In Training
May. 13th, 2025 03:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hrjMy Amtrak experience (to Kalamazoo) has been fun and interesting...and I'm ready to be home now. Although we're just about to go through the Sierras and I'll be in the dining car for that, which has great views.
The train was delightfully on time heading east -- in fact, we got into Chicago early enough that I could change to an earlier Kalamazoo train and be on the same one as Lauri (though she was in Business so we couldn't sit together). Heading west, we had a 6 hour hold-up in Salt Lake City due to police action on the tracks (rumor mill says something about a shooting). So here we are in Reno around the time that we were originally supposed to be arriving in the Bay Area.
Kalamazoo was fun, as always. I may jot down some thoughts on the sessions in my Alpennia blog when I have some brain back. (Train travel doesn't drain my brain as bad as airplanes do. I've gotten a bunch of reading/note-taking for the LHMP blog, polished the script for the next podcast, worked on data transcription for my "what do fans think is a Related Work anyway?" paper. Didn't manage to do a full clean-up of my email inbox like I'd been thinking, largely because there's no wifi and although I can tether my phone, the reception goes in and out regularly.
Part of the fun of being a sleeper-car passenger on Amtrak is that all meals are included and you get sorted into random dining groups to fill up the tables. Most of my meals have included fascinating conversations about where people are from, where they're going, etc. Lunch today turned into talking lesbian fiction and I sold a book and picked up a new podcast listener.
A large proportion of the sleeper-car set (i.e., people who can afford the substantial cost) seem to be retirees doing a lot of traveling, including a fair number of foreign tourists. But then there are some people who simply don't fly but are heading for family weddings and reunions and that sort of thing.
I've spent most of my non-meal time hanging out in my cubicle, which gets views almost as good as those in the Observation Car. The sleeping arrangement is about equivalent to camping in my car (i.e., questionable mattress and cramped conditions for changing) but much superior to flying.
And we're about to pull out of Reno, so I'd better post this before I lose signal.
The train was delightfully on time heading east -- in fact, we got into Chicago early enough that I could change to an earlier Kalamazoo train and be on the same one as Lauri (though she was in Business so we couldn't sit together). Heading west, we had a 6 hour hold-up in Salt Lake City due to police action on the tracks (rumor mill says something about a shooting). So here we are in Reno around the time that we were originally supposed to be arriving in the Bay Area.
Kalamazoo was fun, as always. I may jot down some thoughts on the sessions in my Alpennia blog when I have some brain back. (Train travel doesn't drain my brain as bad as airplanes do. I've gotten a bunch of reading/note-taking for the LHMP blog, polished the script for the next podcast, worked on data transcription for my "what do fans think is a Related Work anyway?" paper. Didn't manage to do a full clean-up of my email inbox like I'd been thinking, largely because there's no wifi and although I can tether my phone, the reception goes in and out regularly.
Part of the fun of being a sleeper-car passenger on Amtrak is that all meals are included and you get sorted into random dining groups to fill up the tables. Most of my meals have included fascinating conversations about where people are from, where they're going, etc. Lunch today turned into talking lesbian fiction and I sold a book and picked up a new podcast listener.
A large proportion of the sleeper-car set (i.e., people who can afford the substantial cost) seem to be retirees doing a lot of traveling, including a fair number of foreign tourists. But then there are some people who simply don't fly but are heading for family weddings and reunions and that sort of thing.
I've spent most of my non-meal time hanging out in my cubicle, which gets views almost as good as those in the Observation Car. The sleeping arrangement is about equivalent to camping in my car (i.e., questionable mattress and cramped conditions for changing) but much superior to flying.
And we're about to pull out of Reno, so I'd better post this before I lose signal.
no subject
Date: 2025-05-14 03:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-05-14 03:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-05-15 08:33 pm (UTC)