Amtrak - Sunset Limited

Today I arrived in Houston, after being on the train for about 30 hours. This sounds like a long time but it actually flew by! I found that being on the train was kind of like suddenly having the life of a dog. You sit and stare out the window, eat, and nap. I did a lot of reading too, so this perhaps goes a little bit beyond what a dog might do. But, I'm sure most dogs would enjoy reading if they knew how.

If I could choose between train and plane, I'd choose train every time! It is inexpensive, has a very chill ticket return policy, the staff are friendly, the bathrooms are... well.... ok they're not that much better. If you use the handicapped one it is much roomier than an airplane bathroom. The rocking of the train lulls you to sleep, and the view is usually more interesting than just a sea of clouds. (Not always true in Texas.) You can walk around or go sit in the observation room or snack bar. And from what I saw, most single travelers in coach had a row to themselves. Even if you didn't have a row to yourself, the seats are more spread out than airplane seats.

Despite the overall awesomeness of the train, there were a couple things to pick on. The coffee was so-so, I'd probably give it a 2 out of 5. And although we seemed to be on time all the way to San Antonio, we still ended up being 2 hours late into Houston!

Here's my advice as a now-seasoned train rider:

1. Bring a blanket! And a pillow if you have room. They give you little airplane-type pillows but more is better I think. I didn't bring any warm clothes and ended up wearning 3 shirts and was still cold. At the very least bring a sweatshirt/jacket. Ideally bring an eye-cover too, because they leave aisle lights on at night which I found a little bit bright to fall asleep to.

2. Bring some food. Sean told me to do this and I was glad I followed his advice. For next time, I think I will plan on buying lunch and possibly breakfast on the train, as they aren't too expensive. (Dinner is kind of pricey - so i'll try to bring something for that, plus some snacks.) I talked to a woman who had a burger for lunch and she said it was pretty good. The snack bar is OK. It's like, an advanced vending machine. Some candy, some pop (but no Coke, wah), some hamburgers wrapped in plastic (?!) and that bleh coffee. I know I am a blogger and I should be braving new territory, but I just couldn't do a pre-wrapped burger. I will have to bring Sean for that purpose next time.

3. If someone is picking you up at the train station, be sure they are warned about the potential lateness of the train.

4. Bring a cell phone charger and/or other electronics. Every seat has outlets by it - hooray! I had put my phone charger in my checked bag - doh. But while we were parked at San Antonio for 2 hours, I picked up free wi-fi and did some emailing. :)

5. When I checked in, I got an Amtrak brochure. I checked out the various sleeper car configurations, and I found that for one of them, there is an in-room toilet with no door!! Gasp! It would be like being in prison (or so I've heard.) I think this is strange and to be avoided at all costs... but that is a personal opinion.


I'm about to board the train in Tucson (a little after midnight).



The observation deck. Good spot for reading or napping in the sun.

Surfing

Right now is one of those times when I really dislike my thesis. It's 10:00pm on a Friday night, and I am alternating between editing perl scripts and watching surfing videos on hulu.com. The surfers don't sound very intellegent. They say stuff like "when your turn comes, then it's your turn." Oh, really.

But when I stop and think about it, what do those surfers need with a big vocabulary? They have everything they need. They wake up in the morning and paddle out. If you have ever laid your head on the chest of the person you love and felt their heart beating, that is what it feels like to paddle out on a surfboard. (Although sometimes, if you surf in WA, the ocean has had a lot of coffee.) When you are out there, you don't need to know that the rate at which your body temperature approaches the ambient temperature of the ocean could be modeled as an exponential function. (You know, because it's proportional to the difference between the two temperatures.) You don't need to know about anything except your immediate surroundings and what you are going to do next.

Those kids who grow up surfing are so lucky! They never know the horrors of unix, or vi, or finding that missing paren at 10:30 on a Friday night. Their lives are so happy and magical that they barely even have to learn how to talk. I never thought about this until now, but I think the only reasons humans developed the ability to talk is because we were dissatisfied. Hmmm. No wonder dolphins can't talk.

Road Trip Pics

I didn't take too many picture on my road trip, but here are a few:



Here's me climbing on a train at the Sacramento Railroad Museum. I like to climb on stuff. :) This museum was really cool!! Guess who they said the unsung heroes of the railroads were? The civil engineers who did the dangerous work of surveying the rugged terrain so that they could lay down track.



I had to stop on highway 1, because of a lane closure. Everyone got out of their cars and took pictures. It was a very scenic place to be stuck... luckily I didn't have to pee!



The infamous blown-out tire that I blogged about a few days ago. :)

Lending Club Update #F

The Lending Club has finally re-opened for business! And guess what? I am no longer allowed to loan money on their site. Can you believe that? Grrr. I am seriously pissed. "Lending" is now technically "investing" since the loans are now securities that you can buy and sell. So to sign up as an investor, you must confirm that you either a) make more than $70k per year, or b) have a net worth of more than $250k.

Well, of course I do not have either of these things. Yes, I *could* go get an engineering job after I graduate, but I don't *want* to! I actually emailed a friend of mine who is a lawyer, cause I was really pissed. When you're American and you're pissed, you start thinking about a lawsuit. (In case you were wondering if I really love my country, with all this talk of moving to Costa Rica and what-not, you can now see that I do.)

Anyway, my lawyer friend thinks that most likely there is nothing illegal about this practice. She said that it is unconstitutional to discriminate based on stuff like race or gender, but other than that a private company does not have to provide their services to you if they don't want to.

Still, I now think that the LC people are big JERKS. (However I'll happily rescind that opinion if they change their mind and accept lowly graduate students as investors.)

Positive Things about Phoenix

I have been trying to think of something nice to say about Phoenix. After some serious brainstorming, I have come up with a few things.

1. The Spanglish radio stations. I love these. Nothing even close to that exists in Seattle.

2. Parking is insanely easy. I think we all know that I h8 driving, but given that you must drive here, it's nice to have a break from parallel parking.

3. If you wash something or get something wet, it dries super fast. In Seattle you can hang up a towel and 2 days later it might still be wet.

Ok, that's about all I could think of for now. So here's what I actually think of Phoenix: It's interesting to look at, in a freaky way. It's kind of like when you are playing Super Mario and you get to that level where everything is giant. It's kind of fun, right? Giant trees, giant ducks, etc. But now imagine trying to actually live in a giant world. It's neet, but really impractical. I mean, how do you get the giant spoons into your mouth? And how do you climb up onto the giant toilet? Where would you buy clothes???

In Phoenix, people have adapted to giant-world by buying cars. They sit in the car, and then they become giants. It's like on Iron Man where the guy has the big suit that he sits in and controls. So, how could Phoenix be improved? They could continue working on the car attachments to make them better and more integrated with their human hosts. For example you can already go through drive-thrus and eat in your car. If you could easily go to the bathroom in your car, this would be a big help.

Also, more places could be made car-friendly. They could make large outdoor "bars" where you pull up next to a little table, and waitresses on scooters deliver drinks to your table. Then, each car has a loudspeaker attachment, so that your car can chat with its friend cars. They could even figure out a way to do car 'dancing'. Maybe everyone could put on giant bumpers and bump cars on the dance floor.

Anyone else have any ideas on how to make Phoenix more car-friendly?

I Stopped Traffic

Ok, I mentioned this on twitter and I thought it deserves a little more explanation. On Tuesday evening, I picked up my good friend Audrey from LAX. After stopping to eat dinner in Irvine (CHIPOTLE!) we continued on the road to our intended destination of San Diego. Audrey offered to drive since I'd been driving all day. (I took highway 1 from Santa Cruz down to San Luis Obispo - a highway whose beauty is surpassed only by its treacherousness.)

So we'd been on the road for less than 10 minutes when suddenly a tire blew. Audrey kept the car under control and since we were much closer to the left edge of the road she steered to the left, across the carpool lane, and parked on the left 'shoulder'. This was quite a terrifying place to be. We were sandwiched between a tall concrete wall and 90-mph California traffic. As she was bringing the car to a stop, I saw my hub cap roll ahead of us and get smashed by an oncoming SUV. I doubt that guy even noticed.

I thought I should get out and check on the car, but luckily Audrey convinced me that this was an incredibly stupid idea. Instead, she called 911. They sent an officer, who was parked behind us in about 15 minutes. He said that his partner would run a traffic block and we could drive over to the right shoulder and up off the next exit. The traffic block was amazing to watch.... within a few minutes, the traffic dropped off to a trickle and then stopped completely. The officer guided us with his loudspeaker, which was amazingly easy to hear. He was super chilled out - by the time we got to the gas station my heart was still pounding but he just sat there and made small talk with us for a few minutes until the tow truck arrived.

The tow truck driver put on my spare tire for me in about 2.5 minutes... he seemed un-impressed by the shredded tire. I suppose he's seen worse. Unfortunately, after he left, we realized that the tread from my old tire was still wrapped around the axle. So Aud and I had to take off the spare, get the old tread off, and replace the spare.

That pretty much summed it up. The next morning I bought a used tire in Oceanside so that I wouldn't have to drive through the desert without a spare. The moral of this story is: don't be an idiot like me. I hadn't checked my tire pressure and all of my tires were low on air. Because of this I put myself and one of my best friends in a very dangerous situation. On the positive side, it could have been WAY worse and I have learned a very valuable lesson!!

My 2 Years is Up

I'm in Tacoma right now, "working" in a coffee shop. I woke up feeling like I'd been hit by a train, but as soon as I got on the road, I started feeling better. It was like magic really. I am almost always happy when I'm on the move. I don't really know why this is. But I do know that 27 has been the most unsettling year of my life. I somehow thought 27 would be really cool - mostly just cause it's a cool number I guess. It has been fun most of the time, but I've just been worrying a ton.

I just looked up the 'forever 27 club' - just to see if anyone has any thoughts on if/why 27 is a particularly angst-y year - and I found something pretty interesting. Saturn Return. I can't say I believe in astrology..... however, I thought that article described me to a tee. The questions that they tell you to ask yourself on there are exactly the things I have been asking myself!! Guess the folks in astrology are pretty tuned in to the quarter-life crisis phenomenon.

The reason I say that my 2 years are up is that 2 years is the max. length of my attention spam. Maybe that will change when I enter this magical "stable period" that follows the Saturn Return.

PS. Tacoma is actually pretty cool. I think it may be one of the best-kept secrets of Washington. And it has a sweet light rail!

Carriage Return Eats City

Why do DOS carriage returns produce the worst bugs ever? They are like those super-bugs that have become resistant to normal anti-biotics and their very existence threatens to undermine society as we know it.

For those of you who like unix, check out the following piece of code I had written, and then the output that was being printed... it's crazy!

-------- My Code -----------

print "grepstr: <<$grepstr>> \n";
print "HELLO!!! \n";
my @greparray = split('\n',$grepstr);
print "** greparray: <@greparray> \n";

-------- The output -------

grepstr: <<:phrase (007): " One moment please .. . ... Let's see . .. . .. . .. . .. flights from pittsburgh to austin . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. If you'll just hold on, this shouldn't take too long . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. Gosh the network has been slow all day . .. . .. . .. I'm glad you called though . .. . .. . .. . .. I'm not sure how long this will take . .. . .. . .. This has been a long day, but I'm glad you called . .. . .. hummmmm. .. This is taking longer than usual . .. . .. . .. . .. I wonder if something is wrong . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. I'll bet the network is down again!
:phrase (007): " I'm sorry. Something is wrong with the flight retrieval. on what day would you like to travel?
>>
HELLO!!!
>

--------------------------

Now, when I changed from splitting on '\n' to '\r\n' it fixed everything. Why?? Why can't you just split on '\n'? Apparently the '\r' hanging out by itself is some kind of non-causal symbol that eats the following 3 lines that are printed after it?!?! It makes so sense!!!