I decided, partially at the behest of my mother, to copy-and-paste these two lovely anecdotes here for my own remembrance. They were both written to Justine, so either I really love telling her stories and she brings out the writer in me, or she's a great sounding board for complaining. Either/or, I suppose, and probably both.
The first is my retelling of my trip back to Evanston after my trip home for the weekend.
Oh man. The trip back was a nightmare. Let me see if I can describe it and do it justice.
On the way to the airport, I realize that I have left my cell phone charger at home. This is the prerequisite to the building hysteria.
So I get to the airport, and I've figured out that I'm going to take the bus back to Evanston, and the flight gets in at 7:55pm Evanston time, and I'll wait around for a while and then catch the 9:11 shuttle, because it runs fairly irregularly on Sunday nights. And I make it through security - the guy there, not too bad looking either, hands my my license back and goes "6'1"? Nice." - and find my gate and sit down to find that my flight is leaving at 7:45, not 6:55 as advertised. (I still don't know why there were so many delays. As far as I can tell, the weather was not that bad.)
So I figure, hey, this is okay, I can roll with this because it just puts me at O'Hare closer to when my bus is scheduled to leave. Fair enough. I get on the plane, we all settle in, and the flight attendant (sort of older but not old, and quite bitter and jaded, which ordinarily would have amused and fascinated me but I found it grating because I was getting stressed) informs us that we can't leave for another 15 or 20 minutes because of weather and traffic into O'Hare.
Okay, so I'm going to miss the 9:11 bus. That's okay, there's one at 9:41. I'll just take that one, I'll be back in Evanston by 10:45, I can shower and go to bed and be ready to face research on Monday morning.
So we land at O'Hare, and the flight attendant informs us that it's going to be another 20 minutes before we can get off of the plane, because there's no open gate for us. At this point, I'm getting really antsy; my legs are starting to hurt and I'm getting that sort of tight contained feeling where I just want to punch the window out and jump onto the tarmac. But I don't, because I have exceptional self-control. Or maybe I just don't want to get arrested.
Finally she informs us that there is a gate open for us; G12. Now the thing you have to understand about O'Hare is that it's huge, so all domestic American Airlines flights go to this one terminal. We start taxi-ing to our gate and I realize we are at a completely different terminal. Now, maybe I'm unreasonable, but I'd just like to know why we couldn't have moved into position before this, so we could quickly maneuver into position at our gate, since obviously we couldn't possibly be at a different terminal.
So she starts apologizing for people who are missing their connections because by the time we get to our gate it's 9:35pm and we were supposed to be there at 7:55pm. Only she sounds pretty insincere and starts droning on about how you should go talk to the people at the gate blah blah blah, which everyone knows and no one is appreciating her "helpful hints". And yes, it's not her fault, but sometimes you just ought to keep your head down.
I get off the plane and it's 9:38pm and by this point I'm frustrated and angry and sort of near tears, so I keep closing my eyes and telling myself to stop being a baby about it, and I have to pee so bad I'm about ready to burst and I'm not going to make the bus anyway because I have to take the shuttle to the bus stop, which will take five minutes or so. So I take care of business and try to figure out what to do.
Well, I can take the bus, but the next bus doesn't come until 10:56, and I don't want to wait around for another hour. I'd rather be moving, so I decide to take CTA (the train) because even though it will take just as long, at least I won't have the dead time. This is a Very Bad Decision.
So I hop on the blue line, having paid my fare, and I ride it down to transfer to the red line, and once on the red line I can take the purple line right up to Evanston, walk a block and a half and be back at my dorm room. At this point I am feeling a little on edge because I have never taken the blue line before, but I figure I have a map and there are lots of helpful posters on the trains, so I'll be just fine. Right? So I figure out that I can go from the blue line to the red line at Jackson; I hop off at Jackson and walk across to the red line, where I set my stuff down and get ready to hop on the first red line that comes through. By this point, it's about 10:35 or 10:40, and I'm feeling okay.
Some random guy - a black man in a uniform that says UHAUL Spokesperson on it - starts talking to me, and I'm pretty relaxed, pretty calm, because I've done red to purple before and it's a piece of cake. So I'm carrying on a bizarre conversation with him because he just won't stop talking, but I figure, hey, I'll just ditch him when I get on the train and it'll be fine. Ya get some crazies. He was pretty harmless I guess.
So we're standing there, and standing there, and it gets to be about 11:00pm, which is just too long to have to wait for the red line, which is supposed to run every 8-10 minutes. It's a 24 hour line. This voice comes on the loudspeaker and informs us that the red line is not running underground right now, and we will have to go up to Wabash and Adams to catch it (a station that does not usually have the red line running through it). So my new BFF informs me (quite needlessly) that we have to go up to Wabash, so I follow the people to this stop.
We get up there, and the CTA attendant lets us in for free because the transfer should have been free, and we head up to catch the red line. At this point, I'm feeling pretty tired and incredibly annoyed, but things are going to be fine, right? So we stand up there and watch as not one, not two, but THREE red lines go south (the wrong direction) while we see three or four brown lines and three green lines, but no red lines. And by this time I'm really frustrated and I don't know what's going on, and I'm texting my mother, having given up on saving my phone's battery because maybe this is an emergency. I also texted Dessi, because I was going to stop in and say hi to her when I got back to the dorm.
My mother calls the customer service line for CTA; Dessi texts me the number of a cab service. I have no cash. My mother calls me and informs me that red line service has been restored to Jackson, of which no one saw fit to inform us. It is midnight. The last purple line train leaves Howard for Evanston at 1:20am and at this point, I am really starting to panic. I'm taking deep breaths and closing my eyes and trying my very hardest not to start crying because if I cry, it's all over. But I don't even know where in Chicago I am, although I do have a map, and it's midnight and I'm downtown and I might get stranded and I have no idea what to do.
I tell my traveling companions (which include my BFF) of this development, and we head down to talk to the CTA assistant. My BFF starts yelling at her, and she looks at us like we're idiots and tells us no, it hasn't even been close to an hour since they rerouted the red line (not true) and that two northbound red lines have come through the station (also VERY not true). So she tells us to go back up and catch the brown line and take it to the red line.
Now I'm seriously starting to panic because the brown line isn't coming and I don't know if I should go back to Jackson and try to just catch the red line and besides, I'm not even sure I know how to get back to Jackson and heck if I'm going my myself but I don't want to go with my BFF either so this is awkward. And all the while, I'm texting my mother and I'm texing Dessi, and I'm panicking and my BFF is creepily looking over and going "you textin' your people to let 'em know? you textin' your friends?" and I keep saying "yes, yes" because I want him to know that if ANYTHING happens people will know where I was last.
So we hop on the next brown line that FINALLY comes through, and hop off to transfer to the red line. At this point, I look at this sort of grad student looking kid who was waiting with us before, and he looks at me and then gets up and off the train, saying "You want the red line? Yeah, we can get it here. You from out of town?" but he was safe, unlike my crazy, insane BFF who is dancing around going "come on! over here!" Finally my new acquaintance goes "we can get on HERE too," yelling across the street to him, and we headed down, underground, to wait for the red line.
So it's about 12:15 and it takes 45 minutes to get from the red line to the purple line, and there's no red line and I'm freaking out, like massively freaking out, wringing my hands and everything. The new kid looks at me and goes "don't worry, I think you'll be fine. worst case scenario, if you miss the purple line, just find someone at the CTA and make them pay for a cab. as long as it comes in the next 10 minutes or so, though, you'll be fine." My BFF goes, "I'll show her, I'm riding that way anyway, I'm going to Wilson" and I looked at the new kid and he goes "I'm going to Morse. it's fine. she's going to Howard, that's two stops away.
When the red line finally comes, I have been texting Dessi about where I am, and she's got Paola with her and they're trying to figure out where in Chicago I am. She calls right when it arrives, because she's arranging for Kelsey to come and pick me up if I'm totally lost, and I just get on the red line and turn my phone off, letting her and my mother know that I'm on the red line now so at least I'll know where I am shortly.
Now I'm totally cut off from everyone. My phone has a dying battery; my traveling companions are pretty sketchy, and the train is full of odd characters. I slip into a seat and fall back into the pattern of closing my eyes to try not to cry, biting my lip, praying, the whole nine yards. Finally, the train starts to clear out and we're getting close. Just as we get to Morse, I turn my phone on and it's 1:03am; I'm going to make it. I'm going to be okay.
My buddy gets up, looks at me, informs me that I'm going to make it with time to spare, and I thanked God that I had found someone who was sane and intelligent and nice. I get off at Howard, have to walk under and up onto the other side of the station... and the last purple line of the night pulls in. I hop into a car, hoping it's empty, and it's not - there's one other person - but I just sit where I can be alone and sort of huddle in my hoodie with my backpack and my laptop, my credit cards and driver's license and everything I didn't want to lose around me. I text my parents and I text Dessi to let them know that I'm going to make it back okay.
And that is when I pull my hood over my head and finally, even though I know everything is fine, I let myself cry. And I sobbed basically until I got to my stop. I was quiet about it, but I'm pretty sure that the girl in the car knew I was crying. Whatever, she probably assumed I was nuts which is fine by me. I got off at my stop, wiping my eyes on my sleeve, and headed down to the road.
And now it's dark. It's 1:30am. I have no idea which way to walk, but I can't give up now, so I decide to turn right and I watch the signs. Foster and Sherman... okay, familiar names... Foster and Orrington. Bingo. My dorm is on this intersection. So I walk further, totally drained, totally exhausted, and run into a couple of girls from the other REU (the materials science one). One actually recognizes me, so I talk to her for just long enough to not seem rude begging off (after all, it IS 1:30am) and then run upstairs.
I can't even tell you how relieved I was to stick my key into my lock and open up my dorm room. It was incredible. I grabbed a bottle of water out of my fridge and started to guzzle it down, and then headed over to let Dessi know I was back. I knocked on her door, she opened it and looked really startled for a minute, and then gave me a huge hug. Then, of course, I had to be polite again so I went into her room and sat on her bed, barely conscious, as she gave me her weekend in blow-by-blow detail. Finally, at 2:00am, I told her I was going to go shower and go to bed. Which I did.
And waking up this morning was the hardest thing I've ever done.
The end!
And the second, slightly less epic retelling of my trip to Argonne National Laboratory, with special emphasis on the bus ride. For posterity!
OH MAN. so we had to take this field trip type thing to Argonne National Lab (which is a Very Big Deal, I guess, and having that around for grad school would be pretty sweet). we had to be there at 8am, which ended up being really stupid because we didn't even leave until 8:30 because someone was late. grrr >:(
so we're there, and it's 8:30, and this bus with reclining seats is pulling onto the road and I'm all optimistic like "this won't be so bad and a nice bus like this has got to have air conditioning! it'll cool off!" okay. no, actually, it won't. so the day was like 99 with a heat index of 103, and horrendously sunny and the sun is pouring in through the huge windows and we can only open thin windows at the top, not the huge main windows, and Dessi looks at me and says "hey, is this blowing HOT air at our feet?"
why yes, yes it was. so we attempted to sleep while sweat is dripping down EVERYTHING and we're all miserable and sort of half-comatose because it's the only way to survive and we finally get there and step out into the 99 degree day, and it FEELS COOL. thank goodness cutting edge government funded research labs are air conditioned.
the lab itself is HUGE, like fifty buildings, and we of course walked into the Nanoscale Materials Center or whatever it was because, you know, nano, and had some tour guide who knew nothing at all about science.
tour guide: "and in this room, we have a U-V-V-I-S machine. that stands for ultraviolet ... um ..."
VISIBLE. the Vis is NOT an acronym. BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
although we got to see their particle accelerator which generates x-rays, which is pretty cool and apparently one of three in the world (there's one in Germany or France or something, and one in Japan). well, not really see it so much as see the structures that house it.
and then they fed us. and we got back onto the bus, which still had no air-conditioning, and we wilted and melted all the way back and I played hangman with Vic and this kid stood up at one point and the ENTIRE BACK of his shirt was soaked with sweat, I kid you not. TERRIBLE.
(shorter because of its nature: a facebook post rather than an email. still, not too shabby if I do say so myself, but I have an unfortunate habit on facebook: I don't capitalize anything but proper nouns.)
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