgXb9crbaoPEnokG7p969ueaTbMvYGheP5NI/s4032/20210820_143429.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilZrMetxMgzn10lvg6W2Hcu-JuydPR-SJuJ4cSSxbs6Dh2T7FGsYD9bOe3gfekgpStZCknJAWugZlA6GY3Q_EH14C6adIv1W7zLgXb9crbaoPEnokG7p969ueaTbMvYGheP5NI/s320/20210820_143429.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><p>Some rather intimidating signs here and there either warning you of the dangers of the road, or goading you into taking even more roads through the hills. Very cool!</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqG4Jk0lAdrbH6LwNiewO8sBoc13XranEW0Vd3SzDu00vS9NSAZ9aREUxAcfgrJ0WLJ0bifDaisffeRF3c69cyj7Kz-T9Fl1OkGepsaKfXkHmIKc-jbyWarInAuHmTtxOqGWff/s4032/20210820_143711.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqG4Jk0lAdrbH6LwNiewO8sBoc13XranEW0Vd3SzDu00vS9NSAZ9aREUxAcfgrJ0WLJ0bifDaisffeRF3c69cyj7Kz-T9Fl1OkGepsaKfXkHmIKc-jbyWarInAuHmTtxOqGWff/s320/20210820_143711.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVYUio_VfKivhKPjqj_83Xa2_-9Z0INhGjZR8kNCzxhdYIh-hzVa4scVgYmDQJd3KsalRpLvER8Sa008Mh8dvXmvZqna1fi0oP_JGwm8S1ZS7hW93Qv5OKUebNiAMeJLFtACfU/s4032/20210820_143725.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVYUio_VfKivhKPjqj_83Xa2_-9Z0INhGjZR8kNCzxhdYIh-hzVa4scVgYmDQJd3KsalRpLvER8Sa008Mh8dvXmvZqna1fi0oP_JGwm8S1ZS7hW93Qv5OKUebNiAMeJLFtACfU/s320/20210820_143725.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>Time was wearing on, and by the time the roads got busier and we saw more and more national chain restaurants and stores, we decided to call it a magical day and hit the superhighways for our destination. Again, great driving habits of the local citizenry meant trucks on the right, passers on the left, and everyone was doing at least 15 over the 70 mph speed limit. </div><div><br /></div><div>When we saw the first sign for Baltimore the idea of driving 124 miles seemed like the home stretch, when it's actually a longer distance than that to our family cabin back home. But after 1100 miles you get cocky about more mileage.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipFORwPBgJcYxmFp5MbcOGUmnArYlGZiceuKmlL2G_hyphenhyphenqjRkBQqpfv4AGYgE64l4fH6UqzIB07rNgtBc6DNxkQcOtfoMkafnO9_92e18A-WDwQnGw40vy2gjmBdjcaF_i1-llv/s4032/20210820_154025.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipFORwPBgJcYxmFp5MbcOGUmnArYlGZiceuKmlL2G_hyphenhyphenqjRkBQqpfv4AGYgE64l4fH6UqzIB07rNgtBc6DNxkQcOtfoMkafnO9_92e18A-WDwQnGw40vy2gjmBdjcaF_i1-llv/s320/20210820_154025.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><p style="text-align: left;">We caught the "Welcome to Maryland" sign, and you're going to have to trust me on that as the below image doesn't really look very clear. But we got it!</p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbqRprAb2vjEx22o63f4K7mdH9d5T53hmYeF_6wi68Hr1dxztZmIejevjpaMH6q21-wchXLxBsYlpjR9q9LlybZxTEn6c32lonh4tuDYF4pxCoduifjdKA6UZhvCHrlgroYw9J/s4032/20210820_155837.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbqRprAb2vjEx22o63f4K7mdH9d5T53hmYeF_6wi68Hr1dxztZmIejevjpaMH6q21-wchXLxBsYlpjR9q9LlybZxTEn6c32lonh4tuDYF4pxCoduifjdKA6UZhvCHrlgroYw9J/s320/20210820_155837.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">At this point we were both ready to be done driving, and quite excited about the days to come that the speed went up and the time flew by. Lily did all the driving today and that was fine by me - yesterday burned me out a bit. 1100 miles and we only listened to music in the last hour or two, and that was just the new Lorde album, and her previous two albums. Not bad for 24ish hours driving across half the country! It's a testament to the fun we had driving, chatting, and exploring the half of our country from the Mississippi river to the Atlantic Ocean.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxtxDA6L9iuCBf7uBuzZ1w3PmWfAEPeVhySQeutl54ikKtyRISD4lr7fOU2X83pkmlwslCabfsrUOOunsR19HfKCkzOmkyAPhNin34qiFNAieeALX0NfJESUQMODKfMBhHiglj/s4032/20210820_155843.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxtxDA6L9iuCBf7uBuzZ1w3PmWfAEPeVhySQeutl54ikKtyRISD4lr7fOU2X83pkmlwslCabfsrUOOunsR19HfKCkzOmkyAPhNin34qiFNAieeALX0NfJESUQMODKfMBhHiglj/s320/20210820_155843.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div>We finally got to my brother's house and the girl cousins got to see each other after way too many months. We had a great dinner (Pizza!) and sat around chatting with my brother, sister-in-law, and niece, though in Lily's case it involved lots of running around after a toddler and playing "peek a boo" to hear her giggle. Both hers giggling. A good way to end an amazing journey incident free!<div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA7aRMm8I5srEO4yDtjHphN0mazr9fSoZQSj4KA4wZFUeC5JAaRVrH1HdEMMcQx1eInO_epeNC9zpZpfHbBSPo2HeYvM53sB6Idt4Dfn9xzCXP2ffRGS0v6DLH793Dvaj9LdFY/s4032/20210820_174807.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA7aRMm8I5srEO4yDtjHphN0mazr9fSoZQSj4KA4wZFUeC5JAaRVrH1HdEMMcQx1eInO_epeNC9zpZpfHbBSPo2HeYvM53sB6Idt4Dfn9xzCXP2ffRGS0v6DLH793Dvaj9LdFY/s320/20210820_174807.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Again, too tired to edit, check for mistakes and spelling. Tomorrow is a big day!</div><br /></div></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-89118302088152395742021-08-19T23:25:00.002-05:002021-08-19T23:26:58.972-05:00Operation Lily Put, Day 2: Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A slow start to the day, a trip to Casey's to get some breakfast snacks, and we were on the road! We knew this was going to be a long, boring day. I was looking for any excuse to take pictures or see something interesting.. anything!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We came upon a truck and I noticed it was a car carrier. Not so much the kind with the shiny new vehicles on it, but a flatbed with a collection of cubes that used to be cars before they got compacted! If you <i style="text-decoration-line: line-through;">look closely, you can see a reflection of me</i> squint you can see a tire sticking out on the right hand side of the image.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLKZtAIAMLcvliv4djdjb5bpIdOvNkojHh4Qc1_8uRPtFSGDgjOKenII5hSyOCionJqRe7rY4q7mbq39wB_Fc3LDrloZMKTTEmAw6rAhHjLXn1pyiPuT59Km2Gc35LdD5mZC0a/s1476/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1476" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLKZtAIAMLcvliv4djdjb5bpIdOvNkojHh4Qc1_8uRPtFSGDgjOKenII5hSyOCionJqRe7rY4q7mbq39wB_Fc3LDrloZMKTTEmAw6rAhHjLXn1pyiPuT59Km2Gc35LdD5mZC0a/w640-h360/1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I do have to say one of the best things I've seen so far is a many laned highway that restricts trucks to the right hand two lanes. So nice not to have to wait while two trucks have an "elephant race" lumbering past one another while those of us with only 4 wheels form a long line behind them. It doesn't solve the problem of the white minivan that camps in the left lane, but the further east we go, the more people keep right and pop out to the left land just to pass.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The day before we'd started seeing these funny beehive shaped buildings. I think I probably saw these before and just forgot, but we had to look it up. They're for storing salt and sand for the street crews in the winter. I think they're a little bosom-y, myself. Once we got into Ohio we stopped seeing them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeZDP5EbvKCwYNmUC23ZSl1rumelN2451-O9T3TKCpK-kA5uqW41VlHvRtlLyWwco6ySd5m74xMoV2ip-kaDSTqVLnyCU4y1_4xopWfTmZLVA6PA2KE0KdIpcl2aJ1h0u_fsja/s1107/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeZDP5EbvKCwYNmUC23ZSl1rumelN2451-O9T3TKCpK-kA5uqW41VlHvRtlLyWwco6ySd5m74xMoV2ip-kaDSTqVLnyCU4y1_4xopWfTmZLVA6PA2KE0KdIpcl2aJ1h0u_fsja/w640-h480/2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>Oh and another thing about Indiana.. The license plates have a covered bridge on them, and it took us a little bit of time to figure that out. We didn't really have time to find a covered bridge, but I'm betting (hoping) that Pennsylvania has one or two, and we'll have a lot more time on Friday to go tilting windmills and looking for old bridges. BTW, the bridge in Madison County was burned down due to arson in 2002. So they rebuilt it. And then it got burned down again in 2017. Someone must really hate that movie. Jill and I saw it in a drive in theater along with Free Willy 2<strike>: The revenge</strike> but I don't remember much of it, we were still just dating back then.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH0U9GL0nWhYUbHXL48bVtqJ1bftApXXXMvi2ignXD1-q8o-mnGkKrwbTZEJSxw148TGffwl1-tiM0ewclbzMcBekG2fdHkDRZevabEYljUbcKHpyKzDEDgpr4HTkjRpJ-kaFn/s500/unnamed.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="265" data-original-width="500" height="106" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH0U9GL0nWhYUbHXL48bVtqJ1bftApXXXMvi2ignXD1-q8o-mnGkKrwbTZEJSxw148TGffwl1-tiM0ewclbzMcBekG2fdHkDRZevabEYljUbcKHpyKzDEDgpr4HTkjRpJ-kaFn/w200-h106/unnamed.png" width="200" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>And just when we thought Indiana couldn't get any more boring, we get walls on the side of the highway. So we couldn't even look at the trees and barns on repeat. Luckily it didn't last very long. I think it was mostly on the Fort Wayne bypass.<br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVRjocCvSntlEEzMU7TPeEgQI-OWj4OC7G392_8MhRsSkY_uspI1WDrIRKHYiQFI_UR4vHh7962MHwEsD-PQoSaTH5CPUaC9SedJVl74Q58a6iTEAj7sTCkucUtNofxkioAXAJ/s1107/3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVRjocCvSntlEEzMU7TPeEgQI-OWj4OC7G392_8MhRsSkY_uspI1WDrIRKHYiQFI_UR4vHh7962MHwEsD-PQoSaTH5CPUaC9SedJVl74Q58a6iTEAj7sTCkucUtNofxkioAXAJ/w640-h480/3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So yeah, we didn't take the direct route that goes straight across easterly, through Cleveland and such. It had more construction, and I wanted to avoid large cities, and to be honest it didn't sound fun at all. So I played the "this route is only 10 minutes longer" (but you repeat it six times and now you're an hour slower) game. When we go to the cabin if Jill is sleeping I can do that and stretch the drive out by another 45 minutes or so, but I get to go through tiny little towns and look at interesting old abandoned buildings. In those towns. Times are tough in Wisconsin.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Turns out Lily and I share a common love not just for driving, but for going off the beaten path a bit. Every time I suggested something different, she was up for it -- and a few times she thought of the best way to not be efficient in our route planning. So I'm going to find a covered bridge for her if it means looping back into Ohio.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We saw an amusing van that Lily described as having antlers. I was noticing the arm out the window holding something fabric and flapping it about. We decided it had to be a baseball hat, likely drying the sweat out. Good old Gutter Dan and his companion, whatshisname. When we finally passed Gutter Dan and company, I took a look at the driver. Turns out Dan's an older gentleman, and wasn't wearing a shirt. Oh and had the window open.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It's been stupid hot on this trip so far and crazy humid as well. High 80's or more, and just not comfortable. And yet we see so many cars on and off the highway driving with the windows open. I remember doing that in the 70's because Dad was too cheap to get an air conditioner in the <strike>orange</strike> <i><strike>(did you know it was international strikethrough day today? Well it is now.)</strike></i> saddle tan 1976 Dodge Aspen.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But don't all cars come with air conditioning now? I suppose not. I'm thinking that might be my most bougie statement of the day. But I can't imagine that makes for much of a comfortable ride, though it's better than no air conditioner and closed windows..</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgERCmJy3wEQnCgHv9NyNsonHDHzZLhaDEUO6ooMvqxomiYOxsKBCldWtoEZrIVIUguRSbn-d_XKPBDzpFNxhf6_eBqct-S8R7gBEVWGYvvFrspvNrNKUfMZDsOUAo3AKQnhsCF/s1107/4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgERCmJy3wEQnCgHv9NyNsonHDHzZLhaDEUO6ooMvqxomiYOxsKBCldWtoEZrIVIUguRSbn-d_XKPBDzpFNxhf6_eBqct-S8R7gBEVWGYvvFrspvNrNKUfMZDsOUAo3AKQnhsCF/w640-h480/4.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">More hours and more Indiana. They did have some kick ass windmills though. They seemed much, much larger than the windmills we have back home. See the corn, too? So much corn. Great, you've got corn.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA2aCu8Gsm2BoazN6iHn4WdbPgcJ91pxRxFGGT0r390sQYKaEF8-e4FnKPQIdpXh3UIJUZLcMLkLWiHc_sNYgQ-NoXoI-XW5hfUOu9_YbFQUlmkVNY0DRaglQvDxzU9Uh7Qq-K/s1107/5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA2aCu8Gsm2BoazN6iHn4WdbPgcJ91pxRxFGGT0r390sQYKaEF8-e4FnKPQIdpXh3UIJUZLcMLkLWiHc_sNYgQ-NoXoI-XW5hfUOu9_YbFQUlmkVNY0DRaglQvDxzU9Uh7Qq-K/w640-h480/5.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But then Ohio happened -- and we got a picture of the welcome sign! Want to know what Ohio looked like? Indiana. And corn.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoJZiqtySDLaGLHr9pNzYejwujd2H6ca_6P0GcfMc4U8lBNlluIpKt0aXrEtVjSgA67gTmCJYVdE7jGcbyRenX_nT9GBfTlrSmyNWT8EqBzpZCbvIX0zD2aAB5PFyhPIY2uGtQ/s1107/6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoJZiqtySDLaGLHr9pNzYejwujd2H6ca_6P0GcfMc4U8lBNlluIpKt0aXrEtVjSgA67gTmCJYVdE7jGcbyRenX_nT9GBfTlrSmyNWT8EqBzpZCbvIX0zD2aAB5PFyhPIY2uGtQ/w640-h480/6.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We stopped at the rest area mentioned in the above picture. Standard fare, pretty clean, nice picnic pavilion, and.. so much corn.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkYWA20UleCAhrgDfcVmW_j9QivVIMpqUG_S9ZkdY4V1K2NJGq2O1DdQVBFa3bSjoYEqy_CL7ofKffcIZ3yLdw5zAYcGEGXoRLRHiA5fQYX3fH_si2Y174ipWzmeulwKqSSDZH/s1107/7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkYWA20UleCAhrgDfcVmW_j9QivVIMpqUG_S9ZkdY4V1K2NJGq2O1DdQVBFa3bSjoYEqy_CL7ofKffcIZ3yLdw5zAYcGEGXoRLRHiA5fQYX3fH_si2Y174ipWzmeulwKqSSDZH/w640-h480/7.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span> I had a call with my therapist in the late afternoon so I was looking for a town with a park. Settled on Wooster, Ohio. It's actually got something like 4 exits, so it's of moderate size. And Lily knocked it out of the park, so to speak, in finding me a park in which to have my call. Huge park with an amazing view:</span> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span><br /></span></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLedw5owGqyX4ims-Q6xP1J9EaIssPKPomo_q0y3CtlT2WN7BvaVRwhT6xxfAzsvCl4-bgXV2Nw5-gw4tjJh1vvBs4oOUmH1aUxuFVsKzNPIzprsOVTpoXDqWw-UzezBMXNvaW/s1107/8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLedw5owGqyX4ims-Q6xP1J9EaIssPKPomo_q0y3CtlT2WN7BvaVRwhT6xxfAzsvCl4-bgXV2Nw5-gw4tjJh1vvBs4oOUmH1aUxuFVsKzNPIzprsOVTpoXDqWw-UzezBMXNvaW/w640-h480/8.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not a bad place to get your head shrunk!</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">and beautiful scenery, except many (like, MANY) of the trees had Lord Of The Rings scale spider web clumps in them. The size of footballs, sure to be holding billions of scary monsters.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0GILVWni_kEORBRFBll5JJAwrIuNcA3l7SfTpj9W98vhg0Gf0PCJsDSvC9erxz9YN3nH1BGCx0scylFCSQjrmsrsgH2ww-z06cx8NPFLDCAx5Wfj1SYF5xRNIlZqxQd9tm1oI/s1107/9.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0GILVWni_kEORBRFBll5JJAwrIuNcA3l7SfTpj9W98vhg0Gf0PCJsDSvC9erxz9YN3nH1BGCx0scylFCSQjrmsrsgH2ww-z06cx8NPFLDCAx5Wfj1SYF5xRNIlZqxQd9tm1oI/w640-h480/9.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The rest of the park had wildflowers, and nice benches, and these amazing paths that smelled like ValleyFaire when it opened in the 1970's. Can't recommend it enough. Although I can't remember the name of the park, because it's in Wooster Ohio and you're never going to go there on purpose.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUwYkW-scYAyJPWBqdSjnlNnJ4ISuh1YM-iEez4SuDl3SAjphxkSZrKhCTe0_79nKZaQjDjauMp36nK2jomtQeYVFvy6X0qUSepq-o-pn9nJFgOxv1Yx2uYT1xZwri_Y3j2n4g/s1107/10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUwYkW-scYAyJPWBqdSjnlNnJ4ISuh1YM-iEez4SuDl3SAjphxkSZrKhCTe0_79nKZaQjDjauMp36nK2jomtQeYVFvy6X0qUSepq-o-pn9nJFgOxv1Yx2uYT1xZwri_Y3j2n4g/w640-h480/10.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But something amazing happened when we got to Wooster. Elevation changes! Curves in roads! Interesting things outside the car windows! It changed everything. Yes, we were tired, but this felt like we were getting somewhere. I had to remind myself a number of times that we were still only in Ohio, but it felt much, much less like being in the Midwest and another place like home but with different graphics. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Yet another side note: Lily is so awesome at being the right amount of curious! We would see something like a billboard with a "your ad here" message on it, and we'd both thought to wonder how much that would be. So a full sized billboard is called a "bulletin" and it's 2-3k for four weeks. A smaller one is called something else but I forgot, go google it. But they're like $900 for four weeks. No matter who was driving, the other one of us was always ready to do a quick search and learn the answer to our curiosities. But not too much -- just enough to satisfy.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We also started to see Amish folk in great numbers. Like there was an invisible line they weren't allowed to live west of - as evidenced by the fact that when I'm in Minnesota and Iowa, I might see one or two, but never too many in a single trip. This was like a convention! Horse poop on the side of all the roads, people in a wide variety of buggies, and even Amish people walking horseless on the side of the road. I expect we'll see more in Pennsylvania, traversing covered bridges we hope. But I've never ever seen one on a horse. Do they not do that? For Rumspringa do kids ride ponies at the fair?</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEvQSUCSBv0iaNDO-v93VYJAwx5DloJCzoUb1aQ8_KGdxxn6JY5eBPxacY1zcWGrqWL6p8hmbexaBPwuMQclyEmO-ESE4uXBfXnriAabNNZluVRVTwk8L003_l5wCHLGqUFKOr/s903/11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="903" data-original-width="677" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEvQSUCSBv0iaNDO-v93VYJAwx5DloJCzoUb1aQ8_KGdxxn6JY5eBPxacY1zcWGrqWL6p8hmbexaBPwuMQclyEmO-ESE4uXBfXnriAabNNZluVRVTwk8L003_l5wCHLGqUFKOr/w480-h640/11.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We did continue to see beautiful skies and majestic clouds. And hills! So many hills!</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0dGAf9zmiavS69F9ti4_Vbo-xqZE9ZFKZVdl8GROwL2XHJRp7m2dwG7mq6a0EsUpj5o_al4qQrXaa-X3oREl7XNRsa6vSycgb8N-aXnromKl3J2D0E6jrNOghB-s1Bvj2txSk/s831/12.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0dGAf9zmiavS69F9ti4_Vbo-xqZE9ZFKZVdl8GROwL2XHJRp7m2dwG7mq6a0EsUpj5o_al4qQrXaa-X3oREl7XNRsa6vSycgb8N-aXnromKl3J2D0E6jrNOghB-s1Bvj2txSk/w480-h640/12.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">At some point <i>(again, I could look it up but don't want to. Go figure our route and look at a map and suss out what I'm talking about - the name ended with " dam") </i>we came upon a man-made lake, with huge towering hills around, and occasionally the road would jet across a section splitting the lakes apart. I was reminded of the TV series Ozark. You should watch it, but it's really dark so don't if you don't like that. And by dark I mean scary, but also filmed so dark you have to watch it under a blanket in order to be able to see anything. I kept thinking about all of the towns and homes and cemeteries and things like that who were flooded out to make the lake. I felt bad for the poor "second nation" folks who were driven from their homeland - that they got by driving the first nation folks out. It's still pretty eerie.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We could see deer in the hills, either in fields or edges of trees, but way high up in the hills. It was very cool, but also fun to see them not just on the side of the road, dead or alive.</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtgE6DVKiuWFVBZgaYOCEqcIscxnjiSDLLUpTUcC91e3sZumsnCxKuDAAlKs1veQhV5h934F3H7Kya19HzAB2X5oSYCCRgGcNT0oII6VClvFuTm1TxS4jMRTG45GdSZCn1C1SZ/s831/13.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtgE6DVKiuWFVBZgaYOCEqcIscxnjiSDLLUpTUcC91e3sZumsnCxKuDAAlKs1veQhV5h934F3H7Kya19HzAB2X5oSYCCRgGcNT0oII6VClvFuTm1TxS4jMRTG45GdSZCn1C1SZ/w480-h640/13.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I had noticed this the night before when researching the route - but we were going to go through West Virginia! <i>(mountain momma, take me home)</i> and that was going to bump our state count for the day up to four! We were in WV for literally 5 minutes before popping into..</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIldANmqXh7U4RPr4nHeql1gocNS9qVJ3GtALv_ztK93lUByEELyloUf8etT8mCoJ_A5HVcfmS9_nIXWkrVDNL-04Xsw6NG3xI33niXyNav4OYbS1GaYqEuykSjbZ6i1vTAmhy/s831/14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIldANmqXh7U4RPr4nHeql1gocNS9qVJ3GtALv_ztK93lUByEELyloUf8etT8mCoJ_A5HVcfmS9_nIXWkrVDNL-04Xsw6NG3xI33niXyNav4OYbS1GaYqEuykSjbZ6i1vTAmhy/w480-h640/14.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Pennsylvania! And we got all three new states' signage recorded for posterity!</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiveha35l-1qO3FxcCLLO2zzbBeDNdY47Cs5Ff1RVJpJHK1uQo2oyrtFLQn8ayV16Uu2ToEKKofFGS7lmpnmXQ-3EV8tzfjmrW7xhV_xqDBibo2PG3JzWXrdzNs6qGDWAFeUeBT/s831/15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiveha35l-1qO3FxcCLLO2zzbBeDNdY47Cs5Ff1RVJpJHK1uQo2oyrtFLQn8ayV16Uu2ToEKKofFGS7lmpnmXQ-3EV8tzfjmrW7xhV_xqDBibo2PG3JzWXrdzNs6qGDWAFeUeBT/w480-h640/15.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">After a beautiful sunset that lasted for hours, it got dark and we found our way into Pittsburgh. How the HELL did they live there before google maps? It's up and down and sideways and crazy all over the place. Even with the map, the instructions, and a line literally showing me where to go there were a bunch of times that I had to slow down just to see where the road might be. Oh and I'm going to start a collection for more streetlights in Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas. They have some, but none of them are anywhere near the curves, many of which are 90 and more degree turns.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So a good friend made a suggestion for hotels in Pittsburgh, and we were super jazzed about it. But I didn't want to make a reservation last night, because I didn't know for sure that we would make it to Pittsburgh, and the reservations were non refundable. So of course when we did the "Lily, make us a reservation 30 minutes before we walk in the door" trick that's worked so well for us the one time we've used it, they were sold out. But she found a Crown something that was inexpensive, really kinda nice, and in a big box store and parking lot factory, so less fear someone would break into her car and steal all her stuff. Not that they would want any of it. No offense to her, but college kids who haven't even colleged yet don't have anything of value. Except cash and checks from cards - and when we got done eating, she went to work and cranked out a ton of personalized thank you notes. Better late than never.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">When we checked into the hotel the clerk noted my surname deficiency, but also loved my Discover card - it's an image of an old cassette. The clerk in Valpo commented on it as well. We asked the Pittsclerk what the food options in the area were and he listed all of the boring chain restaurants you can find anywhere. We ended up deciding to have someone deliver some Arby's, but that was complicated so we just drive to the drive-through window and brought some back to the hotel. It was gone within minutes. When we were in Baltimore checking out colleges last year we had no option for food except delivery, so we had Subway meatball sandwiches delivered. It was the most expensive Subway order of my life, but at 2 in the morning they were so good!</div><div><br /></div><div>Tomorrow is a shorter driving day, and we intend to make it a much longer drive than it needs to be. Covered bridges, actual mountains, Amish, etc. Can't wait -- but can't keep my eyes open anymore. It's a good kind of tired. Not even going to go back and fix the typos.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-11685590633091129022021-08-18T23:38:00.003-05:002021-08-18T23:46:07.118-05:00Operation Lily Put, Day 1: Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">After a morning of alternating calm and furious packing, we were finally ready to go. In true Minnesota goodbye style, we said all of our goodbyes the night before, then this morning in the living room, then again on the porch, and finally on the front lawn with some pictures. It was a tone of excitement rather than just weeping and gnashing of teeth.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXMHmQoq8n46Llnd-LmHuohh_vWFsdrP8g3ksNwwyGPArUK_Ce_90Ezd0n3XQBj3FDXheA4sTuIBNSjm4N_pUP9kVQ94af23ihu7VHpkMsOlrBFjtvf6TxDHmudnOazSa178Qx/s1107/20210818_105252.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXMHmQoq8n46Llnd-LmHuohh_vWFsdrP8g3ksNwwyGPArUK_Ce_90Ezd0n3XQBj3FDXheA4sTuIBNSjm4N_pUP9kVQ94af23ihu7VHpkMsOlrBFjtvf6TxDHmudnOazSa178Qx/w400-h300/20210818_105252.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p>Photos were taken, goodbyes said again, and apparently I was in the way of a proper picture. How was I to know?</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ1g4XmMB7sbqHt6uG0mWI5APICm9KRC16lBuRm4U-1WSeJmkZaDt4IRfYCWJ7-ajG3PMWHPr7f6dGnEc-yG1XBAPYZBalDhTAZ7F36UalTYNhOULI-w94tue9zepOklFsvZ1w/s1107/20210818_105215.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ1g4XmMB7sbqHt6uG0mWI5APICm9KRC16lBuRm4U-1WSeJmkZaDt4IRfYCWJ7-ajG3PMWHPr7f6dGnEc-yG1XBAPYZBalDhTAZ7F36UalTYNhOULI-w94tue9zepOklFsvZ1w/w400-h300/20210818_105215.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">When we finally got on the road, we were chatty and thrilled to be beginning the trip. I managed to get an artistic black and white selfie on I-94 just after we got on that highway. We would end our day on the same road, so many hours later.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgDlxDYqJ5e_SvvSCwKBKTJjnqM4CEUGZbX46yNaLFaaZkqbdrktMaI34F4ehfZugoZSxLh_4csvmWsHHEFunOH-O7jT7TPfLHZZ-La9egArq51q11s5Iu0AUP_cS-FzzRE3jg/s1107/20210818_110955.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgDlxDYqJ5e_SvvSCwKBKTJjnqM4CEUGZbX46yNaLFaaZkqbdrktMaI34F4ehfZugoZSxLh_4csvmWsHHEFunOH-O7jT7TPfLHZZ-La9egArq51q11s5Iu0AUP_cS-FzzRE3jg/w400-h300/20210818_110955.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">One of my promises for the travelogue was to take a picture of every "welcome to" state sign. The first I got crossing over the St. Croix river into Wisconsin. It's a bit blurry, but it's so much better than the pictures for Illinois and Indiana, because I didn't get those. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>Interesting aside: The story I told the kids when they were little, when they were bigger, and endlessly repeated even these days whether they like it or not. It's the story of the Welcome to Wisconsin signs. You know how they're always made out of that wood? It's because back in the days before states, Wisconsin was ruled by a king. He was a cranky king and didn't like people from other lands, so he build a giant wall around Wisconsin. When it finally became a state, they did away with the king and the wall as well. They took parts of the wall and built welcoming signs with them. So when you see those signs, you're seeing a reminder of the past. (I didn't really mean for it to be a political yarn, but I can see the similarities now..) When I told the story to the kids so many times going to the cabin, I could stretch that shaggy dog story out for 20 minutes, easily.</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitlwgyekBqCs7iXpqgdjmiPIi13BdEpys5hS-zCf1mbHLYqTZU8HqTS3biDCdowrsXLlU0ecQqeL4_COxht1_z6DMnuE7a0q0xs6PeHttOMnHos7nS0ydV4gP9r6slTc5zr1Ni/s1107/20210818_113227.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitlwgyekBqCs7iXpqgdjmiPIi13BdEpys5hS-zCf1mbHLYqTZU8HqTS3biDCdowrsXLlU0ecQqeL4_COxht1_z6DMnuE7a0q0xs6PeHttOMnHos7nS0ydV4gP9r6slTc5zr1Ni/w400-h300/20210818_113227.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div>We've seen enough of western Wisconsin to want to take pictures, or even to mention it. <div><br /></div><div>A stop in Tomah to get some Subway handed to us at the car - the Subway minion chastised us for using the wrong side of the parking lot for our pickup, and we promised next time we were there we would do it the right way. (Spoiler: We'll never be there again.)</div><div><br /></div><div>When we got to the Wisconsin Dells, it got interesting again. We hadn't actually been into the main tourist zone of the Dells before, so made a quick trip to check it out. Took about a block of t-shirt shops and Ripley's Believe It Or Not! locations before Lily tagged out. I took the wheel and we headed on back roads to our next destination. But before and during the Dells we kept seeing signs for "Ghost Boat" and every time we saw one Lily would announce it excitedly. Turns out it's only at night, being a ghost boat and all, so we couldn't take that tour. There's money and time saved right there.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8XqJDAaAfWZS1xe4APrKll6CxVgqUVb5r33u7TAwUqMUiFzmLSY2-vH3x4h-1nR9gwYJXxTWxsYNehn0cNPa9v1F4G45BVAfRwHcbeZQHYpurkQXeOR9zOpPzQadxVQFo0KH1/s831/20210818_141717.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8XqJDAaAfWZS1xe4APrKll6CxVgqUVb5r33u7TAwUqMUiFzmLSY2-vH3x4h-1nR9gwYJXxTWxsYNehn0cNPa9v1F4G45BVAfRwHcbeZQHYpurkQXeOR9zOpPzQadxVQFo0KH1/w300-h400/20210818_141717.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We had been told of a ferry that was fun to cross the river on - and it was free! So we made for Merrimac (<i>past Baraboo and the actual Circus Museum! There is a cemetery there and I guessed there was more than one clown buried there..</i>) and got in line. A short wait later we were on the ferry and crossing the river. We had to work pretty hard to not cross the river on an actual bridge getting there - I think it's existence is now a novelty. Gift shops and ice cream stands available on both sides of the river. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlMdkwBXpVmXDEhaX3F4nRalOCZUjfeFtoaNk4AaA4IUpL8m64S6V3Hhr6uZlmjMz13K9PUw6Aq_mXs8hQw3S_UFw0_RRn94Lhp-2rdW-WW_uQd6aYfOK0HNZJCAqa8XoPxymM/w400-h300/20210818_151127.jpg" width="400" /></div></div><div><br />So strange to be behind the wheel of a car, not steering or accelerating, yet moving. But it was a really cool side trip, and if we're ever back that way again we may try it again. Or not, because...<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-xGhizCT45_fCaWLU3f-qAGTYeJXLkSdqR1gO8kFwUosdv6PZZXu6ug0EdbKRhDDtad-6SEVz7G3mR_LwF4lZS8WVx-tE9n-n6AgDLAyIYC8bh8aAtTf8nheuPp2iBPeNaz2_/s2209/pan.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="826" data-original-width="2209" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-xGhizCT45_fCaWLU3f-qAGTYeJXLkSdqR1gO8kFwUosdv6PZZXu6ug0EdbKRhDDtad-6SEVz7G3mR_LwF4lZS8WVx-tE9n-n6AgDLAyIYC8bh8aAtTf8nheuPp2iBPeNaz2_/w640-h240/pan.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The moment we got to the other side, our cell phone data dropped off. So some amount of time was spent happily wandering the back roads of Sauk county trying to find either a major highway or a cell signal. Eventually Lily's phone caught a signal and we were back on track. I found the experience of not being connected to the world of data quite unsettling. How on Earth did we live without a 24x7 connection to cat memes?</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfgoFEekQY4naH7F2Suug_caCAt2EswijrQDMWF-oTphXv5GKas3tVU_rPOy6JbtT7dPf-HNt2QYErRHFnU2T7ewdXPAtj3SunOskGYvqeSMqmbpq4nMkJH1-Ed7UhWHEKfXP5/s1845/Screenshot_20210818-153242_Maps.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1845" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfgoFEekQY4naH7F2Suug_caCAt2EswijrQDMWF-oTphXv5GKas3tVU_rPOy6JbtT7dPf-HNt2QYErRHFnU2T7ewdXPAtj3SunOskGYvqeSMqmbpq4nMkJH1-Ed7UhWHEKfXP5/w400-h180/Screenshot_20210818-153242_Maps.jpg" width="400" /></a><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A long day of driving the same superhighway, glancing off Milwaukee and then bypassing Chicago, we were surprised by both the Welcome to Illinois *and* the Welcome to Indiana signs. Didn't even see the Illinois sign. And we crossed into Indiana so seemingly quickly I really didn't understand where on the planet I was anymore. I thought we were still west of Chicagoland, but apparently bypassing it is so boring you miss everything leading up to signs for Gary Indiana.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We did actually stop once at the first Oasis we came across, for comfort stations and some caffeine at a Dunkin' Donuts that was out of donuts. Lily slept through the mess that was Milwaukee highways, and she really didn't miss anything. Except that damn white minivan that kept changing into the wrong lane, slowing down and speeding up randomly, and just in general causing me emotional distress.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">By the time we rolled into Valparaiso Indiana, or Valpo as the locals call it, the sun was setting and the clouds were enormous and beautiful. I've always been in love with the ocean, and the sheer magnitude of it inspires and excites me. Coming back to the Midwest I miss that feeling, but once in a while I see clouds that make me feel like I'm looking at an Ocean. The clouds of Indiana did not disappoint. I think it's the flatness and size of the sky, but for an hour or more before sunset we were treated to some amazing giant white puffy cloud collections. The picture doesn't do it justice.</div></div></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy-e3d4MawgLKZBHgoeKAZsqzvVBto-lACDgMnwneGqxk0pFzrpiUu9ML8qTKsjLRTbcqhuSD1kBq45OfYRqlKve_Ig8UsFAC6NduFGuGi3KWI8OAdyMzdFUvlHBS3Zvc7A7oi/s831/IMG_2383.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="831" data-original-width="623" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy-e3d4MawgLKZBHgoeKAZsqzvVBto-lACDgMnwneGqxk0pFzrpiUu9ML8qTKsjLRTbcqhuSD1kBq45OfYRqlKve_Ig8UsFAC6NduFGuGi3KWI8OAdyMzdFUvlHBS3Zvc7A7oi/w480-h640/IMG_2383.jpg" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I was tired and tired of being in a car, so we checked into the hotel, chilled for an hour or so, and headed off to a late dinner. Lily had a friend from her summer job that went to school in Valpo and had some suggestions for food. <a href="https://stacksvalpo.com/" target="_blank">Stacks </a>was the best reviewed restaurant around, and did not disappoint. It's a library themed joint, and had not only an amazing menu of food, but a beer list that would take years to get through. <i>(Funny - we were sat in the bar side of the restaurant initially, until Lily got carded for getting a Diet Coke. The waitress was seriously freaked out when she found out they'd sat a minor in the bar area. So she moved us to another table about 30 feet away. Crime solved.)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj15Ou40s_sK8djHz5D-zk7eXAtaacJszMl2Sy-2AU531o9PJ8Cr1cVnWCX0Shq2Nw9_MW0aVq8YNjFXeQu1WP_0y0WwfBw7975FojpIZeByCBtCJqUititiugtXLVUFZUkBuYc/s1107/20210818_212616.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj15Ou40s_sK8djHz5D-zk7eXAtaacJszMl2Sy-2AU531o9PJ8Cr1cVnWCX0Shq2Nw9_MW0aVq8YNjFXeQu1WP_0y0WwfBw7975FojpIZeByCBtCJqUititiugtXLVUFZUkBuYc/w400-h300/20210818_212616.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">There was even an interesting tidbit about the bar woodwork, captured on the menu below. No, I'm not going to transcribe it because I'm too tired and you're lucky to get as much as you did. Lily got amazing looking pasta and I got a burger with meat the size of a small steak - pink. So good! We left fat and happy with leftover boxes that I'm sure we'll forget in the mini fridge in the hotel. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="830" data-original-width="1107" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTMIQ9NmPTUNxEseVhDBZk4LTfpK_vR6KCrahrUPtHbfKEssN7SEqibpGLAP4HwUEaRpEM1mBZslYHr8ycQeO87OsChDD2ZPikCp5thT7cRsmc4IAKuXAfAPc5d4x3Jfj2H9bG/w400-h300/20210818_212735.jpg" width="400" /></div><div><br /></div><div>Tomorrow is Valpo to Pittsburgh, roughly the same number of miles as today, but no big cities to bypass and the promise of both boring endless flatlands, as well as our first foray into some mountain-like scenery. Lily's very excited about driving in the Appalachians and the enthusiasm is contagious. She has been up for every side trip and distraction so far, and makes for a fun, pleasant and interesting tour companion.<br /><br /><p></p></div></div></div>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-42102333245068208742021-08-17T23:10:00.003-05:002021-08-17T23:17:02.160-05:00Operation Lily Put: Day -1<p><br /></p><p> Not sure if it should be day negative one, or day zero. You figure it out.</p><p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm3wtKiEisU7xG_vaWSbXxOlRzfFa1tqWa03gBC_I2wDRyxqLO4Z5WwxYTvWNM6OiR7zAq-gZ28CJomDmGm09iw83N9U31EiTWyQuhG69hLYKHX7BvKiLgFD603gExGAngNv-a/s640/110907-1537-35%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm3wtKiEisU7xG_vaWSbXxOlRzfFa1tqWa03gBC_I2wDRyxqLO4Z5WwxYTvWNM6OiR7zAq-gZ28CJomDmGm09iw83N9U31EiTWyQuhG69hLYKHX7BvKiLgFD603gExGAngNv-a/s320/110907-1537-35%25281%2529.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So long ago.</td></tr></tbody></table></p><p><br /></p><p>Tomorrow I begin an adventure. The short goal is getting the daughter to college. The longwinded goal is to drive with her from Minneapolis to Baltimore in her car, then hang with my brother and his family for a few days, take a train up to CT to hang with my sister for a few, then take a train (!) home from New York along the Great Lakes, and finally back up to Saint Paul.</p><p>It's just that easy.</p><p>When I dropped the first kid off at college, I had the wife with me. She's my rock, and after the son's convocation we left, went to a nearby state park to check out the scenery, and I managed to completely lose it in the car. Luckily, wife was out looking at scenery. But I was a blubbering mess. Coming back to his school later in the year and seeing him on following holidays made me understand that we weren't losing him forever. In fact, he's home for summers and it makes me wonder what I was worried about. So ideally the second kid will be easier.</p><p>Ideally.</p><p>My son and daughter are very different characters. My son has my brain on the creative side. He's got the same perspective in many ways. I'm sure he'd like to think he's weirder than I ever was, but he's got a ways to go on that one, even with his gender questions. When he was going off to college I used to say it would be like losing a limb. I would miss him that much.</p><p>For my daughter, it's like losing a small part of my soul. She's got my brain too, but in a different way. She has the analytical, but also the anxious. Her attention to detail is about managing potential situations and how to handle them. I'm not saying she's crazy like me, but she's got a leg up on the competition. And for that I love her, and we understand each other in ways that a father fully appreciates with a daughter. She could be aloof and distant, but she isn't. She's smart and faulty like the rest of us, and I love her. So I'll miss her. But I'll know this time around that I'll see her again. That she'll come home for the holidays or summers and sleep until 1pm and I'll wonder how she'll amount to anything being so lazy. Like she's supposed to. Like the boy does. Like I did back in the day. (I don't think her Mother did back in the day or now, but they have a special connection all their own.)</p><p>When she was little - a baby or a toddler or a tween or a teen - the joking phrase I used was "What color car, dear?" suggesting that I would spoil her to the ends of the earth. Which is true. Once, when she was but a little one (toddler? baby? memory sucks.) we went to a wedding and I remember taking her out on the dance floor and swinging her gently about in a slow dance and thinking in "five minutes" I would be dancing with her at her wedding. We're not there yet, but I can see the young woman in the child and her independent nature and know it's all out of my hands at this point.</p><p>She wandered off to a summer job this year far from home, so it was a bit of a test for both of us on the homesickness and independence front. I'm proud of how well she did, and it did help me get a grip on her leaving. But this is still going to sting.</p><p>We will have three days of driving together getting her car out to Maryland. With my son, I'll drive him down to school in Iowa and by the time we get there we'll have chatted for five hours and I'll be fully ready to let him go. I don't know that will be the case with the girl, but we'll see. We're both looking forward to the journey and adventure.</p><p>I'll blog about where we go, what we see, and all about the expedition. It's Operation Lily Put because that's her name and I used to call her "Lillyputt." And I'm "put"ting her in college. The wife is taking the boy to his school on the exact same day, so this is going to be all me. Just me and her. And then just me. It's ok, my therapist and I have talked about this quite a bit, I feel pretty prepared.</p><p>In the last few days we've all been busy. Me with medical stuff, the wife with a new job, the daughter with packing. Today we had a complicated dance of people being dropped off, picked up, errands run and packing carried down to staging areas. In picking the daughter up from the local car shop (oil change and checkup) we rode my new scooter. She hadn't been on a scooter in a long time, and she remembered back to my very first one twenty years ago. (Less for her.) And on the way home she suggested we go to Butter. It's a local bakery/coffee shop. When she was in first grade I would walk the two blocks to her school and walk her home. Sometimes we would veer a block off the path and go to the local shop for juice/coffee and treats. I will always remember it as a special time. So will she, apparently. And today when she suggested it I knew it was The Right Thing To Do, because it was bringing us full circle.</p><p>So we went, got the same coffee/treats we'd gotten a decade and a half ago, and sat out at a tiny little table on rickety chairs, and enjoyed our detour. When I think of her as a little one, for some reason I think of her in one of her complicated but well coordinated and beautiful outfits. Smiling a toothy grin and enjoying her sugar rush in the spring or fall sun. Today she was explaining how the cups and containers were fully compostable, and talked of other things that an adult would talk about. It was the same, only different. And I know I'm about to spend a LOT of time with her, and might get a little weary of it -- but I doubt that. It was just really wonderful to bring it back full circle, and take my beautiful little girl out like we used to back in the day, and have a treat. Now I know she's going to go into the world, and do it really well and successfully. But it was a good reminder of the girl she used to be, while also appreciating the woman she is growing into.</p><p>To my credit, there was no blubbering today, but I considered it. Don't worry, it'll happen at least a few times this week. But you'll be along for the ride. </p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib3gsLmDouJeRRHbYHunKjvvdVtxjkKOkz4WsgjPBL2dMSe3hf2PnpK7EQTLqj0B9P-Gja195XCXcfjWdksGbZh-iXMpTFITbqu81s56nzxAbQTD7jGJ8iHixKjFXzsA8TZYaA/s3648/20210817_144913.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2736" data-original-width="3648" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib3gsLmDouJeRRHbYHunKjvvdVtxjkKOkz4WsgjPBL2dMSe3hf2PnpK7EQTLqj0B9P-Gja195XCXcfjWdksGbZh-iXMpTFITbqu81s56nzxAbQTD7jGJ8iHixKjFXzsA8TZYaA/s320/20210817_144913.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-2184923808221766122020-12-07T22:41:00.002-06:002020-12-07T22:41:49.476-06:00Say goodbye to a few hours<p>You know how you sit down to check Facebook for just a moment, but then you find the sun has set, or it's hours later and the cat hasn't been fed? It's so hard sometimes to stay focused, especially when the things we're browsing are interesting.</p><p>I might like interesting things more than the average bear, and I certainly like things that aren't interesting to most. For my history research, family research, and general amusement I have a subscription to Newspapers.com -- it allows me to search and read so many old (and newish) newspapers, but it can be just as distracting as a quiz on Facebook telling you which Berenstain Bear you are.</p><p>So I caught myself heading down the rabbit hole the other day, and thought I should just kinda keep track of what I was jumping from to and fro. So welcome to my wanderings:</p><p>I started in a Facebook group called "Historic Minneapolis," which for one reason or another linked me to another Facebook history group called</p><p><i>Sharing Minnesota History and Experiences</i></p><p><span> ... </span>which had an article and link to</p><p><i>History of the Police and Fire Departments of the Twin Cities, 1899</i></p><p><span> </span>... which in chapter IV had a story about</p><p><a href="http://spphs.com/history/1899/chapter_4.php?fbclid=IwAR0Ch8730xSWqbFRsb8DXrLt38gmnL6DQFSz2C4FI8DPymv6c-wOFLzRIzc" target="_blank">WONIGKEIT AND IRMISCH ARE CONVICTED OF MURDER AND ARE HUNG (1892)</a></p><p><span> </span>... so searching for the address to the saloon</p><p>Found Otto Wonigkeit in newspapers.com</p><p><span> </span>... which had an article that clarified the victim's name was</p><p>Lindhoff</p><p><span> </span>... which led me to a search result with an unrelated Linkhoff</p><p><i>Joseph Lindhoff, a young lad, was shot at today by some person unknown, and was slightly injured</i></p><p><span> </span>... which was in a small article on deaths including</p><p></p>Chas H Kirkwood, of Ishpeming MI died between Ishpeming and Nauganee with the following details:<br /><blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk_iWBLHJCihrgongh0kXHCZzGEdWDNhxxT2yYYr4k71c0LOXpcrywu4hXLjlXE7-CX8XoW1-2m5CZ-CAxAQEEbezg7h8XqOpuwnuBLlCbPFQaS5kloERooeNyUUYzESbvbp_c//" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="803" data-original-width="546" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk_iWBLHJCihrgongh0kXHCZzGEdWDNhxxT2yYYr4k71c0LOXpcrywu4hXLjlXE7-CX8XoW1-2m5CZ-CAxAQEEbezg7h8XqOpuwnuBLlCbPFQaS5kloERooeNyUUYzESbvbp_c//" width="163" /></a></div><i>"At 11pm, Charles fell from the front platform of a crowded electric car. </i></div><div><i>He caught the handle at the side of the step and was swung in front of the car, where he fell. </i></div><div><i>The car passed over his legs, cutting both off at the knee. </i></div><div><i>His face rested on the return circuit wire between the rails and he received a shock that caused instant death.</i></div><div><i>The car was stopped 100 feet further on and the body was picked up and carried back to Negaunee, where life was pronounced extinct.</i></div><div><i>Mr. Kirkwood was 45 years of age and a successful business man, owning multiple drug stores.</i></div><div><i>He leaves a widow and two children, aged 10 and 12. His son, aged 10, and his father's pet, has not slept or eaten since the accident and refuse to be comforted.</i></div><div><i>Mr. Kirkwood leaves a large estate free of incumbrance and a heavy life insurance."<br /></i></div><div></div></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;">Looking to see what happened to the "large estate" wondering if it became a Michigan Empire</div></div><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>... where I found ads referring to </p><p>Kirkwood pharmacy in Ishpeming</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>... and on the same page had an movie ad for </p><p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0017569/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_73" target="_blank">The Wise Guy</a>, starring James Kirkwood (Born in Grand Rapids MI in 1876, no idea if related)</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>... which introduced me to</p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kirkwood_Sr." target="_blank">James Kirkwood Sr., an Actor and Director</a></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>... whose career fizzled with the end of the silent film era. He died at the <a href="https://mptf.com/">Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital</a></p><p><span> </span>... which was created in 1940 after the untimely deaths of several former Hollywood stars (including <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roscoe_Arbuckle" target="_blank">Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle</a>, a wholly different rabbit hole), now destitute, shook the community.</p><p><span> </span>Scores of movie notables spent their last years here, as have far less famous people from behind the scenes of the industry. Those with money paid their own way, while those who had no money paid nothing. Fees are based solely on the "ability to pay."</p><p><span> </span>... where, in 2020, actor <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0307255/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0" target="_blank">Allen Garfield</a> died of COVID-19 at age 80. You remember him as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=324vo7VxWJI&list=PLGqbHCqF9Iab7-AGOYLThQZfarfZVFo1G&index=16&t=0s" target="_blank">Chief Lutz in Beverly Hills Cop 2</a></p><p><span> </span>... anyway..</p><p><span> </span>... one of James Kirkwood's 3 different marriages was to</p><p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0497759/?ref_=nmbio_sp_2" target="_blank">Lila "Cuddles" Lee</a>, an actress whose story includes a number of different cliches</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>... such as:</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> <i>"being p</i></span><i>lucked from obscurity, discovered by songwriter <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gus_Edwards_(vaudeville)" target="_blank">Gus Edwards (fascinating wiki page)</a> while playing on the street with other children."</i></p><p><span> </span>As a very young boy, Edwards worked as a <a href="https://www.wnyc.org/story/song-pluggers-then-and-now/" target="_blank">song plugger</a> at <a href="http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/14770" target="_blank">Koster and Bial's</a>, at <a href="https://vaudeville.sites.arizona.edu/node/51" target="_blank">Tony Pastor's theatre</a>, and at <a href="https://www.playbill.com/venue/bowery-theatre-vault-0000000058" target="_blank">the Bowery Theatre</a>. In those old vaudeville days, song publishers would often hire a very young boy to sit in the theatre, and immediately after a vaudeville star had sung one of the publisher's songs, the youngster would stand up in the audience, and pretending to be completely overcome by the song, break out in an "extemporaneous" solo of the same tune. </p><p><span> </span>He discovered <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gus_Edwards_%28vaudeville%29#Career" target="_blank">Walter Winchell, Elsie Janis, George Jessel, Eddie Cantor, Groucho Marx, Phil Silvers, Lila Lee, Georgie Price, Eleanor Powell, Hildegarde, Ray Bolger, Sally Rand, Jack Pearl, the Lane Sisters, and Ina Ray Hutton</a>. </p><p><span> He also </span>wrote "<a href="By the Light of the Silvery Moon" target="_blank">By the Light of the Silvery Moon</a>" (Oh holy crap that version is creepy!) among other songs.<span style="white-space: pre;"></span></p><p><span> </span>... Back to Cuddles -- her turbulent marriage to matinee idol James Kirkwood in the 1920s came very close to an "<i>A Star Is Born</i>" scenario. <i>[Just found this researching links - the writer of the latest version of <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1517451/" target="_blank">A Star Is Born</a> was <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/a-star-is-born-mptf-rescued-screenwriters-family-health-crisis-1159356" target="_blank">helped by the MPTF</a> - who run the hospital/home listed waay up there.]</i> Her acting career was shooting up while his was plummeting. They divorced in 1931.</p><p><span> </span>She was awarded a Star on the <a href="https://goo.gl/maps/5Bqz5y7rjBmh29uq5" target="_blank">Hollywood Walk of Fame</a></p><p><span> </span>Her erratic screen career decline was triggered by severe bouts with what was euphemistically referred to as tuberculosis, but whispered to be the results of acute alcoholism.</p><p><span> </span>For her tuberculosis in the 1930s, began an extended stay at the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/wrinstitute/photos/347773208592765" target="_blank">Will Rogers Memorial Hospital in Saranac Lake, New York</a> until her death in 1973.</p><p><span> </span>She made a few dismal comebacks on stage and in TV soaps in the 1950s but to little fanfare. Her last picture was as a hayseed mom in the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Sjhf4XB4_w" target="_blank">deservedly </a>obscure <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061522/?ref_=nmbio_mbio" target="_blank">Cottonpickin' Chickenpickers (1967)</a>.</p><p><span> She </span>had a son with James Kirkwood Sr, named..</p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kirkwood_Jr." target="_blank">James Kirkwood Jr,</a> who:</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9V7B0z-wFqCz5sCYsygkFGgyLY0OtZgSIQcpslIqEXOvN92yUP0f4mu2trAUmazdNctsT3BxREkcaFzCcf7hF9MeQN-g80boBetxnN4sQVu6subrEYYV7Y-Otac9EYFGP-oRK//" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1723" data-original-width="546" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9V7B0z-wFqCz5sCYsygkFGgyLY0OtZgSIQcpslIqEXOvN92yUP0f4mu2trAUmazdNctsT3BxREkcaFzCcf7hF9MeQN-g80boBetxnN4sQVu6subrEYYV7Y-Otac9EYFGP-oRK/w126-h400/image.png" width="126" /></a></div><span> ... </span>at age 12, he <a href="https://www.newspapers.com/clip/64857486/" target="_blank">discovered the decomposing body of his mother’s fiancé</a>, Reid Russel
of whom he was allegedly fond,
in the garden hammock of a friend’s house where they were staying. How long had it been there? Was the gun in the victim’s hand the weapon that had killed him? <p></p><p></p><p><span> </span>Much mystery surrounded this incident, at first listed by the police as a suicide, later investigated as a possible homicide. More about that in James' semi-autobiographical "<a href="https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/12/13/pony-somewhere/">There must be a Pony</a>" - <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_Must_Be_a_Pony" target="_blank">book </a>or <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092081/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1" target="_blank">film</a>.</p><p><span> ... he </span>wrote "<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083107/?ref_=nm_flmg_wr_5" target="_blank">Some Kind of Hero</a>" and the play PS Your Cat Is Dead, made into a <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0245341/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_61" target="_blank">movie by Steve Guttenberg</a> in 2002. It's only partally semi-autobiographical.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span> </span>... </span>more importantly, James Jr. wrote <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088915/?ref_=nm_flmg_wr_4" target="_blank">A Chorus Line</a><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></p><p><span> </span>In 1976 he received the Tony Award, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for the Broadway hit A Chorus Line.</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span> </span>He </span><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190525163106/http://mobile.easthamptonstar.com/Books/2012710/Missing-Jimmy" target="_blank">died of AIDS in 1989</a></p><p>I checked out the trailer for PS Your Cat Is Dead and now I want to see it. </p><p>It stars Guttenberg and Lombardo Boyar, who played <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0101603/?ref_=tt_cl_t2" target="_blank">Raul in Happy Feet</a>. It's about an actor holds a burglar hostage on New Year's Eve, after his girlfriend leaves him and his cat dies.</p><p><span> ... </span>it also stars <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0914475/?ref_=tt_cl_t2" target="_blank">Cynthia Watros</a>,</p><p><span> ... </span>who played <a href="https://lostpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Libby_Smith" target="_blank">Libby</a> on <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0411008/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1" target="_blank">Lost</a></p><p><span> ... </span>and has a (web) series called <a href=" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3797508/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_16" target="_blank">Cynthia Watros gets Lost</a> which you can watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPuyzzCgJHnABRVLHhX7Sh_4zb7efZZMS" target="_blank">here</a>.</p><p><span> ... </span>which looks good and bad and only has a few episodes, including one in which she works at a donut shop.</p><p>So what started as a comment on a Minneapolis history facebook page has caused me to end up wanting Donuts. Hope you enjoyed the journey as much as I did. :)</p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-64535644765234055572020-11-05T21:16:00.002-06:002020-11-05T21:21:58.404-06:00Got held up on the way to the Zoom call. Literally.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNl-CGeeNBmpoKgNgbN8XFI-l5QDmh3_4cT_abGxB6dm4tidmqn3GB1R0CNH0JtVuLy-4VrO8C1bm_P6SxUOFlf6Uk1TlDMIH_YsuWbyZoKVSEoLQW9rUeI_VV8I81IG_21nRs/s493/910601000000kw30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="493" data-original-width="344" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNl-CGeeNBmpoKgNgbN8XFI-l5QDmh3_4cT_abGxB6dm4tidmqn3GB1R0CNH0JtVuLy-4VrO8C1bm_P6SxUOFlf6Uk1TlDMIH_YsuWbyZoKVSEoLQW9rUeI_VV8I81IG_21nRs/s320/910601000000kw30.jpg" /></a></div><br /> Every other Thursday I meet with a group of guys from <a href="https://www.faceitfoundation.org/" target="_blank">Face-it</a>. Since COVID began we've been doing Zoom calls instead of meeting in person. Midsummer I realized I could use the two hours to go for a walk, use my earbuds and enjoy some exercise while I enjoyed the call. It's a great group of guys, and a tremendous part of my support system.<p></p><p><br /></p><p>I haven't been walking as much lately because it gets dark early and I was a little worried about the recent uptick in crime. But tonight was "dinner on your own" night and I like me some Jimmy Johns, so I figured I'd go for my walk, grab some takeout sandwich, and bring it back home to enjoy on the porch. It's been lovely weather lately.</p><p><br /></p><p>As I started my walk I joked to the guys that I was walking through Uptown so I'd probably get mugged. We all laughed, and the call proceeded - though I wasn't on video, I was just doing audio, because who wants to do a Zoom video call while walking, right? My earbuds have "ambient sound" mode, so I can still hear what's going on around me, so it's pretty safe.</p><p><br /></p><p>As I'm happily walking along 33rd, just about to get to Fremont, I notice a black sedan pull into the driveway a bit ahead of me. They cross the sidewalk so I don't have to stop, but I do notice that the reverse lights go on. So I'm paying attention to make sure they don't accidentally run over me. They don't, and I carry on.</p><p><br /></p><p>About fifteen feet later I sense and hear movement behind me, so I turn to see a young, maybe 14 year old, kid with a generic blue facemask, and he puts a hand into my back and says "don't say anything or I'll shoot."</p><p><br /></p><p>Seriously? He looked so young. And kinda angry.</p><p><br /></p><p>So let's back up a bit. </p><p><br /></p><p>I walked home from work downtown to our house in Kingfield almost every day for ten years. It was a great way to get exercise, decompress from work, and save money on gas. I really enjoyed it. I did, however, get a little nervous sometimes when it would get dark early, and I was just aware that we have some level of crime in the city. My plan was to be loud (I can be loud, more on that later) and to walk directly into the middle of the street I walk down. That street is Blaisdell and during the commute, is so busy that blocking it by walking into the street is likely far more dangerous than getting mugged -- but it would be an effective way of drawing attention to my situation.</p><p><br /></p><p>I thought about self defense weapons or things like that, but really thought being aware of my surroundings and wise to the fact that there are bad guys out there was probably the best I could do. Most of the time a weapon in a situation like that is used on the victim anyway.</p><p><br /></p><p>I never had any issues, and the fact that I'm male, with a large-ish profile might have had something to do with that. I'm aware of my priveledge, even if it's because I drink too much Summit beer. I would get myself amped up from time to time when I thought I might be at risk, but always felt a little let down I had never been tested.</p><p><br /></p><p>So I'm finally in that situation where a crime is being perpetrated against me. I get to find out how I would react.</p><p><br /></p><p>Backing up a bit again..</p><p><br /></p><p>I spent five years in the Marine Corps. Not the infantry. We were a smart group of Marines who honestly thought a lot of the macho military stuff was a bit silly but we went along with it because we dropped out of college or something. But the Marines nonetheless. I'm quite proud of my service, and regardless of my job in the Marines, I went through the same bootcamp as everyone else. As a skinny nerd I might have had a rougher time, in fact. In any case, one of the things I learned from the Marines is what my family calls my "Marine Voice." It comes from your stomach, takes all of your bottled up emotions, jams them through your lungs taking every breath of air you hold, and comes barreling out of your throat almost skipping the mouth. It's quite loud, and I've been permanently banned from using it in the car. Or indoors. Or anywhere, really. As I've matured I've mastered my emotions a little better and control my anger or agression or whatever. Did I mention it was loud? I'm quite proud of that, and if I can figure out how to make money belting out whatever I can, it would be a fun job.</p><p><br /></p><p>One of the other things I took from the Marines is a sense of problem solving that usually shows up as a direct need to face a situation, usually somewhat aggressively, and look for a solution. I'm pretty good at remaining calm, and like to go into logic mode when I can.</p><p><br /></p><p>So looking at this kid I just went into Marine mode. Remembering that my time in the Marines was 30 years ago, it's just something that never goes away. The thing in my back didn't feel like a sharp thing (knife) or anything really heavy (gun) and to be honest if it was a guy he wasn't aming it anywhere important, and it wouldn't be more than a .22, so it's just a little hole. We have lots of hospitals around here, what's the worst that could happen?</p><p><br /></p><p>Oh yeah, I'm a little dark, too, so regardless of my mental state I've always had a tiny bit of a death wish.</p><p><br /></p><p>So at full Marine volume I say (shout? emote?) "Go ahead, shoot me" and then remembering that if you're being mugged on a New York street nobody will look at someone yelling "Help" but they'll look if someone says "fire!" I yell "Fire! Fire! There'a a fire here!" and so on.</p><p><br /></p><p>The kid went from angry to wide eyed, confused, and scared in a heartbeat. He turned and ran toward the car and I could see there were two others in the car. Kids, really. And they all had the same look of "what the hell is happening here?" on their faces. </p><p><br /></p><p>At this point I'm actively mad and he's running, but I'm walking briskly after him yelling for him to get out of the neighborhood, go away, things like that. It's likely my language was fairly coarse. Like, you know the phrase "swearing like a sailor"? Well the Marines are a department of the Navy, just sayin'.</p><p><br /></p><p>The kids offer some halfhearted responses, but to be honest I couldn't hear them over my own volume, and they didn't look like they were really trying that hard. Off they sped, this old man standing on the sidewalk yelling his head off at them. Problem solved.</p><p><br /></p><p>I'll file a police report at some point but there was little point to calling 911. Black car (likely stolen), didn't get a license, three kids. Same description as the rest of the latest incidents.</p><p><br /></p><p>So I turn, announce "All is well, carry on" to the neighborhood, and continued on to pick up my dinner. Went right back to my (still on) Zoom call, luckily I was on mute. When I told the guys they thought it was hilarious. So did I. Nothing like a good shot of adrenaline to put some pep in your step.</p><p> </p><p><br /></p><p><i><span style="color: #cccccc;">Yes, I know, it was technically foolish. No, you shouldn't do this. I shouldn't do this. I could have been hurt, etc. I made some assumptions and was lucky it went the way it did. I love you too.</span></i></p>fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-36449789919208668562019-01-13T17:38:00.001-06:002019-01-13T17:39:17.886-06:00A weekend in Chicago<br />
Lily placed well enough in her regional bouldering competition that she was selected to compete in the divisional competition in Chicago. It was the same weekend Eli needed to return to college, so we thought we'd make a family adventure out of it.<br />
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An unseasonably warm January meant that exploring the city in the free hours of that weekend would be much easier. Oh hindsight, you nasty thing, you.<br />
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We took off Friday and headed out in the morning. The fact that Lily could take some driving shifts helps on long drives such as this. As someone who really really loves driving, it's tough to give up any driving time to anyone, but when Lily drives we get to chat. That and she is always happiest when driving, and I like to see her happy. (Especially in these tumultuous days of high school)<br />
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Somehow I managed to miss getting pictures of the Oasis we stopped at in Illinois, but it was a first for the kids - and I hadn't been to one in a very long time. It was the church of gluttony and consumption that I remembered it. But we ended up getting a ton of treats and food, as well as some polish kolaczki for our breakfasts. We really made out like bandits skipping the toll and hitting the oasis. We saved at least $-35 doing that!<br />
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Traffic was as bad as usual but Lily ended up driving into the city and did a great job. She even got to "assert her dominance" a time or two, under my ever watchful eye, of course. Our AirBnB was in the Humboldt neighborhood about a mile from the gym where the competition was held. It was a nice brownstone in a neighborhood of brownstones, and we got the whole second floor. It was really nice having a room for each kid and one for Jill&me. They made themselves at home by retreating to their rooms and shutting out the outside world.<br />
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We rousted them for a dinner excursion and we walked down to the Ukrainian Village neighborhood to a few restaurants, sure that one of them would work for everyone. The second one we hit was <a href="http://www.lockdownbar.com/" target="_blank">The Lockdown Bar and Grill</a> and it was perfect. Eli and I had been talking about gentrification and the state of Uptown in Minneapolis, and I had lamented the loss of the Uptown Bar and Grill, and this place had a similar vibe.<br />
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We walked home through an area known as “Paseo Boricua” (or “Puerto Rican Promenade”) and it's bordered by these <a href="https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/puerto-rican-flag-sculptures" target="_blank">huge sculptures of the Puerto Rican flag</a>:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sixty feet tall, spanning the street!</td></tr>
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Our AirBnB was decent, quiet, and had all the comforts of home. Including a heating system that took a bit to understand and master. By the time we left we were able to manage.<br />
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The competition on Saturday went great! We dropped Lily off for her isolation time at the gym, and Jill and Eli and I went to a Dunkin Donuts to begin the great destruction of my calorie counting for the weekend. But those are some tasty donuts. Don't judge.<br />
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We returned with enough time to get good places to watch Lily climb. At four minutes per climb and only four routes for her class it was over pretty quickly. In the end, she ended at #16 out of 22, but that's not bad considering it makes her the 16th best in her class for a 12 state group. We're quite proud. She was just happy to have gone that far.<br />
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I have videos of her climb on my Facebook page but the best photo I took was this picture of her calloused and chalked up hands:<br />
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After the competition we went back to let her decompress and we planned the rest of our day. We had a good portion of the afternoon and all of the evening, so we got out the Chromebook and planned our tourism. The plan was to uber downtown, snack, tour, then get some amazing Chicago pizza and maybe take a train around town. We headedto a food hall where everyone had a great choice of foods. That was the last of the plan.<br />
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It had started snowing a little bit by this point, but not even enough to bring winter hats. Arriving at the food hall we discovered it was closed on weekends, and we were on our own. Also, it was now snowing quite a bit. With wind. And ever cooling cold. Heading toward Millenium park to see "the bean" we figured we'd find something on the way. Within a block or two we found our "something" ion the form of the Berghoff. A classic Chicago restuarant with a heavy German lean, the kids got pretzels the size of your head, and Jill and I got good German fare. My sausage trio with slaw and potato salad was flat out amazing, and Jill's schnitzle was just as good. What had intended to be a snack turned into a giant mean and we wouldn't be hungry for hours. Not to worry, we had a lot of walking and touring to do, so it would be fine. (Real Life 2, Expectations 0)<br />
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By the time we left the restaurant we had discovered a full-on blizzard. Snow, wind, cold and a poorly outfitted family meant we had to think on the fly. We ran into the lobby of the Art Institute of Chicago to re-replan. It was bad enough out that Eli thought maybe the museum wasn't such a bad idea after all. Problem was that it was closing in less than an hour and we didn't want to spend a ton for a short amount of time. Not to worry, we can check out the bean and head to the train and head north further into the city for something else, probably indoors.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It felt so much worse than this!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I got my tiny picture of the beginning of Route 66, though!</td></tr>
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Venturing to the bean (Cloud Gate) past the ice skaters - they were also clearing snow around the bean and it was fun to watch the other tourists running away. <br />
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Eli didn't actually know what we were going to see until we got there, and thought it was pretty cool. Lily was pretty cold and de-stressing from the competition, so between that and the weather our evening was starting to look shorter.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">And why did the bean smell so strongly of pot?<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is going to be the cover art for our first album</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Typical reactions to a proper Craig <br />
Tourism Death March</td></tr>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWEwxh2ZROhmiU-FUIz9WyraZngTbuxldHS4CRyFSHx1TdEYvC7-YMT3oj0YygNd_E7fN72SPsk0WEENA-Ce2ykFOVCF5zp2Ze5MJU4GfjVnQQ_YTFYNgrLOqYcl5zAdjkNPuR/s1600/20190112_165036.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWEwxh2ZROhmiU-FUIz9WyraZngTbuxldHS4CRyFSHx1TdEYvC7-YMT3oj0YygNd_E7fN72SPsk0WEENA-Ce2ykFOVCF5zp2Ze5MJU4GfjVnQQ_YTFYNgrLOqYcl5zAdjkNPuR/s320/20190112_165036.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
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We bailed to the subway and decided to go back and call it a day. Cold, tired, frustrated but still in moderately good spirits.<br />
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Although I was starting to think of ways to clearly tell the guy smoking that he wasn't being sly, it stank, and he should stop. But I didn't. Probably for the best. But boy did he look like he thought nobody knew he was smoking.<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
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Back to the AirBnB and the comfort of our evening. We ordered some amazing deep dish local joint pizza and watched The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the desert. Tired and happy.<br />
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Sunday we hit the road early, grabbed some more Dunkin Donuts and headed for Mount Vernon IA. Part of the drive was on route 30, the Lincoln Highway. I told Eli when he was older and I was old we would have to drive the Lincoln Highway from New York to San Francisco! After we dropped Eli (many hugs and well wishes later) we headed home. For only being two days, it really felt like a much longer trip! And Lily got a ton of night driving hours in the end.</div>
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fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-55506035343319632052018-12-06T18:00:00.000-06:002018-12-06T18:00:02.639-06:00Copenhagen Adventure, Day 7<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Commuting with the local Danish folk has been a bit of a high point for me on this trip. Just really love the vibe with the trains and the traffic and the bikes!</div>
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Took the train up to meet Michael for a ride to work, but got to stop at his house - apparently the former home of Jørgen Haagen Schmith, a WW2 resistance fighter (portrayed by Mads MIkkelson in <i>Flame & Citron</i> - a great movie!) which of course I found fascinating!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuHKOHXBr9ILryc3WRScGNaIBN9lp6wNlXSLhVuZhrYYgyCk5yKuvmGBCPt5j8RB3KarczuK6GEjDXRzvczbaeQJcIj_XnERHqZ10Ga0pUuPFTqyAs_D9EW-BcnF0ABqicmoW5/s1600/20181205_080607.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuHKOHXBr9ILryc3WRScGNaIBN9lp6wNlXSLhVuZhrYYgyCk5yKuvmGBCPt5j8RB3KarczuK6GEjDXRzvczbaeQJcIj_XnERHqZ10Ga0pUuPFTqyAs_D9EW-BcnF0ABqicmoW5/s640/20181205_080607.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Apparently the intersection was the scene of some sort of kerfuffle during the war</td></tr>
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And since I had it bookmarked, we drove past Jægersborg Allé 184, where Citron was killed after a gruesome firefight, where he held is own against 200 German troops, finally running out of ammo and charging the machine guns.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ok, not much to see from the road, but still amazing</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of the previously mentioned Thatched roof houses</td></tr>
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The monitors in the office had been deocrated with lights this morning, and get everything just that little bit of extra holiday cheer!<br />
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Heading home I realized I needed to eat - <i>again</i> - and headed into the center to find something.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The light show included turning the whole building into an advent calendar with a number in each window</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Like I would go to Copenhagen and not see something Lego?</td></tr>
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After having some Gløgg in Nyhavn I screwed up the courage to get some dinner, and had a lovely Tuborg holiday beer (Julebryg) and a "New York burger" which was flat out amazing. Then back to the hotel to write up travels and then pack for tomorrow's departure.<br />
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I very much would love to stay longer. And I very much can't wait to get home. It's been a lovely, fun, beautiful, amazing, interesting, enlightening, happy trip. But I miss my family and my comfy home. But it sounds like I'll be back in less than too many seasons, so I look forward to coming back some day -- maybe next time during summer months where I get tons of light for taking pictures...<br />
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<br />fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-17572658367977808842018-12-06T15:00:00.000-06:002018-12-06T15:00:01.887-06:00Copenhagen Adventure, Day 6<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Some more good office time, but most importantly, I took the train in to work! No issues, and I felt like I blended nicely with the local Copenhageners. Wear headphones, dress as stylishly as possible (with dark, muted colors of course) make sure your cheekbones are high and proud, and look awake but not too awake. The further you get on your train journey the more you can confirm you're on the right one. But halfway to Malmparken (it's a station, not a car from IKEA) I saw one of my workmates get on the train. One of the sales folk, we've talked a ton, and he was actually the only person I brought a gift for - some beef jerky, as he mentioned he liked it. So we got to talk some more, and more significantly he helped me get on campus and badged me through the door!</div>
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Some things I liked about the office that I think we might want to have in Minneapolis</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ok, this one is just a front end developer and our CEO playing some fierce ping pong</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtdxxhuDh0QayQiQgffLtocUP4kmQiHbKRFbdjb-WVuYloJLQbBX-RsEBYPJYrbDswRHBUNJQUKiAicmz_rR1qmylTOOeIjtBvhDHHQDAJbZzoP18P3OoXHhPDHzAvKoea5LRI/s640/20181204_172112.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="480" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dashboards. Tasty, tasty dashboards</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtdxxhuDh0QayQiQgffLtocUP4kmQiHbKRFbdjb-WVuYloJLQbBX-RsEBYPJYrbDswRHBUNJQUKiAicmz_rR1qmylTOOeIjtBvhDHHQDAJbZzoP18P3OoXHhPDHzAvKoea5LRI/s1600/20181204_172112.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtdxxhuDh0QayQiQgffLtocUP4kmQiHbKRFbdjb-WVuYloJLQbBX-RsEBYPJYrbDswRHBUNJQUKiAicmz_rR1qmylTOOeIjtBvhDHHQDAJbZzoP18P3OoXHhPDHzAvKoea5LRI/s1600/20181204_172112.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYtLgFvjZtS3KyV2ZOWMzJDw0QT1MarlKcbiS9XGqgFXD4NtTGrketpqAzewaJvgyU25Ypqfa4bhIa5ii3Ibp9pEfpO4dPzZ0Tf0qZS4lCI3M4rbtKnQ6HB3EMo-FCsDErhXGj/s1600/20181204_172141.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYtLgFvjZtS3KyV2ZOWMzJDw0QT1MarlKcbiS9XGqgFXD4NtTGrketpqAzewaJvgyU25Ypqfa4bhIa5ii3Ibp9pEfpO4dPzZ0Tf0qZS4lCI3M4rbtKnQ6HB3EMo-FCsDErhXGj/s640/20181204_172141.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A "conversation pit" - handy and comfy</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoHtGnQVgrbwMeF6fStLXfGuOvUW3OaEEeMqj2HkvzDq7yege4exkAlt3lZaUkiJI4bfWDUlRL14uHh_fPI3ZYTIU9ak69vQBEDZmMZW5hkzzcfwUFnQRcXZ-58LvX87d8PFM_/s1600/20181204_172159.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoHtGnQVgrbwMeF6fStLXfGuOvUW3OaEEeMqj2HkvzDq7yege4exkAlt3lZaUkiJI4bfWDUlRL14uHh_fPI3ZYTIU9ak69vQBEDZmMZW5hkzzcfwUFnQRcXZ-58LvX87d8PFM_/s640/20181204_172159.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Polaroid org chart - they even took polaroids of our online pictures since we weren't there</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAMmw8XcljaXEfUnCd3n9CoN-M4jjfsdaa3Fd8Q24szwyJxbG-G_m2LsAqP6Ii2Wn668C8cGD1x0rMouQ0DlR1ceKD0FVYseqZW7GKGJMtr7pmvVkWSAK-ffRkfV4qTbVYIuwA/s1600/20181204_172206.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAMmw8XcljaXEfUnCd3n9CoN-M4jjfsdaa3Fd8Q24szwyJxbG-G_m2LsAqP6Ii2Wn668C8cGD1x0rMouQ0DlR1ceKD0FVYseqZW7GKGJMtr7pmvVkWSAK-ffRkfV4qTbVYIuwA/s640/20181204_172206.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Office supplies</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSvfSq4Vi2PTwagXLzQ1nrXd3J6uDuUfCbNwy3WlovtL3ZNseUdQA5_KY82x4PGf5QGnnsjSPA_EkXBxPEEx58tNDOgCOEdcpPSNrR0JIQAkRIDQzmakwMvYfB_swmY1at8J3B/s1600/20181204_172220.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSvfSq4Vi2PTwagXLzQ1nrXd3J6uDuUfCbNwy3WlovtL3ZNseUdQA5_KY82x4PGf5QGnnsjSPA_EkXBxPEEx58tNDOgCOEdcpPSNrR0JIQAkRIDQzmakwMvYfB_swmY1at8J3B/s640/20181204_172220.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">They keep their sales people in a glass cage. I mean, office.</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiR8xFyD0ytIVgKWkuPa0lYesmcBPhX367UgYZCeygJXItfVdBBw4LP6tNYPNmd_ljecOI1GaX34hulAWWkYhLP9Tg23cGLYRgdYqQ6Nr5F8Ft9DqtERSCDNluPK4J1uUP3fYAK/s1600/20181204_172238.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiR8xFyD0ytIVgKWkuPa0lYesmcBPhX367UgYZCeygJXItfVdBBw4LP6tNYPNmd_ljecOI1GaX34hulAWWkYhLP9Tg23cGLYRgdYqQ6Nr5F8Ft9DqtERSCDNluPK4J1uUP3fYAK/s640/20181204_172238.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Whiteboards and sound baffles</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBt0WvTBUeFzMWpiCkx1nYWsCiJk2e9dS7AoDWDxHim3qg6PwCXvs6pYq-3sTd_1XFVwwCg7bregKwdQwXiL7NQeYqlrFZcVfEJgTveVr1rnilhsEt9C4fgUnmmKHNVjT6Yllp/s1600/20181204_172739.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBt0WvTBUeFzMWpiCkx1nYWsCiJk2e9dS7AoDWDxHim3qg6PwCXvs6pYq-3sTd_1XFVwwCg7bregKwdQwXiL7NQeYqlrFZcVfEJgTveVr1rnilhsEt9C4fgUnmmKHNVjT6Yllp/s640/20181204_172739.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So many international workers that every desk in the office has a little flag representing the country of the person who sits there. I think Eli would be challenged to name them all!</td></tr>
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That evening the team I'm on had a dinner out in my honor. We first went to Tivoli (see previous post), a historic amusement park in the middle of the city. Normally closed for the winter, they have Christmas themes in December and do it up in full yuletide fashion. They even run the rides - and some of those rides are crazy tall and all the way up in the wind and cold temperatures. None of us were brave enough to go on them in the 30something degree weather, but I secretly wanted to go on the crazy spinning airplane ride. Next time!</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtohBB8eRueEK3Dol5jB0MjgQ0P1_Crxf9_1Z4TppDkJQmsbaL4dwRlV2aj83ET70Nh_yPVMLBidO6eq1JwV37Fun9ilUw9G0UTK4c9F1bUGMnifAp6fNnbhsUtZvHnlpsHt9w/s1600/DSC02065.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtohBB8eRueEK3Dol5jB0MjgQ0P1_Crxf9_1Z4TppDkJQmsbaL4dwRlV2aj83ET70Nh_yPVMLBidO6eq1JwV37Fun9ilUw9G0UTK4c9F1bUGMnifAp6fNnbhsUtZvHnlpsHt9w/s640/DSC02065.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxVW_X3q1wR-r8P96orW4H_o9BfVDe93prspzT2g1tqThZVVn20d5pBLSv_Fx3VkBS-OEHGMR0jTp-9mKEgjeZMsFifvGCz1fhhx_4wiPQnoTrJNUeu3P8YeEcoZSTASQS5eyb/s1600/DSC02066.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxVW_X3q1wR-r8P96orW4H_o9BfVDe93prspzT2g1tqThZVVn20d5pBLSv_Fx3VkBS-OEHGMR0jTp-9mKEgjeZMsFifvGCz1fhhx_4wiPQnoTrJNUeu3P8YeEcoZSTASQS5eyb/s640/DSC02066.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBtdIZztEQl7wJDfzQGzxHORLN8e2y3RtROurfQFOmyngTTq9mUgKwyleHWiiMEq0wKn2YeNSHvW5UEkHvtu0_zTzrBM9SplzYrMizYBj_0CnOVBvypPvJvmARsQxn6ESAf57E/s1600/DSC02068.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBtdIZztEQl7wJDfzQGzxHORLN8e2y3RtROurfQFOmyngTTq9mUgKwyleHWiiMEq0wKn2YeNSHvW5UEkHvtu0_zTzrBM9SplzYrMizYBj_0CnOVBvypPvJvmARsQxn6ESAf57E/s640/DSC02068.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9RG759FMyXcy2T52pLJxqUh1f7x1FlEYrKov8K4C90L9T7ipr9reGNVylNKxa-n_CZNAkQYYrGuKOLeDSHCG93uiawiHmAAbNtn5esPlPp5Yqu202qdf-W0ujE2Uh_y90os4Q/s1600/DSC02070.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9RG759FMyXcy2T52pLJxqUh1f7x1FlEYrKov8K4C90L9T7ipr9reGNVylNKxa-n_CZNAkQYYrGuKOLeDSHCG93uiawiHmAAbNtn5esPlPp5Yqu202qdf-W0ujE2Uh_y90os4Q/s640/DSC02070.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I liked the mixed media steampunk-like theme here - also, it has Hygge in the name, so,.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj25ZiOv_Chk9zBTPaPz6w1uyB1rhxBgXFsCZZIWVK2u3-by3nYSHBXgEc640RzIQSHxu0N1QCgGs68Tf62lT8vdfdIecEcP4EPROUujerKEFjUsEBCfzpdvZMkqqMi62bWODKE/s1600/DSC02074.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj25ZiOv_Chk9zBTPaPz6w1uyB1rhxBgXFsCZZIWVK2u3-by3nYSHBXgEc640RzIQSHxu0N1QCgGs68Tf62lT8vdfdIecEcP4EPROUujerKEFjUsEBCfzpdvZMkqqMi62bWODKE/s640/DSC02074.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There are a lot of Hans Christian Andersen themes here, and this one is, of course, the flying luggage story..</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFKWgThnjWj5luWuCsRLx7ReN7UAH3BRa3LrgMaElqIY44vf5C6q_FvVI6_ATGxxNBgZmJEGl-kgw53xzfwdWFgG37X6fxEayDI-0eP03b6RpTnHcS24hrGCJmhqS0AIf3Mfvp/s1600/DSC02075.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFKWgThnjWj5luWuCsRLx7ReN7UAH3BRa3LrgMaElqIY44vf5C6q_FvVI6_ATGxxNBgZmJEGl-kgw53xzfwdWFgG37X6fxEayDI-0eP03b6RpTnHcS24hrGCJmhqS0AIf3Mfvp/s640/DSC02075.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hard to tell, but old fashioned cars!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieqcr-m3LyeiNoY5g-49uCrFNeHvLZt4jCZCWG89nZWaieHYOBI6tXnIHILkY-hUfn2YPnExlD2dXtFLQgQvrZYirHqqHAOFkaDJit2_EPSRa0CsN7W082kWRzneejqmocxCTK/s640/DSC02078.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="480" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The crazy spinning airplane ride</td></tr>
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It really is an amazing place - even if you don't go on the rides. There are many HCA references, and it was fun to hear my Danish cohorts talk about riding some of these rides forever ago when they were little. There was a great episode where everyone was explaining to me who Rasmus Klump was, and all about his pancakes and friends (Seal, Ostrich, etc.) -- for as endearing as they described it, it was utterly foreign. Like listening to the radio in Canada - you understand what it might be, but had no idea so many people loved it, while you didn't know it existed.</div>
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We followed the walking tour of the park with a traditional Christmas dinner at one of the more famous restaurants in the park. Apparently when the Christmas season opens all the celebrities of Denmark pay tons of money to eat there on opening night. As much as I like the idea of eating where Mads Mikkelson ate, I'm much happier that my boss paid for the pleasure.</div>
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The foods were amazing. Some really fish fish, creamy creams, and bready breads with many backstories and tales of how the Danish co-workers grew up with these foods. It was extravagant and tasty - but surprisingly filling, for sampling foods for so long. No room for dessert, even! But I think the herring with different sauces was my favorite, even if I was tasting it for hours afterward.</div>
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We also had some of the holiday beers, and more importantly, some proper holiday Aquavit. It tasted okay, but I was just happy to finally have some after having read about it for so long. Side note: Friday night's holiday party involved quite a bit of drinking, but nothing compared to the <i>single shot </i>of Aquavit I had this night and how I had to concentrate on not falling asleep or freaking out about the <strike>bed </strike>table spins. It passed quickly but I thought it was funny how intense it was.</div>
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We wrapped up the evening, and I had a good walk with our CTO. We had a good chat, and it was another of those times where I was really happy to be getting to know my co-workers and the founders not just as people I work with, but as good friendly people with whom I have a lot in common. Especially the leadership - it's nice to have the common experiences of children and age to share perspectives regardless of our countries of origin.fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-850287.post-10455195237752651152018-12-06T12:00:00.000-06:002018-12-06T12:00:07.679-06:00Copenhagen Adventure, Day 5<div style="text-align: left;">
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Random observances:</div>
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Everywhere you go there are Christmas Carols. Street decorations, lights, Christmas markets selling all sorts of interesting yuletide gear, ad then some. It's quite festive. Magical, even. Although there's no actual snow. A+ for effort though.</div>
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Dry day. Some days it's pouring rain, some day's it's a misting drizzle, some days it's dry. Not monotonous, for sure!<br />
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I'm overly warm everywhere I go. I packed and dress for cold damp and rainy (or snowy) and as a result I'm layering clothing, wearing sweaters, and my jacket is a Minnesota Winter jacket. So when I'm outside I'm a bit too warm, and when I'm inside I'm overly warm. I don't know if it's that the Danes are smart enough to want to be warm, or the Minnesotans are too cheap to heat well, but when I'm at home I'm always cold - especially feet. But here I've been overheating everywhere. It's a good problem to have, I suppose.<br />
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There are these little black and white birds Im seeing often. They're magpies, and apparently they're so smart! They can recognize themselves in a mirror - few animals do, and they're the only birds who do. Plus, they're pretty.<br />
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Work has now gotten quite busy. I'm spending a lot of time talking with people, working on relationships, and explaining things. While I've met many or most of these folks online, and interacted with most of them, it's different meeting in real life. And the same goes for the space!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWtpca8wIiTO2yphjgseXgkGN634SKGTl-q1Ibz0xgGp625BA3f-ChgdvFXqSiZBrUWErhXBswrwCWI5fW8V4tsztkwRrbnWZ-eCnPR6jPQ-Wn5A-o8pk_DliLOhCmOd-lpSZ/s1600/20181203_090044.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWtpca8wIiTO2yphjgseXgkGN634SKGTl-q1Ibz0xgGp625BA3f-ChgdvFXqSiZBrUWErhXBswrwCWI5fW8V4tsztkwRrbnWZ-eCnPR6jPQ-Wn5A-o8pk_DliLOhCmOd-lpSZ/s640/20181203_090044.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A very festive welcome</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Treats!</td></tr>
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Busy with meetings and such, time flew by. Another great lunch, this time a more traditional Danish Christmas selection, with Ham and Potatos and such. Very tasty and substantial! Also, more currant juice. I feel like I'm at IKEA!<br />
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It's 50 degrees today, and we even got a glimpse of sun!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sun!</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Office Organization</td></tr>
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I've been getting rides from my boss to and from work sometimes, and traffic is bad enough that I have him drop me at a close by metro stop and walk from there. Tonight the rain made everything shiny and wet, even though it had stopped coming down. It made for some really beautiful scenes. Copenhagen doesn't need much help in that arena, but the rain takes it to another level.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I will have dreams about this moment</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Christmas lighting - even cooler the next few nights!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVQGN06SAtPghyphenhyphenJN2XogWNPk8jm_IpguDZmTKSn6OrIlvch2T3_qkXXn2MwGi2AjcCqL785uzMlegbC1Gvf0c6n6qlmIJ12lzutrXQc3tSSTHQ_3b9I2KG3YJLAcHma9dnGXke/s1600/20181203_193825.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVQGN06SAtPghyphenhyphenJN2XogWNPk8jm_IpguDZmTKSn6OrIlvch2T3_qkXXn2MwGi2AjcCqL785uzMlegbC1Gvf0c6n6qlmIJ12lzutrXQc3tSSTHQ_3b9I2KG3YJLAcHma9dnGXke/s640/20181203_193825.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tuborg and some impending pasta</td></tr>
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Ok, I have to admit something. I suck at finding food. My social anxiety makes it so easy to avoid going into restaurants, and eating alone makes me feel like a sadness magnet. But sometimes I push myself and get rewarded. Tonight I needed proper carbs and protein, so I sought out Italian. Finding a well reviewed place near the center of town, I headed out. It was small, but oh so italian and I ordered a proper Danish been (Tuborg) and some good old spaghetti. It was simple, expected, and traditional, but so tasty, so filling, and so worth whatever that crazy Danish money cost. While I'm thinking the expense report is going to have some peaks, it'll have enough valleys where I wimped out on food. Seriously, there were a couple days where I just didn't eat enough food. But then, I was also trying to figure out what that odd feeling was on my belly It was the feeling of a shirt that wasn't stretched tight. I can't wait to get home and weigh myself! (I'm guessing I'm one of the rare people who loses weight when travelling to such a great food city)<br />
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After coming back home I kicked open the laptop and worked on my travel journal. All the while watching my new favorite Danish TV channel -- the kids channel at night. It's just shots panning across different children's show characters sleeping. Because, you know, kids should be sleeping, not watching creepy giant hook handed pirate bear with the mouth that looks like it's screaming. Also, have you ever seen a sleeping puppet fart? Yeah, it's as awesome as you'd think.<br />
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Scroll down to see video -- if it's not region locked. Not sure yet. :)</div>
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<br />fnirthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05023008531852629417noreply@blogger.com0