so i’m in nyc again, for some software training. natty and the capt and henry and i drove up to my parent’s compound yesterday/last night. as i’ve mentioned before the trip should take about 4 hrs. it took closer to 5 and a half, but this time the capt had nothing to do with it, especially wiht natty’s new breast feed the capt while he’s in his new capt chair style car seat, that kid has the life i tell you, plus throne and food and beverage service while on the road.
now, having the northbound lanes of the NJ turnpike closed down might have had something to do with it. yeah that was it.
when we crossed over the delware memorial bridge, there was a huge sign that said "NJ TURNPIKE CLOSED AT EXIT 7A–USE 295" what we didn’t get, was, was it that the exit was closed, or the whole fucking turnpike, i mean they can’t just close the turnpike, can they? –oh yes they can. turns out that they were diverting all traffic to another road, and then another and another etc. but once we were on the turnpike, there was no turning back, so we just kept on heading that way. we caught up to the traffic about 2 miles from the detour. thankfully there was a rest stop right before the exit/detour, so we got off for food, walk the dog/change the baby. by the time we finished, the accident was cleared, but there was a 10 mile back up. so i quickly jumped off the high way to follow the detour anyway. suddenly we were weaving through small jersey towns and the seemingly infinetely repeatable jersyscape. i swear, every thing in that state looks the same. i feel like i’m in a 50’s movie where they just keep repeating the scenery outside the car window. i did get to see a monster home depot though, i didn’t suggest stopping. eventually we made it back to the highway, and sure enough, it was right were traffic was opening up. i bet we saved an hour of stop and go. i was pretty happy with myself. really.
we got to the compound without further incident.
However it was time to walk henry, at it was 16 degrees. now that i don’t live in the north country, that’s pretty fricking cold. but that was nothing, compared to the -5 it was at 5:30 am when i was walking him before my commute. now that’s pretty fucking cold. on commuting, man, it’s a been a long time. seems like a lifetime since i was doing the daily CT to NYC grind back in 1999. in fact, it feels like i have had like 10 different lives since then. i had forgotten the crazy ass culture of slowly climbing the platform and the rushing to seemingly random areas of the train platform in anticipation of where the doors on the train will open. that and all the train buddies. people that don’t know each other outside the commute, it was interesting that people were all talking about how they were taking the ’slacker’ train (which was the 7:20) i guess the hardcore people are already in the city by 7 am. freaks.
naturally the train car i picked had no heat, which didnt’ help my toes defrost much, i then opted to walk to our meeting space, which was at 48th and broadway…so like 5 big long avenue blocks. by about 5th ave, i had no feeling in my feet at all. good times.
training was crazy. nothing like meeting a guy that is a leader of an industry–and has been doing something for 13 years or some shit.
so i opted to take the times square shuttle back to grand central at the end of the day, which for a 5 min ride is not nec. worth the 2 dollars i spent on the metro card but whatever. i got on, got a seat, and was pretty proud of myself. then in grand nyc style, some homeless guy jumps on the train right before the doors close. and in nyc style, he had obviously just recently shit himself. as the toxic stench moved over the car, people started moving all to one end, ahh it’s good to be back. then there was a mad rush out of the car to get away. i caught an express train home and was back at the compound by 8 something. like a real business man, i completely missed a day of my son’s life. he was asleep when i left, and was asleep when i got home. it was pretty fucking weird. then at 5:30 am, it started all over again.
more later….