Off and fumbling...

I am quickly squeezing in a moment of Wifi time. In just over 2 hours we'll board the Capitol Limited, which will take us--in our very own compartment--to Chicago. Neither the Capitol Limited nor the Southwest Chief--our homes for the next 2 nights--have Wifi, apparently, but here in the Acela First Class lounge at D.C. Union Station we're up and running.

We're also dozing a bit, which is appropriate given the hubbub of the bustling terminal we just closed the Acela Lounge door on. Most inconveniently, as full as Union Station is of dining choices and upscale shops, the restrooms in the terminal are in the midst of a 6 week remodeling, and all needy bladders are being shunted to the food court restrooms. The result of this is a short wait at the men's room, but--to no one's surprise--a line of 20 women before you even breach the doorway to the women's facilities. Hence, I stood watch by the men's room door as Jeff did his business, but held my own until after lunch when we went back to the Acela Lounge.

In flagrant disregard of a sign posted just next to where I'm sitting, we're munching chocolate cookies from Au Bon Pain, rather than merely availing ourselves of the Lounge-sanctioned snacks of chips and goldfish crackers. I am, however, properly consuming Amtrak/Green Mountain coffee from the lounge dispenso-matic.

Jeff has been in good form. I've been talking up our trip a good bit for the past week, and he's reasonably well oriented to the program. It helps, of course, that we're now in the tranquil Acela lounge, and out of the Barnes&Noble/Food Court/stairways/mobs/escalators of the Station-at-Large where I must remain appended to him at the elbow, turning him right and left like an upright vacuum. That can get on anyone's nerves. Both the turner and the turnee.

Stepping off the MARC commuter train, which took us from the BWI Airport train terminal to Union Station, Jeff failed to notice the gap and stepped down a foot and a half into the pit. Luckily that's all the deep it was, and a porter was positioned to help him as the gap was dicier than normal. Otherwise, so far so good. I am merely berating myself ever so slightly that I didn't think to brighten up his suitcase handles with yellow or orange tape so he'd know where to grab.