Princess on the Road

It seems that no matter how early I leave to get to the station, I’m still fucking late and then it’s just all downhill from there…

 

My train from Chicago to Seattle wasn’t scheduled to depart until 2.15pm so no rushing around like a headless chook as per New York depature.  So I left the hostel just after 12.30pm to get to Union Station, which I had walked from to the hostel on my arrival in Chicago in about 20 minutes.  For my departure, I had decided to save myself the walk and take the bus which would be quicker anyway right?  Not fucking likely.

 

Google Maps tells me I can take a bus which stops right out the front of the hostel directly to Union Station.  Sounds perfect.  I decide to check with the guy at reception just in case.  He says he doesn’t really know the bus routes and it appears he has never noticed the bus stop that is directly outside the hostel door.  Yeah thanks for your help douche bag.

 

I wait at the bus stop but no bus is coming.  Waiting… still no bus.  Maybe Google Maps lied.  I try the bus stop a block over where I had seen the bus I wanted stop earlier that morning.  Waiting… no bus.  In a panic, I decide to walk to Michigan Avenue where there are shitloads of buses.  On the walk there, my luggage strap decides to just come off my bag.  Not fly open or even snap, just slide off my bag and take my sleeping bag with it in the middle of the street.  How annoying.

 

Then on approaching Michigan Avenue there is road works right where I need to cross the street.  Just as I brace myself to haul my turtle across the road (since I don’t like the idea of rolling him through tar and gravel) along with the other pedestrians, one worker tells me to stop (but not everyone else wtf?) and walk to the next corner to cross the road heading east when I want to go north.  This means I would then have to cross the road a total of three times just to get to where I wanted to be with just one crossing.  Just as I’ve psyched myself into doing this, the worker changes his mind again and says I can cross where I originally wanted to.  Yeah thanks for that.

 

Back on the safety of the footpath, I now have to find a bus stop that has a bus that goes to Union Station.  After 10 minutes of dodging rude individuals who don’t like to move to the side for people with luggage, I find the bus stop with a bus that goes directly to Union Station.  Hallelujah.  Bus pulls up and it’s an old one which means instead of just one step up into the bus, it has four.  Also, there is no luggage area so all the old people (and the bus was full of old people) glare at me the entire way because my turtle is in the way, even though I was practically sitting on him.  I’m starting think maybe this is divine intervention telling me to do as Americans do and just fly everywhere.

 

At Union Station, I get my ticket and decide to check-in my baggage save me lugging it on the train and possibly breaking my neck trying to get into the overhead luggage compartment.  I go to the counter, Amtrak lady asks to see my ticket.  I give her my ticket.  She says I can’t check my baggage in because it must be done no later than 30 minutes before departure.  My departure is 2.15pm.  The time is 1.53pm.  Fuck you Amtrak.

 

Next I have to board the train.  I hand my ticket over for my boarding pass and I get told that to find my seat I have to walk six carriages down.  Sounds easy enough.  Only I can’t tell where one carriage starts and the next ends – do the six carriages include the cafe car as well?  There is also the number 711 written on my boarding pass (the boarding pass is usually just a scrap of paper with the station code for your final destination so they know when to boot you off - eg SEA for Seattle).  Perhaps this is my seat number?  I look in the door of the closet carriage.  It says seat 71 this way.  Maybe that’s me?

 

I get on the carriage.  It is full of old people.  Apparently they are handicapped old people because they tell me I have the wrong carriage – it is for disabled only.  Since I am obviously too able-bodied to be in the disabled only carriage, they tut-tut me off.  However, I did consider asking them if being a foreigner counts as handicapped in America.

 

I spot an Amtrak lady.  I tell her I am lost.  She looks at my boarding pass and says to go to the next open door and up the stairs to find a seat.  I do as she says.  As I go through the open door I notice a number on the side of the carriage – 711.  So it was the carriage number on my boarding pass – why didn’t I just get told that in the first place?

 

The remainder of the afternoon was pretty uneventful.  Since I was blessed with common sense, I sat next to someone who was only on the train for 3 hours so I ended up having two seats to myself for the rest of the trip.  I noticed there was a tosser sitting in the seat in front of me.  He whinged to the elderly gentlemen sitting across the aisle about his ex-wife and the fact he couldn’t have a cigarette whenever he wanted because there was no smoking on the train.  Seriously, what a dumbass – if you can’t smoke on a plane or a bus or any other form of public transport, why would Amtrak be any different?  I had dinner in the dining car and ate overpriced Amtrak slop and the service sucked so I refused to tip.

 

 

 

 

That evening, I worked out I am conveniently short enough to fit across the two seats to sleep.  This was good because I snore really loudly when I sleep sitting up.  I know this because I snore myself awake when I have a little snooze while looking out the window.  Although my slumber was not interrupted by own snoring that night, I was rudely awoken at some ungodly hour by the tosser having a rather loud conversation.  Only there was no one talking to him and he wasn’t on a mobile phone.  He was having a good ol’ chit chat to himself.  It was at this point I realised he was not a tosser at all – he was a FUCKING NUTTER.  And his little midnight monologue was some of the most random shit I have ever heard.  So much so, I got out my notebook and decided to take some notes.   Check out these pearlers:

• Women are women.  They’re not like us. They’re not careful.
• I’m violent like left-wing Russians.  They are like the Irish of the Russians.
• In Utah you can’t smoke but you can walk around with 16 fucking wives. (Utah is a popular destination for polygamists)
• One wife is too many.  Two girlfriends is better than one wife.
• Yeah white power!
• Me, I like Mexican women.  They’re hard workers.
• I think I need to stop for a smoke break… I’d have one right here, if they throw me out they are going to have one hell of a fist fight.  I might end up in jail but it will be worth it.
• We’re gonna stop in a few minutes.  This is as far as I want to go – North Dakota.  Let me off for a fucking cigarette!
• I wish you had the opportunity to get to know me.  I’m one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet.  I love animals.  I love women.  I’m just a little more outspoken than most guys.
• 2% – 5% of white females will consider dating outside their own race or other women.  In fact, they are more likely to date another woman than a black man.
• Just don’t walk out the door.  She might love you.  She just wants you to ask her the right questions.
• When you’re presented with a situation to ask questions but you’re too afraid to ask questions… I’m the guy who asks the goddamn questions.
• God is my best friend.
• I could have been President.  If I had run and said the right things, I could have won.  But I didn’t run.  I didn’t say the right things.  Obama is only 1 year older than me.
• Yesterday I had 13 women in my apartment.  I was the only guy there.  I was talking to ‘em like I’m talking to you right now.
• I don’t know if you guys have heard of the actor Tony Randal but that guy was making love to women in his 80s.  That’ll be me one day.
• Why do you think I’m sitting here talking to myself?  I’m depressed.  I don’t have my woman here.
• I’m adaptable.  I can adjust to any situation.  Puerto Rican, Chinese, I don’t care who they are.  I can adjust.  I can relate.  I’m the best.
• Let’s get this fucking canoe rolling!  Move it!
• They’ll let those fucking fairies get married but I can’t even have a cigarette.

 

 

That is just a small sample of the dribble.  I couldn’t write quick enough to get it all down.  When he started singing to himself, the elderly gentlemen told him to be quiet and that was the end of that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next day at lunch, I was waiting at the dining car doot to be seated (as was the procedure and God help you if you didn’t follow it) when some douche bag comes in the door behind me and stands a little too close to my personal space bubble.  He aks me what they have to eat here.  Er, food?  I say I don’t know but perhaps he might try reading the menu.  I then get seated with the douche bag (since Amtrak is a little short on space, you don’t get a table to yourself so you share).  Without even looking at the menu he orders the spinach leaf salad for $6.  What a fuckwit – he knew what was on the menu but asked me anyway?  After I make my choice, he then asks me if I am from Great Britain.  I say no I am not.  Well, where are you from then?  You sound like you’re from Great Britain.  I tell him I’m from Australia.  He says he has met a lot of Australians and I don’t talk like them.  It seems that my accent is not an obvious one – a cashier at a supermarket in Niagara Falls thought I was Canadian and I’ve had quite a few Americans tell me I have a lovely Southern accent.  I suppose I do have a lovely Southern accent – it’s just from south of the Equator not the south of the USA.

 

 

My second night on the train was rather boring – there was no late night jibba-jabba to keep me entertained.  Next morning at breakfast in the dining car, I’m super hungry so as well as my $7.50 pancakes (I’d had similar ones  for $3.90 elsewhere and they were actually good) I decided to have a side of breakfast ’sausage’ and ‘hash browns’.  During previous breakfasts at my various destinations, I had noticed some interesting dining combinations.  For example, I don’t think it is unusual to have pancakes with maple syrup, eggs and sausages with tomato sauce for breakfast if one so desires – just not all together on the same plate.  Yes, that’s right.  In America, you can have a little maple syrup with your scrambled eggs, a little pancake with tomato sauce and a sausage with a bit of both.  Even I get a bit queasy and I’d pretty much eat shit from a stick.  So naturally, when my pancakes arrive the ’sausage’, which is round and flat like a rissole hence the ‘ ‘, is perched on top of my pancakes.  The hash brown is thankfully on its own plate (wouldn’t you put sausage with hash brown – sweet with sweet, savoury with savoury?) however, it is the sadest hash brown I have ever seen.  It’s basically grated potato heated up – that’s it.  No lovely crispy, greasy, fluffy potato square.  Just grated poo on a plate.  Incredibly depressing.  Especially since it ended up costing me $21.50 after the Amtrak server helped herself to a $10 tip before I realised.  Thanks bitch.

 

 

Peace out.

 

 

 

 

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 30th, 2009 at 8:54 am and is filed under USA Trip '09. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.