I am so sorry I didn't blog yesterday. I could say I spent the morning chugging Nyquil and the afternoon at a Russ Meyers retrospective, but that would be a flashback to my youth. These days I worry that Nyquil could cause heart problems. Let me Google that. Hmmmm. Dizziness, increased heart rate and nervousness. I don't need them. I'll just double my Prozac. It won't cure a cold but at least I won't be anxious about it. Russ Meyers made soft-porn movies in the late 60's & early 70's. These were so 'soft' they wouldn't even qualify for the after midnight schedule on Showtime. His movies were all about extremely buxom babes with boobs big enough to make a Guernsey envious. This was before they struck pay-dirt in the California Silicone Valley and they had to use cotton batting or concrete.

My time at K101 in San Francisco wasn't wasted after all. At some point in early 1982 I answered the phone and it was a former Minnesota listener now transplanted to San Francisco. Usually I'd rather slide down a razor-blade banister than meet up for dinner with a stranger. Not that I am or ever have been the definition of "arm candy", I still worried about having to eat dinner in a public place with someone who says, "Call me Joe" and keeps muttering over his prime rib, "I am not an elephant! I am not an animal! I am a human being!" We ended up eating at one of the darkest restaurants in San Francisco. Joe wasn't taking any chances. Besides, much to I-Knew-It, my host was accompanied by his partner. I know it is a beautiful thing, this whole life-long-love, but I didn't quite understand it in 1982, and it seems too complicated in 2011. His partner wasn't the gayest person I've ever met but when he pierced his ears, sequins poured out....so the San Francisco fire department was standing by.

Thanks to the internet and my website and in spite of my cold I was ready to slide down that razor blade banister again. That couple now lives in Richmond, Virginia, still together, raising a wonderful special needs son and they were keen on driving to see me and spend the day. I met their Sean, who is indeed special and had a fun afternoon dinner I will never forget. I owe that re-union to the internet. Remind me to send Al Gore a thank-you note.

I prefer cherry blossoms to snow flakes so I'm out of here. No time for music. I don't like dashing but dash I did and "nothing will be finer than to be in Carolina...in the moooooooorrrrrrning.

Rob

Sometime in the middle of the night I woke with a scratchy throat and sloppy nose. I may have to call the house doctor. Ha! How long has it been since hotel's had house doctors. Or house detectives for that matter. I like those old-fashioned hotels where they had the funky door you would put your suit into and the hotel fairies would steam and press it and return it in the morning. I did that once and never saw the suit again. Seriously, I am not feeling well and I'm going to bed. Imagine how one feels when hours pass without a call from the President. The last time I spent the night in Washington D.C. I hung out with Dick Nixon. He kept asking me to pull his finger...Damn! he was tricky. I love big eastern cities. So many friendly ladies worried about my social life. They keep asking me, "Going out?" and "Looking for a date?"

This is a horrible blog and THIS time I'm not re-writing it. Deal with it.

Rob

PS: I am really sick. I went to the bar for a sip of something medicinal and this nice lady told me I was hot. I KNEW I had a fever.

*Blogger's Note: This is the second time I've written this entry. None of the facts were changed to protect the innocent.

Lounging, reading, music, and believe it or not...fireworks! There was a perfectly good window in my train compartment but you'd have to be an idiot to look out of it because it was night and you would see nothing except your own reflection in the window. As I sat looking out the window at the speeding dark (keep your opinions to yourself, please )and as we rolled through some small town was surprised to see fireworks. Not just a firework...but the whole doggarn magilla. If they were 4th of July fireworks then the train was really running late. After deciding it might be the Grits Festival, celebrating the harvesting of the grits..well...hell...I didn't know wtf it was. I DO know it was eerie watching the rocket's red glare from a constantly changing perspective. Of course that little display sparks another spat of My Stories. ("I hate your damn stories...)

For almost 60 years I've remembered a particular Fourth fireworks display when I was about 7 or 8...or 5. The fireworks were shot off at a local softball field. The audience sat in the stands and among the tombstones in an adjacent cemetery and they fired the rockets from the area just over the center-field fence. Being showered with ash and sparks was part of the fun and it wasn't considered a success unless two or three people were seriously burned. (The local hospital's annual profit depended on a 'successful' 4th of July.)What made this particular show memorable were my antics along with about 20 other kids around the same age. We would run toward the outfield fence like an invading army taking the beach and at each BOOM and BANG would fall down in death throes of varying dramatic degree. Then we'd run back, wait for the next one, and run and "die" again. Even Patty Duke said, "That's some fine acting" and several of us won Golden Globes (but no Oscars). I know that's a silly story but it is etched in my memory and I bet they didn't have Patty Duke at the Grits Festival.

The other two memorable fireworks were in Tacoma and San Francisco and I'll save the meat of those stories for another time. One involved spending twelve hours on a blanket by the Marina saving my space and watching the Boiz and the Lesbians sashay by (This was SF) and the other was in Tacoma when they all went boom at once...the fireworks, not the Boiz and the Lesbians.

That's the end of this blog. On the original version I remarked at how boring the stories were and asked for forgiveness. When I found out my penance was the standard 7 Our Fathers, 7 Hail Marys, A Novena, and a book report on The Song of Bernadette, I decided to do it over and see if I could get a plea deal.

It was still boring.

Sorry,
Rob

I've splurged for a compartment on the train to Washington. I can be quite the elitist when the finances lean to green. Why am I paying an extra $100 to spend 19 hours on the choo-choo? I got aboard without standing in line. A nice man lifted my bag up the stairs without a snarky comment. I found my room, hung my coat in the little closet, unpacked my jammies, books, music, and snacks, sat on the wide seat, stretched my legs and remembered many other wonderful train times. When I worked in Tacoma I rode the train dozens of times. Often, just to Portland for a fun day trip. Many times to Minnesota on a 36 hour, two night odyssey through the Rockies. I've made these trips sitting in coach and lounging in compartments. In some crazy fiscal madness I used to get the room with bathroom and shower and ride across the old Great Northern route like a latter-day robber baron. Once, on a trip from Washington State to San Francisco, I went coach and somewhere in the Siskiyou Mountains, a cowboy was assigned the seat next to me. He got on the train just after midnight and by 12:30am was farting like a steam engine huffing its way up-grade. The sounds were off-putting and the aromas were disconcerting so I fled his flatulence to sit in the lounge and watch the dark speed by outside the windows. Somewhere around 6:30am I checked and he was gone. I returned to my seat, but was careful not to touch or put any personal objects on his seat...for obvious reasons. So, if given a choice between a lonely compartment and the companionship of coach, I'll take the solitude. It's good to be King.

It seemed like time for music. My earphones were hanging about my neck (I can't wear buds) and I returned them to my ears and powered up.

"Ohh whoaah....." Yes Justin Beiber. He seems like a nice lad. While I listened I looked out the window and decided to quit wearing blue jeans or sneakers. EVERY senior citizen I could see was wearing blue jeans and sneakers. Brilliantly white sneakers. And there is something very strange that happens to Senior Citizen Blue Jeans. They smell odd. I was going to write, "they smell funny", but there is nothing funny about it. Seriously. Their jeans are fine until they take their first Senior Discount and ...bang! From then on they just don't smell nice. At some other time I'll think about why that is, but trust me...it is true.

"You know you love me, I know you care
Just shout whenever, and I'll be there"

If you sniffed Justin Beiber's jeans they would smell just fine. I surmise.

Rob

It turns out I didn't have to spend the night in the roach motel after all. Memo to myself: Read Itinerary. I actually had plenty of time between trains. Even time to have a meal with a friend in Chicago. Breakfast at the hotel was the plan since he works and hearing the moaning and groaning about driving downtown was something I could deal with in the morning but not in the evening. Turns out the breakfast was without the slightest mewl.

There is something I really like about breakfast in a hotel restaurant. Often, the pricey (and not very good) night-time restaurant becomes the pricey (and often quite nice) breakfast restaurant. I, however, am boycotting the Ritz Carlton in San Francisco for breakfast. When orange juice is that expensive I expect it to be personally squeezed between the legs of Faith Hill. (knee level--don't be dirty)

Not that this hotel restaurant was cheap. What was I thinking that made me order "Green Eggs & Ham?" It sounded fun but turned out to be eggs scrambled with spinach and a piece of ham thin enough to read the Sun-Times through. And it was just $15 and no cents and I had no sense when I ordered it. (Toast was extra!!!!) My friend had a bagel and a schmear. I could have gotten him one of those at Dunkin' Donuts. We had a nice conversation though and I now wish we had eaten dinner. Maybe next time because by 9:30am he was off to work and I was back to killing time. My train didn't leave until 6:40pm.

In 1979 I took the train from Duluth to St. Paul...St. Paul to Chicago....and Chicago to NYC. I wrote about it in my story because the fondly remembered Mesa Kincaid tried to poison me on the Twin City/Windy City portion of the trip. That time I had time to kill and some of it was spent in various public facilities as her toxins worked their wonders on my bowels. By noon I had almost recovered. I fluffed and douched (metaphorically) in the Union Depot bathroom and after checking my bags wandered in search of a time-killing diversion. The only movie playing within walking distance of the station was something with Don Knotts. On a previous trip to Chicago I saw an Elvis movie at the same theater...and this time I was seeing RITE. I weep for the poor Catholic Church and Anthony Hopkins' career. Memo to myself:Avoid downtown Chicago Movies.

The movie didn't kill enough time. I arrived at the train station almost 3 hours early and entertained myself with my Kindle and mp3 player.

Etta James is singing...."Chestnuts roasting on an open fire....." and they are calling my train.

Memo to myself: Update music.

A pillow changed my life. Recently. Last fall I was visiting and the pillow on the guest bed was acting strange. (I suppose that should be strangely) When my head first rested upon this eerie-pillow it felt rock hard. I take that back. It didn't feel quite as hard as a rock. Let's say it felt like a 25 pound burlap bag of clay. For someone who bought a couple of feather pillows in 1975 and still used them even though the feathers had disintegrated to dust, this pillow wouldn't do. Add to my bed-time experience a set of flannel sheets and I was prepared for a miserable night. Then...like my hair-girl at the Aveda Salon...it felt like a pair of warm hands grabbed my temples and the pillow and I became one. It would be easy to say my head sank into the bag of clay but it was more than that. My head was absorbed by the pillow and all the thoughts and cares of the day drained away. When I rolled to the side, my right arm under, my head over, the pillow conformed in a magical way and for those moments before sleep I became that pillow.

Getting into the bed at the hotel in Chicago I was prepared to miss my pillow. I say MY because I stole it from my host. I told them about my pillow epiphany the next morning and also informed them I was absconding with it. They approved. Just after Thanksgiving I saw a clone at Kohl's and $38 dollars later had two magical pillows. I returned the original when I visited at Christmas. I also noticed that all the pillows in the guest bedroom were now bolted to the mattress. It was like sleeping in a Motel-5.

I needed to sleep in a hotel because the arrival of the train from Minneapolis didn't match the departure of the train from Chicago. It was way to cold to enjoy my evening in the Windy City. There was no wind, ironically, but I could see my breath and when I can see my breath and haven't been eating garlic, it is too cold. It didn't matter. I had a Kindle full of books as well as a couple borrowed from the Duluth Public Library. I'm never bored if there is something to read. Getting back to my pillow. I do not travel with my own pillow. Or my own linen. All the bed-bug talk has made me think about it but so far Jackie Onassis/Wallace Simpson I am not. I had dozed on the train but not much. There must have been a convention of some sort in Chicago because the train was loaded with Amish families heading to Chicago. Sitting in the car with 12-14 Amish made me uneasy. I kept wondering if they had special dispensation to ride the train. I kept thinking about the convention they were going to..."When did thee get in?" Lets just say it wasn't my best train trip. That would be when I rode the Orient Express and spent the night having wild sex with Agatha Christie. Or Peter Ustinov. I can never tell the difference.

I reached for the light switch just as a cockroach found himself in plain sight on my night stand. For $96 a night plus tax I didn't look forward to spending the night with a stranger. Also, if there is a cockroach, you know there are probably bed bugs. Unless cockroaches eat bedbugs. Sort of like snakes in a corn field eat the mice. Since I had no desire to sleep with a roach, bug, snake, or mouse and both Agatha & Peter are no longer among us, I called the front desk and complained. Their solution was an offer of a different room. It seemed to me it would be much easier to move the roach to a different room so I demurred.

I didn't get a bug discount and the Amish in the room above me partied until 4am, but I was engrossed in the latest John Grisham so I didn't give a whit.

Rob

The bus was ten minutes late, pulling in just as Lady Gaga began singing about a bad romance. I used to read comment after comment about the "lady at the Laundromat" who was a major bitch. Twenty minutes earlier when I dragged my bag into the combination laundromat/bus station she had greeted me with a gimlet eye. I would have rather she greeted me with a Gimlet, even though it was barely 8am. I settled for a bite-sized Tootsie Roll out of a basket near the cash-register. When she realized I was already ticketed and there wasn't a commission from Jefferson Lines in her future, she leaped over the counter and proceeded to pound the back of my head in an effort to get me to up-spit the undeserved Tootsie Roll.

Perhaps I exaggerate.

She did give me a look, not unlike the bald guy with the mustache on the Laurel & Hardy films gave the boys. If you watch it you'll see that Homer Simpson's "Doh!" was being doh-ed before Rupert Murdoch was born.

"Rah Rah uh uh uh"

The bus arrived, I turned my very heavy bag to a woman bus-driver who hefted it to its proper place with a comment, "You're overweight." to which I replied, "You're not so skinny yourself." The laundromat woman yelled from the door, "Watch him...he's a candy thief." Ignoring her I climbed aboard.

"I want your ugly....."

Lady Gaga must have peaked at my fellow passengers because, aside from two rather stuck-up college babes, a guy who looked like a former colonel in the National Guard, and an African-American guy (It is the law that every Greyhound or Jefferson bus must include at least one black on every run).

Don't bitch that I'm being racist! It's THE LAW!

The rest of the passengers were in the various final stages of syphilis and leprosy. "...I want your disease..."

My mp3 timing was superb. The next time I heard Lady Gaga was on 35E passing the former Ramsey County General Hospital (They renamed it.....I think it is called...ODs R US.)just a minute or two from the St. Paul bus station. I'm staying here, visiting family over in Scott County for a few days.

----------dashes representing four days in Belle Plaine---------

After saying my goodbyes on another frigid morning, I dragged my fat ass into the Amtrak station. The clerk who helped me get right with the railroad wasn't in a very good mood but I forgave him since he was going to be working all the live-long day. At last I sat in an uncomfortable plastic seat (obviously molded for an ass shaped differently than mine)and dragged out my mp3 player.

"Gaga ooh la la..."

I think this is where you came in.

Rob

Just to let you know....I'll be returning to the computer for Blog...My Story....and email replies on or about the 14th of Feb. (Yeah Right!) Trust me.