But hey, a solid month! (For a forgiving definition of “solid”!) I’ve already expressed my surprise at the early trends in subject matter here, which have held up since: a lot more about sports than I expected, a lot less about my genre-riffic pop culture obsessions. Another shocker, from my perspective, is how little I’ve used this particular pulpit to howl about The WMATA.
Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t slowly, begrudgingly become fond of the Metro. I still pretty much hate it, but as always I feel like it’s the lesser of two evils between itself on the one hand and driving in Northern Virginia traffic AND paying for inside-the-Beltway parking on the other. It is a slim evil-margin, though. There hasn’t really been anything egregious in the past month, I guess. There was a bad Metro train crash back in June, and since several people were killed in that accident I’m disinclined to use that as snark fodder. It also puts things in perspective and in its own twisted way makes the day-to-day indignities of Metro less objectionable (or maybe I’ve just gotten numb to them all). And that’s all it’s been lately, really: overcrowded trains and escalators out of order (I remain convinced that if there were ever a day when all the escalators in all the stations I pass through were working during both morning and evening rush hour, the entire Metro system would spontaneously implode). These are the little things that make me long for the bucolic rusticity of life as a goat-and-tortoise farmer, but they don’t fire me up enough to write about them, as it turns out.
My extended commute also introduces a certain tricky element around this time of year, but I can’t blame that on the WMATA, either. Late September in northern Virginia usually means some of the most pleasant weather of the year, but the temperature ranges a lot on any given day: chillier in the morning, warmish in the late afternoon. When you drive to work this is not a big deal, and there’s really no wrong way to approach it: if you wear a jacket when you leave in the morning, but you don’t need the extra layer in the evening, you sling your jacket in the back seat; or if you don’t wear a jacket in the morning you turn up the heat in your car and ride in comfort all the way to the office, and ride home with the windows down. My commute, on the other hand, involves lots of time outdoors (waiting for the bus, waiting for the Metro, and walking from the Metro to my office) which means if I leave my jacket at home I’ll have plenty of chances to miss it. But if I bring a jacket, then when I go home I swelter wearing it amidst the crushing throngs of other commuters on the train, or I present an even more awkward shape carrying it over one arm. (That one arm obviously cannot win no matter what I do, and will probably one day rise up against me to overthrow the tyranny of cashmere blend.) I like the onset of autumn, I really do, but there are undeniable logistical benefits to days when it’s either warm all day or cold all day. I am mortified that such petty thoughts even intrude on my mind for a millisecond but since I’ve gone through all the trouble of typing it out I guess I’ll let it stand.
But hey, even what-the-hell-it-was-hot-and-humid-yesterday-and-today-there’s-morning-frost weather can’t take away from how much fun it was to be a New York fan yesterday. The Giants and the Jets both improved to 3 and 0, and the Yankees got their 100th win of the season to complete a series sweep of the Red Sox and clinch the AL East pennant. Sadly the Steelers lost a tough one in Cincinnati, but my wife was gracious enough to be happy for me regardless (as I expect I would be for her if our positions were reversed). Personally I was excited enough to crack open an Old Dominion Octoberfest. Ah, clearly THAT is why the blog didn’t get updated yesterday – one afternoon beer and I was mentally done for the day.
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