Eventually, because the train was running so late, it had to pull over on a siding to let the #4 train heading east go by. So that was another half hour admiring the rather treacherous countryside (at some points, the sides of the ravine have electronic monitors to register boulders rolling down towards the tracks). We got into Lamy, New Mexico, the stop before Albuquerque six hours late, just after the head of the family waiting to pick us up had left to get more food. The snacks had all been consumed during the two hours they'd already waited, expecting the train to be just four hours late.
Bonus, since it was already full dark, we got to see the lights of Los Alamos from forty miles away.
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Musings onboard--We started on the Downeaster in New Hampshire and changed to the Lakeshore Limited in Boston, Massachusetts.
On a new train in Albany, NY. When we pulled into Worchester, the computer said it found WIFI but I couldn't actually connect. That may be the fault of the laptop's wireless card which has long been erratic.
It rained a lot going through Massachusetts, an inducement to catch up on reading and snoozing.
I started "Millenial Makeover" about the influence of new technologies on society, but found it slow going because I found myself disagreeing with the preface and had to start making notes. The authors are public relations people trying to define what's going to shape public opinion from now on. They seem to think that democracy was sorely tested by student and racial unrest.
So, I took up the current issue of the New Yorker and was delighted by a suggestion that a new Adam Sandler movie is going to be remembered as an example of the esprit obamiste.
I am composing this on the textedit program for later posting. Just discovered that it too has rich text, which allows me to use italic and bold. So, what we are learning on the blog is useful in other venues, as well.
There's an hour lay-over in Albany, but the new train has a dining car, instead of the snack car (sandwiches out of the micro-wave). The train is very full--a real cross-section of America. On the other train we had quite a few little children, some entertained by watching sponge bob on the computer. There are electric outlets by all the seats. If i'd thought to bring movies, we could watch them. Spouse found a couple of Coronas in the waiting area of the spanking new train station, so we have no complaints. We'll sit up throught the night. Get into Chicago after breakfast and spend about six hours sight-seeing
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After a night of fitfull sleep, I awoke at the normal time, just before we got to Cleveland, where quite a few more people got off than got on. It's now 4:20. Buffalo was supposed to be at 12:00 and I more or less missed that. About 10:30 the conductor used the loud-speaker to tell us that would be the last announcement until morning because "management" thinks people don't want to be disturbed. He also told us that the Border Patrol might be boarding and we should receive them courteously since they are part of Homeland Security and work for the federal government and their jurisdiction extends a hundred miles from the boarder, which we would be skirting as we ride along Lale Eirie. I don't think any showed up.
What did show up was a clan of Amish, husbands and wives and babies, all in their habits--blue for the women, black for the men and grey for the babies. The women have white hair caps, covered by black for out of doors and then a stiff bonnet--i.e. a more complicated arrangement than either the burka or the veil The men have ear-lobe length hair and beards. Other than their dress, they're quite modern--then men using little halogen penlights to arrange things in the dark.
As the spouse observed, "this is Amurika." One suspects that the politicians who get all bent out of shape by people who look and act different just strike a lot of people as peculiar and that's why there's not more resistance to their rants.
Although the tickets all announce that ID's will be required on board, I'm not aware that anyone's has been checked. The conductors do make sure that there's a signature in the upper left corner, but they don't have anything to check that against. It's my guess that in case the train blows up, they'll be wanting to have a list of names of who was on board--if the tickets survive. Really, all this security business is really nothing more than a make-work program. Only problem is that there's a lot of more important work that's not getting done--like rebuilding the rail tracks and bridges and rail cars and more stations. "Management" has been trained to think in terms of people, rather than things. Perhaps that's because business and government management has largely been left to the men, for whom manipulating people is always the first item of business. I still think that Hillary not wanting to bake cookies was telling. It was reflected in the mis-management of her campaign resources.
The snack car closed at 11:45 and won't re-open until 6:15. So, no coffee for another couple of hours and we're far enough west that it's not yet getting light, as it would be in NH. But, I'm definitely wide awake. We never did get to eat in the dining car, which will open at 6:30. By the time it got to Albany, they people who'd made reservations on the New York segment still hadn't been served. Also, the people in the sleepers get first dibs, so there were more people wanting to eat than they could serve. Since meals are included in the price of the sleeper, I suspect that, until this surge in passengers, the dining car was hardly utilized by the short distance travelers and they only kept the service to pacify the unions. At any rate, now they're over-booking the train by 25% and, since everybody's showing up, there aren't enough seats at certain times. After Albany, half the snack car was filled with people for whom there were no other seats until people got off at Syracuse. As I said, they can't just add more cars, as they used to do, because they don't have the rolling stock and because the passenger trains can't be so long that they can't transit the single lines they share with freight expeditiously. Amtrak has to wait while freight trains use the lines, but freight can't wait--or doesn't want to, because they own the tracks. If trains are always the same length, they're easier to schedule. In the Downeaster corridor, when passenger numbers increased, they added another run, rather than making the trains longer. Five trains a day, rather than four, does increase passenger choice, but it's not really the most efficient alternative because they either have to hire another crew or put the regulars on overtime.
Major puzzlement--how did it happen that a capitalist economy stopped investing in new and renovated capital facilities? How did we transit from capital as savings for future use to capital as speculative investments to generate profit in the stock market? How did capitalism get transformed into a game of chance, rather than the industrial strategy it was to begin with?
5:09 and now I'm wondering if the snack car opens on central time or eastern time. Where's the dividing line? I know Chicago is on central. New Mexico will be mountain.
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Well, that was interesting--breakfast in the dining car.
Perhaps to make up for last night, it was slated to open early, at 6;00 AM just before the Toledo, Ohio stop--a smokers' break. I thought it just a bit suspicious that one of the cooks had gone to the snack car to get a cup of coffee.
Anyway, as I mentioned before, I think, passengers in the sleepers have their meals included and this has a couple of consequences. The first is that there's a preliminary discussion with the dining room host as to one's status--followed by having to sign a chit if one's in a sleeper. After that there's the deposition of the order slip which the server is tasked with filling out, if and when she interrupts her chit-chat with the staff to attend to the customers. (One person was seated at our table and decided she'd been made to wait too long). The second is that, perhaps because they don't collect money, the incentive to provide good service and collect tips is absent--or maybe not.
The breakfast menu is rather meagre (omelet, scrambled eggs, french toast, dry sugared cerial with fruit) and on this day the omelet (topped with jack cheese and a mixture of corn, beans, and red peppers ) wasn't available. Drinks range in price from $1.75 for coffee to $2.00 for bottled spring water (very small print indicates that a cup of water is available upon request) , soft drinks cost less than bottled water. We opted for the scrambled eggs which the server said come in frozen form--i.e. no fresh eggs in the heartland--pork sausabe patties, breakfast potatoes and the accompanying croissant, which tasted OK but was rather soggy. The eggs looked like they had a little yellow food color added (no taste) and the potatoes tasted like somebody had thrown some strange sweetish herb in with the spices.
Although we were told to sit on the same side of the four person table because many customers were expected to arrive, in addition to the woman who departed our table, there were a grand total of five other people who arrived while we waited, had to ask for a second cup of coffee, and had to wait for the bill to be totaled by the dining car host.
Should mention here that the tables are covered with paper "cloths," the coffee cups and plates are plastic (as are the wilted wild-flowers in the vases), the half and half and sugar come in individual packets, but the napkins and utensils are cloth and stainless steel.
When the host finally totalled the bill, he left off the coffee and asked it we wanted to put the tip on the credit card. When the spouse agreed and specified three dollars, that amount was added and brought the bill to fifty cents short of what it would have been with the coffee. The host pulled out a wad of bills and peeled off three dollars and put them on the table, supposedly for the server to collect. I asked about the coffee and was told that since it was served in plastic, it came with the breakfast, but then the host thought to inquire of the server who said it should be charged (the plastic cup was irrelevant), so we offered to pay the $3.50 cash and the host amended to bill and put the $3.50 in his pocket. Since I'm not an accountant, I won't bother speculating how this all works out on the books, but it's a most irregular way of doing business. I'm not sure if they could try harder to make it go away. The whole enterprise seems designed to fail.
It's bothersome to think that cash on the barrel is a necessary incentive to get good service. The absence of direct payment might also be used as an explanation for why health care is in such a mess. On the other hand, the credit card system has consollidated payment functions throughout the commercial sector and the quality of service doesn't seem to correlate with where the money comes from. Perhaps the problem of poor service is connected to the fact that the meals are, in effect, pre-paid, part of the sleeping car price and skimping on the meals and the service increases the profit margin. Meals for travelers was the traditional model that air lines adopted from the railroad and the steamship lines and has now been effectively dropped by the airlines on all but the longest flights--in the interest of saving money. The question one might ask is whose money is being saved? Ticket prices have not kept up with inflation. On the other hand, the residents of more and more towns and cities aren't being served by air and rail at all and while that certainly saves them money, it also means that they're increasingly cut off from the rest of the country.
How many small towns and cities are declining in population and enterprise because they're no longer provided with transportation alternatives?
It's a management problem.
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on the train from Chicago to New Mexico--The Southwest Chief is making its first run on the tracks since the floods. Yesterday, they were still transporting people to Kansas by bus. So far, the countryside seems to be drying out nicely. The tracks are being worked on and the train slows to a crawl from time to time. Corn looks to be about a foot high and everything is very green.
We had an early dinner (comes with the sleeper) and met a Dominican nun from Santa Fe who seemss quite pleasant and forthcoming. We exchanged email addresses. She's left the convent (in Wisconsin) to care for her ailing sister and other family members. Seems like an open-minded religious. And independent.
The train is a double-decker, so we're up high. Can lie in bed and watch the country-side go by like a wide-screen movie. Since the passengers in the neighboring bedroom (separated from ours by a thin door, so it can be a double, if needed) have gone to dinner, it's nice and quiet at the moment. 8:30 by my clock, so it's time to call it a day.
Next morning--
The train is about three hours behind schedule. Although the tracks are clear, the trainman explained that there was a backlog of freight trains which needs to be cleared and they get priority. Presumably, when we get out of Kansas and all the little towns for which the train slows, they'll be able to make up some time. The train whistle blows at every road crossing, so it's almost a continuous seranade. I was reminded that last time when the coach was right behind the engine, I found it too loud to sleep. Slept great last night and didn't even hear the announcements of the stops.
Some of the winter wheat looks to have been ruined. Some has been cut and raked into rows, waiting to be bailed into wheat straw.
Breakfast menu is much the same as the last train, but the suppliers are obviously different. There were real egg omelets and grits. I had the french toast and crisp bacon and refills on the coffee. Management is deffinitely the critical factor.
As usual we shared a table. One young man, a senior at a Christian College in Colorado majoring in aeronautics said he'd been pulled aside by TSA for special interrogation every time he'd flown in the last six months. Perhaps his blond goatee raises suspicion amd, of course, once a name goes on the list, there's no way to get it off. He said he'd not been asked for his I.D. on the train. We weren't either and although we'd been issued a fancy boarding pass when we went into the special lounge to check our bagged at Union Station, when we returned after our excursion, nobody bothered to check that either--lots of procedures that and checks that don't strike the people who carry them out as worth-while. Passengers were asked to arrive a half hour before departure and that was actually barely enough time to get people loaded on the train. Handicapped individuals who have trouble walking quickly were offered rides on a little cart which had to compete with walkers on the platform and probably only had time to deliver one party. Pasenger loading could be accomplished more efficiently, if all the doors were used. But, that would require more personnel to check tickets, give directions and answer questions and personnel are at a premium. It strikes me that all kinds of efficiencies of scale are lost because of the reluctance to hire an adequate number of people.
Most of the oil pumps are pumping.
