Holy Crap... I Never Made it to DC... and Here's Why...

It was 99 degrees yesterday. I know this because I watched it steadily increase on monitors across the Northeast Corridor. When I started my trek, it was a gorgeous 82 degrees and continued to climb as the day wore on.

I was supposed to get to DC, go to an exhibit and meetings at the Smithsonian and then come back the same day. Here's what actually happend.

1. I was supposed to catch a New Jersey Transit train to Metro Park from Metuchen. It is a short 4 minute ride. I stepped on the train at 8:07 just as I was supposed to. The ticket collecter comes along and says... "Oh boy. The train you want is 7 minutes behind us. We are going straight to Newark." Crap. All the seats were taken so I stood in the warm but not hot yet vestibule.

2. I arrived in Newark knowing that I was going to have to either catch the Amtrak train from Newark OR take a train back to Metropark to catch another Amtrak train. Upon arriving in the cesspool that is Newark, I was relieved to see that the train I was supposed to catch in Metropark was 20 minutes late. I went to the Amtrak counter and he felt pity on me and told me just to catch it from Newark. I felt a tremendous sigh of relief.

3. An hour LATER, the train was still late as was the train before it. I got fed up by it and got on a New Jersey Transit train back to Metropark where I would rather wait than waiting farther from home in Newark. The guy on the NJ Tranist train also took pity on me and let me ride for free back to Metropark.

4. I waited at Metropark until it was foolish to wait any longer. I would never make it to the meeting in time and I would have just had to have turned around and came right back home. I bought a ticket for Metuchen and went out to the platform. The Amtrak train I was supposed to take slowed up the new NJ Transit train I was supposed to take back to Metuchen.

I found out later in the day yesterday that the train I was supposed to take to DC didn't make on time. It was 3.5 hours late. That would have made me 2.5 hours late to a meeting/exhibit that lasted 2.5 hours.

Fabulous.

Quite a day... I am not sure this would have been as bad as it was if it wasn't steadily increasing in temperature.... The day ended around 99 degrees.

I take back what I wrote yesterday. Amtrak simply does NOT rule.

What a day.