Thursday

It took me two hours to get home from Silver Spring after my movie last night. That's forty-five minutes over the average time. It's because I took too long leaving the theater. From there I was stopped by a long needless don't walk sign (right in front of a Metro officer, and I don't know the first thing about Maryland jaywalking laws, nor, in the event there happen to be such laws, if those Metro guys can indeed write tickets for their transgression*). It was agonizing: on a midnight sidewalk on a deserted road, waiting because of a micromanaging light bulb. Eventually walking into Silver Spring station, there was no indication, on either train schedule board, that a train was imminent. So instead of sprinting up the escalator I merely rode it, only to discover my train there on the platform. It waited so quietly that I was really confused for several long seconds about whether the train was coming or going. It just sat there with the doors shut. I just stood there wondering. Then it left the platform, bound for DC, and I had to wait sixteen minutes for the next train. Then, even later, I had to wait a further fourteen minutes for my orange line connection deep in the bowels of Metro Center. But that's not all. By this time it was after midnight already, and the coming train was the Last One, meaning that it sat idle on the track for an extra ten minutes, allowing for all other transfer lines to accumulate before departing. By the time I'd walked up the hill to my unit, it was already well into tomorrow, so I backdated this entry a couple of hours to get it on the right day. Blame the machine under DC. [Cavin]