Facebook funnies

I know that some of my readers aren't on Facebook... there are some inventive people on there...

When you have been at home so long that you begin crocheting everything in sight.

I have also seen, "... Next week: Colors and shapes"...

I think that this picture is from the running of the bulls in Pamplona - my friend who posted it said, "This would work in Texas too, I think...(translation: The Health Dept. tries out new methods to keep people from going out.)"

I needed some smiles for today - I'm hoping these might provide you some smiles for you as well....

Commentating on "live" sports

A friend posted a link to this on Facebook...
https://www.thepoke.co.uk/2020/03/20/this-commentators-got-no-live-sport-left-so-hes-commentating-on-everyday-life-and-its-brilliant

I got some chuckles!

Catching up - From March 14, 2020 - part 1

On March 14 (a week ago), we drove out from the farm in Virginia to visit some places around the area. We drove across the next county, Charles City, and down Route 5 to Williamsburg. Patti showed Carl where she graduated from High School in Williamsburg at Walsingham Academy.

We then went to the Old Chickahominy House for lunch:

The Old Chickahominy House

 

It is kind of interesting that since they had a break between breakfast and lunch time, there was a "seating" for lunch right at 11:45am, and they essentially served all the tables at the same time. So, instead of having a waiter or waitress we had multiple folks, each of whom had a specific role (taking our order, bringing our drinks, bringing the fruit salad, the entree, the pie) - so it was efficient but also nice to meet several servers.

We both got "Miss Melinda's Special"

Brunswick Stew and Ham Biscuits - Yum!

Chocolate and Buttermilk Pies for dessert! Double Yum!

The dining room that we were seated in - there were multiple dining areas around the first floor of the house.

There was also a gift shop in which there were a lot of interesting things... we took pictures of a few of them...

Remembering Dwayne and Sue is always part of our days...

We looked for a price on this item, thinking that it might make a good addition to our RV, but think that it was a notice regarding their shop as there was a resident cat...

Another item due to the resident cat!

From lunch, we drove to Jamestown - more in another post on that visit!

At the National Indoor RV Service Center

We made it to Dallas safely on Thursday about noontime, took Uber to the ILC (International Linguistics Center), got Carl's car and the set of keys that we left there, stopped by the dining room and got lunch and "air hugs" from a distance from folks there, saw Mary and Iris and also air-hugged from a distance, and then headed up to Lewisville to the National Indoor RV Service Center. Carl got a tour from the body shop technician (Kelly) on what has been and is going on with his rig. Kelly said that the rig would be delivered to the "campground" (in the parking lot) by 5pm, and that the next action to be done was to apply clear coat to the parts that had been re-painted, but that would not be done until Monday since the paint booth was already occupied by another rig. Unfortunately, the replacement awning still has not come in... but we're hoping and praying that it will be here by Monday and all of the work can be completed by early next week.

In the meantime, we have 3 days of living in the Dutch Star parked in the RV service center "campground" for which we are thankful!

During our train trip, Carl was dealing with pretty severe mouth/tooth pain, so we had called to see if he could see my dentist while we were here in the Dallas area - and we were able to get an appointment for Friday morning. X-rays showed that his tooth was in bad shape with a cracked root and the dentist recommended that he go ahead with an extraction today, as the dentist doesn't know whether he will be open next week... so, Carl is now recovering from a tooth extraction in our nice warm motorhome. We're grateful to have a warm, dry place to stay!

Last leg of our trip - Chicago to Dallas

We left Chicago at 1:45pm on Wednesday, 3/18, and we're due to arrive Dallas on Thursday, 3/19, at 11:45am... right now, we are about half an hour behind schedule at each station, but the scheduled arrival for Dallas is still staying the same. Thankfully we don't have any specific appointments today.

We booked a "Roomette" for this portion of the journey...

The two seats fold down and make a lower bed; the top bunk folds down and there is a mattress up there that you put on top of the lower seats. Three are steps just to the left side of this picture (you can't see them very well) that aid with access to the top bunk.

 Observations:
- This is much more comfortable and conducive to sleeping than the coach seats - we slept well. We were particularly tired as a result of using the coach seats on Tuesday night, so our results might not represent normal results!
- The "ette" part of "Roomette" is critical to notice. There is not much room! Very little space for storage (when the seats are up, you can store under the seats but anything stored under there is not available to access when the bed is made up). I think if I traveled this way more, I would have a better idea of what to pack and in what kind of case. For example, there was a place where a hanging bag could be hung - we were provided hangers and hung our jackets there, but a bag that could be hung would easiest to have accessible but also out of the way.
- I brought slip-on sandal/night shoes, that Carl used too (no, we do NOT have the same size feet! I don't know how he wore them!). The train folks emphasized that we had to have on shoes if we were away from our room - definitely good to have easy-to-slip-on shoes.
- The train horn/whistle sounds almost constantly. We thought they only had to sound the horn for uncontrolled crossings, but from observation, the horn is sounded for every crossing. Once we went to sleep, we didn't notice it anymore. The sleeping cars on this train (and on the DC to Chicago train) are closest to the front of the train (and the train horn).
- I forgot to take a picture while it was made up in the bed configuration...
- It seemed like the tracks from St Louis through Arkansas were really rough - lots of bouncing and swaying side-to-side. Carl was on the top bunk and was glad that there was a safety webbing provided that he connected to the ceiling and would keep him from falling out of the bed.
- Getting in and out of the top bunk was a challenge - the entry was at the corner of the bed - and it was not really possible for an adult to sit upright in the top bunk.
- The folks next to us were parents with two kids - in roomettes across the hall from each other. The top bunk would be "fun" for a child, I think. There are also different kinds of accommodations for families.
https://www.amtrak.com/onboard/onboard-accommodations-for-all-your-needs/sleeping-accommodations.html
https://www.amtrak.com/onboard/onboard-accommodations-for-all-your-needs/sleeping-accommodations/superliner-roomette.html
- The measurements in that second link imply that you'd have a foot and 2 inches of space next to the bed once the lower bed is made up... that is space right inside the sliding door. We happened to have the TravelPro suitcase sitting in that area too... I figure we had about 1'x2' of floor space for doing things like getting dressed...  have I mentioned that it was tight?
- There was a restroom on the floor that we were on which was nice - not to have to go downstairs in the night. There were additional restrooms and the shower room downstairs.

Lots of crop fields as we passed through Illinois

More crop fields

Nearly empty observation car

Lots of available seating

We were stopped at the station in this town -- blocking the street while folks were boarding and disembarking -- I've been the folks in that car before being stopped by a train, but never knowingly on a train that was stopping traffic.

It seems that every small town has a central government building - many with very interesting architecture.

The sleeper car accommodation included meals in the dining car so we took advantage of having dinner -- this was before we ordered. The meals and service were very good!

I had indicated on a previous post that the dining car was only for the sleeper car folks, but, at least on this train, it was open to all, but non-sleeper car folks have to pay.

It was about sunset as we came to St Louis...

The sunset was beautiful, though we weren't on a great angle to capture it.

The train crossed over the Mississippi into Missouri at St Louis.

At St. Louis, they cautioned us to remain seated as two train cars were going to be removed from the train before we arrived to the platform for disembarking and boarding.

There is various information on the train about train travel consuming less energy than cars or air travel. It occurs to me that the train can dynamically alter its carrying capacity - adding or removing cars as the need requires (as long as the cars are where they are needed to be added).

We asked the server in the dining car how long ridership had been down and she said just this past week - that up to then, train travel had been going well.

Carl took a picture of his breakfast. It was good!

He told me that he had reserved the whole dining car for our private use...

After breakfast...

We didn't make use of the shower facilities on the train, but I went to check them out...

Not bad... not as nice as in the lounge though!

Dressing area.

We are enjoying our trip, though one of the things that we have heard about train travel is that you get to talk with other passengers and the crew. In fact, in the dining car, I think they usually seat you with other people -- so the two of us would have been seated with another couple or a single. But... now they are only seating people at every other table and certainly not seating folks together who are not traveling together.

DC to Chicago

Tuesday afternoon (about 4pm) we left DC's Union Station on our way to Chicago, arriving about 8:30am on Wednesday, March 18 at Chicago's Union Station.

As we were waiting for other customers to board our train, I saw a couple who came with their bicycles (only the woman is in the picture). They were in our coach car, so I think they traveled all the way to Chicago. I heard them speaking, I think, Portuguese.

Much of our westward journey was along the Potomac River

At Martinsburg, WV, the old train station is an interesting round building.

 It seems that it may be open for tours at times: https://www.themartinsburgroundhouse.com/

There was an "Observation Car" just in front of our coach class car -- nice big windows and ceiling windows - seats looking out on the view.

We sat there for a while until it got too dark to be able to easily see out. Behind Carl, still within this car, there were also dinette type facilities. This was on the second floor of the train car. On the first floor was the "Cafe" where customers could purchase food and beverage.

Since we had stopped in the lounge in D.C., we had gotten refills on our water and some snacks. We had brought snacks from our RV, so we didn't purchase anything on the train. Normally we would not have qualified to visit the lounge in DC as we were not in sleeping car accommodations on the DC to Chicago leg, but they said that since we had sleeping car reservations for the Chicago to Dallas leg, and since the lounge was not crowded, they let us visit.

I knew that the train had both a Cafe and a Dining car. I also knew that we would have food provided for us when we were in the sleeper car accommodation. What I did not know was that we could not access the Dining car unless we were in the sleeper car... so only the Cafe was available to us for snacks and drinks.

A view of our coach class seats - the seats on the train from Richmond to DC seemed to be more comfortable, but we weren't in them as long. These seats became VERY hard as the hours went on and we tried to sleep in them!!! They did have a part that came up and made a flat surface out from the seat, and then a foot rest came out from the seat in front, and the back reclined (more than coach seats on an airplane) but... it was *not* comfortable for sleeping. We figure that we each got about 5.5 hours of sleep...

The coach seats (and the observation car seats) are on the second floor - so when we first got onto the train, we had to go up these very narrow very steep stairs...

I was carrying my carry-on and trying to go up the stairs and saying, "Oh my goodness..." thinking, "can people really get up these steps?"

Then the steps turned the corner and more steps up... I was still saying, "Oh my goodness, oh my goodness..."

This is a view looking down the steps from the seating level. The restrooms were on the first floor, so... we made a few trips down the steps during the journey!

The front of the train that we came in on - in Union Station in Chicago

Since we had visited the lounge in DC and knew that we were "entitled" to visit it before our trip with sleeper car reservations, we found the "Metropolitan Lounge" in Chicago's Union Station. They had limited food services due to Covid-19, but we got coffee (Carl) and water (Patti) and a nice place to sit and wait.

Carl found out that there were showers available in the rest rooms. We knew that the sleeping car accommodations would include shower facilities, but I (Patti) decided that I would prefer taking a shower in a non-moving vehicle...

The shower was *very* nice. The lounge provided towel and washcloth and body wash, shampoo, and conditioner in the shower.

Carl's youngest son, Steve, lives in Chicago, not too far from the train station, so Carl contacted him to see if it might be possible to meet up with him. He said that there were no restaurants open, so invited us over to their apartment for lunch. As it turned out, Carl's older son, Scott, had the events that would have kept him in the northeast suburbs get cancelled, so he contacted Carl in the morning on Wednesday and suggested that he would also join us for lunch. He offered to pick us up at the train station and take us to Steve and Shay's apartment.

Grand waiting room in Chicago's Union Station

We had a great lunch of pizza and salad from Lou Malnati's!

It was rainy, but we got to see a view of the city skyline from the rooftop of Steve and Shay's building.

With Scott in the penthouse lounge...

With Steve and Shay in their kitchen...

With Steve and Scott in Steve and Shay's kitchen.

I was glad to get to meet Scott and Steve and Shay. We were so grateful to have the opportunity to visit with family, even though we were only in Chicago for about 5 hours! Many thanks to Steve and Shay for hosting us!!!

Scott drove us back to Union Station (many thanks, Scott!!!) and we went back to the Metropolitan Lounge to await being called for our train.

Some of the stops on our "Texas Eagle" route

So, now we're in our sleeper car accommodations, traveling through Illinois as we are on our way to Dallas. Carl has tried out the upper berth to "close his eyes for a few minutes" and pronounced it very comfortable. We're both looking forward to a better night's sleep than last night!