Date: 2004-10-06
To: traveling to maine: day 1
Miles today: 0.0

so, if someone should happen to know where the train station is in greensboro, would they mind telling me? that would be great. thanks.my good buddy, cap'n (AT2002), came to pick me up and take me to the train station this morning. the train was scheduled to leave at 9:30, so i figured we should head over there a little before 9:00 just to be safe. neither one of us had ever been to the train station before, but we knew that we had seen signs for it. we left my house just before nine and headed in the direction of where we knew the station to be. sure enough we saw the sign that said to take a left to go to the amtrak station. we took a left and started looking for more signs that would get us where we needed to be. there was only one problem- there were no more signs. we drove and drove and kept driving and were pretty sure that we were no longer heading in the right direction. i called my stepmother and asked her if she knew where the train station was. she said she was pretty sure that it had been moved downtown to what was once the old train depot and was now the new and improved train depot. we made our way downtown and found the depot and saw signs for greyhound and other bus lines, but no amtrak. we walked into the newly restored depot and it was rather beautiful, but also rather deserted. (current time: 9:15. train leaving at roughly 9:30).uh, where is the train? it apparently has not moved down here yet. where has it moved to? has it even moved at all? why weren't there any signs? i think i have an ulcer. this sucks. yep. a little stressed out now. just a little."we're not going to make it.""of course we're going to make it."i think i'll probably throw up pretty soon. i haven't thrown up since the seventh grade. we get back in the car and head back to where the buses are. we ask a taxi driver if he knows where the amtrak station is, and in a very thick accent of some sort he goes into a long, drawn out disertation explaining how to get there. i can only undestand about every third to fifth word that he is saying, but i think i know where he is talking about. apparently the train station hasn't moved. oh, and, it is now 9:20. we have less than ten minutes before i miss my train.we get stuck behind every slow driver and caught at every red light and it seems like it takes two hours to find the station, but we finally do find it. we pull into the parking lot behind another car. a woman gets out of the car and i follow her inside while cap'n finds a place to park.as i enter the building, i hear the woman in front of me asking the ticket clerk, "did i miss the train?""yes ma'am you did.""well, what time did it leave?"the clerk looks at the information board behind him, "9:24."(it is now 9:28).four minutes. four minutes. i just missed my train by four minutes. the one day the train is actually running on time. i think that for the most part trains do run on time. unless there is a car or a cow on the tracks, they don't have many other outside variables to contend with. i can't help but let out a little chuckle. it is kind of funny in some strange way. if i don't try to find the humor somewhere in this situation, then i could quite possibly throw up all over myself and have a breakdown of sorts. that would not be a good thing."what time is the next train?" the woman in front of me asks."tomorrow," says the clerk.yes, funny indeed.cap'n walks in at this point and i just look at him and shake my head. he comes over and asks what i want to do. i tell him that i'm not sure just yet. we overhear the clerk telling the woman that there is a chance that she could catch the train in a raleigh- which is a little over an hour away. cap'n and i know what we have to do. we're probably going to catch the train. (or, at least, try to).the woman says either to us or the clerk that she doesn't think her friend can take her to raleigh. she walks over to cap'n and i, "what are you boys going to do?""we're not exactly sure yet.""are you from around here? do you want to split a hotel room for the night?"say what? did she just ask if we want to split a hotel room? is she serious? (yes. i think she is)."actually, we live here.""oh, okay then." the woman walks back outside with her friend. cap'n asks me if i want to try and catch the train in raleigh. i say yes.we get directions from the ticket clerk. he tells us that the train is leaving raliegh at 11:20. it is now just before ten o'clock. as we walk outside, cap'n tells me that he can't take his roommate's car to raleigh. i tell him that is fine. we can take my truck. of course, there isn't enough time to go and get my truck and drop the car cap'n is driving back off at his house and then drive to raleigh before the train leaves. i tell cap'n i'll just drive my truck there and find some place to leave it until i can figure something out.we get back to my house and i bid cap'n a farewell and i get in my truck and hit the road. i call my friend, fun sarah, and ask if she knows where i can store a truck for a few days and she says i can keep it where she works. she and her coworker, lori, are on the amtrak site and they're running numbers and trying to figure out where the train is and trying to figure out how much time i have. i am going to be racing the clock on this one. not a whole lot of room for error. and, if i should happen to miss the train in raleigh? yeah, that wouldn't be good. that would mean i would probably end up driving to washington, dc, ditching my truck with my sister, and catching my next train as planned.no room for error. it is just after 10:00. the train will be pulling out at 11:20. i call fun sarah and lori again and they are on the amtrak website and giving me up to date train reports. the train is now running a few minutes behind schedule (must have been a cow on the tracks) and i've got a small window to work with.of course, as soon as i enter a work zone on I-40 and traffic slows to almost a crawl, that window comes crashing down. it is closed and locked before i even know what happened.i'll tell you what happened. traffic happened. for some reason people don't know how to merge. it really isn't that difficult. whether you are getting onto the highway or getting over because your lane is ending, merging really shouldn't be a difficult concept. and yet it is. merging just seems rather foreign to people. as traffic slowed down through the work zone i could see my hopes of catching the train getting farther and farther away.this is such a fabulous way to begin my adventure. actually, it isn't such a bad way to start. afterall, it is part of the adventure. i'll take whatever comes my way and learn to appreciate it for what it is.all part of the adventure.since i am now going with plan C here, i decide to stop in raleigh to have lunch with fun sarah before making the haul to our nation's capitol. i call lara in wahington and let her know of the new change in plans. she says i can park my truck on the street in her neighborhood and she'll move it for me occasionally so it doesn't get towed.after lunch i say peace out to fun sarah and am once again on the road. it was a rather uneventful drive to washington. there was a stretch where i might have dozed off for a little bit, but i'm not sure. i hit rush hour traffic and lara gave me bum directions, but eventually i found where i was supposed to go.it is now 11:00 on wednesday night. i need to go through my pack and see why it is so heavy. after that i'm going to take a nap so i can get up in a couple of hours and catch my next train which leaves at three o'clock in the morning.yep. all part of the adventure.