A Long Way Home

Traveling on FrontRunner / TRAX is a lot of work. Half the trip (the easy part) is spent riding on FrontRunner, while the second half involves riding on TRAX, with about 1-2 miles of walking to fill in the gaps from TRAX to work, etc.

A couple of weeks ago, a Friday, Eli and I began another journey home from work. I felt bad from the start because Eli had his long board (he gets around pretty good for a guy his size on the long board), while I had to walk. I told Eli not to wait for me, but he insisted... so I slowed him way down for the first part of the trip.

We finally make it to the TRAX station, and have to wait about 10 minutes for the next train. Gettting on the front car... it was way crowded. So crowded that many people were standing (including us). As the train started moving, I said to Eli "I didn't see very many people getting on the back car, I wonder if it is less crowded back there"... Eli turns to me and says "Should we do it? Should we run back to one of the rear cars at the next stop?", to which I replied... "Yep, Doooo it!".

At the next stop, we both jump out of the front car and race to the back. I was in front, but to my credit, I did stop a few seconds to let a little old lady get on, but she was interferring with the plan. While running to the rear car, the doors were open on the second to last car, and Eli yelled "I think we should just get on here"... I ignored that suggestion and said "I'm going all the way". Big mistake. When I hit the button on the last car, the doors would not open. I looked at Eli who said "oh crap", while at the same time, the doors that Eli suggested had just closed. We got left behind. It was completely my fault so I really felt bad... so we had to wait another 15 minutes for the next train.

During the wait, Eli calls his wife to explain to her what happened. When he got off the phone I asked "Is she mad?" to which he replied, "Yep, she's mad dude.". I said "I take full responsibility... sorry". Eli told me that his wife doesn't stay mad long and that she would be over it soon. I told Eli, that I wasn't even going to call my wife, I was just going to see if we could make up time somehow.

I guess we got a little too comfortable during that 15 minute wait. Eli took off his backpack and kept babbling on about work stuff. He is explaining stuff to me that he is working on while all I hear is "moua mua mua muaaaa", you know the sound you hear when any adult talks in a Charlie Brown cartoon... Anyway, the train finally arrives and we jump on the back car. We both get a seat... this one isn't that crowded. About halfway to the next stop, Eli realizes that he left his backpack, the bag that has a very expensive work laptop, etc.

Well, we had to go back for it, so we again got off at the next stop, to get on the next train heading in the opposite direction to our previous stop. I didn't feel so bad about my mistakes earlier, because this one evened it up. Eli was crapping his pants about whether his bag would be there when we got to it. If you ask him, he'll say he knew it was going to be there, but beleive me, he was crapping his pants.

When we got to the previous stop, we did find the backpack as seen below. Thank God it was still there. Just had to wait for the next train "once again" to get home.

When we got to the FrontRunner platform we only had a few minutes to get on the train before it left. Of course Eli still had to buy a pass (that is a different story). I had a monthly pass, but I wasn't going to take any more chances. As Eli was bumbling around on the machine to get his pass, I stood in the doorway of the train taking hit after hit as the doors opened and closed on me while a "station host" told me to get on. I said that my buddy was trying to get a pass so I'm not moving til he gets on ... I did not want to get locked out again.

We finally got on the train and headed home. I explained it to my wife, she laughed. I'm not sure how things went with Eli's wife though, I never asked.