Good thing I took an earlier train
I normally leave my house at 6:30 to catch the 6:42 train. My mom had surgery last week and has been laid up, so I've been driving myself and parking at the train station. If I leave right at 6:30 I can get one of the last parking spaces (it's utterly ridiculous that parking runs out at 6:30.) Well, yesterday I left the house at like 6:32 and all the parking had been taken. There's a municipal parking lot a couple blocks down, so I went there. There was plenty of parking, so I parked in space 52. There were signs that only spaces 1-16 were pay parking, other signs that said "Parking for Lombard residents only," and since I'm a Lombard resident (with a village sticker on my windshield) I felt confident parking there. I went to the pay box, and all the slots for spots 17 and above were blocked with another sign "For Lombard Residents Only." Well, I tried. When I got back at night I had a ticket on my windshield. $25! I am totally fighting it!
So I left at 6:20 this morning, got a spot near the train, and even managed to catch the earlier 6:32 train. Normally that gets me in early enough to grab some breakfast. But this morning they announced that the trains might be delayed "due to some police activity ahead." At Oak Park, the last suburb before entering the City of Chicago, they announced that no trains were going beyond Kedzie Avenue (a train stop on the west side of Chicago). And since Chicago's subway line meets up with the suburban commuter train at Oak Park, we had to get off the train and transfer over to the subway.
Now what I don't get is that the commuter train stops only at Kedzie after Oak Park and then goes direct to the Loop (Chicago's downtown area), catching the 6:32 train gets me in to the office by 7:45. The subway, however, makes 13 stops (9 of them before Kedzie). So why (or how) did I manage to get to the office this morning at 7:40? Even with the chaotic transfer of hundreds of people from the train to the subway?
And even more ironic was that a guy I work with was on that 6:42 train I normally take, and he said it was the first train to make it through; he didn't have to transfer at Oak Park.
[Edit:] I was having lunch today across the street from my office at the State of Illinois Building. Suddenly, woop! woop! woop! It freaked me out so much because there was no announcement, and a few people got up to leave. Then, after about ten seconds of woop! an announcement came on, and said that they were testing the emergency alarm system. This was my first experience since being back from Brazil that smacked of terrorist trouble, and it was quite jarring.
So I left at 6:20 this morning, got a spot near the train, and even managed to catch the earlier 6:32 train. Normally that gets me in early enough to grab some breakfast. But this morning they announced that the trains might be delayed "due to some police activity ahead." At Oak Park, the last suburb before entering the City of Chicago, they announced that no trains were going beyond Kedzie Avenue (a train stop on the west side of Chicago). And since Chicago's subway line meets up with the suburban commuter train at Oak Park, we had to get off the train and transfer over to the subway.
Now what I don't get is that the commuter train stops only at Kedzie after Oak Park and then goes direct to the Loop (Chicago's downtown area), catching the 6:32 train gets me in to the office by 7:45. The subway, however, makes 13 stops (9 of them before Kedzie). So why (or how) did I manage to get to the office this morning at 7:40? Even with the chaotic transfer of hundreds of people from the train to the subway?
And even more ironic was that a guy I work with was on that 6:42 train I normally take, and he said it was the first train to make it through; he didn't have to transfer at Oak Park.
[Edit:] I was having lunch today across the street from my office at the State of Illinois Building. Suddenly, woop! woop! woop! It freaked me out so much because there was no announcement, and a few people got up to leave. Then, after about ten seconds of woop! an announcement came on, and said that they were testing the emergency alarm system. This was my first experience since being back from Brazil that smacked of terrorist trouble, and it was quite jarring.