I was trying the make the most of a monthly pass with a weekend trip to the city–a Saturday night foray into Gotham to celebrate a friend’s 40th down in Gramurray Hill.

The trip in was mostly uneventful, minus an entire train car of decked out revelers screaming “Happy birthday Jamie!” and then applauding for several seconds.

A birthday isn’t really an accomplishment worthy of sustained applause. I mean, it’s worth marking and celebrating–in fact, today happens to be the Missus’s birthday…happy birthday The Missus!. But applauding? It’s not striking out 14 in your Major League debut, or being named to the New Yorker’s Under 40 Fiction list.

The published schedule had the length of the 7:53 to Manhattan at 51 minutes. I’m quite sure they’ve added a few minutes to the trip; it used to be 48. There were no extra stops, no surprise stops in Mount Vernon West or anything like that. I guess they’re just allowing extra time for drunk kids who forget to mind the gap.

Either way, the train pulled into Grand Central well before the 51 minute mark, more like 43 minutes or so. I dumped my Times and empty Bud bottle in the respective receptacles and hit the 6 train for 28th, happy that my friend’s wife picked a bar within striking distance of Grand Central, but a little annoyed that I was doing my exact two-train commute on a Saturday.

The return trip was more eventful. I got on the 12:06 and had a smooth ride until we got to White Plains, where the train stopped somewhere in the wilds of North White at 12:42.

The girls across the aisle in front of me were engaged in a long, boozy convo. The girl on the left, heavy-set, Italian, about 22, was obsessed with the ’80s. She had leg warmers on, despite the 75 degree temps, a loose Madonna-circa-’85 tank over another top, and 15…18…20….22 cheap bracelets on her right wrist. She said she was moving to Austin to waitress and whatever else came up in Texas; she said she’d regret not doing it for the rest of her life if she didn’t give it a shot.

The train public address came on, announcing itself with a 4-note electronic jingle that the ’80s girl swore shared the same melody as Madonna’s “Holiday.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, we are being held due to police activity in Valhalla,” it said. “We’re sorry for the delay.”

The whole of the train groaned, though a car full of boozy weekenders seem to take such announcements better than the seasoned commuters. The ’80s girl engaged the guy stretched out on the seat cattycorner to her. She didn’t know him but got him to open up: He’d been in the city on a booty call, she elicited in the interrogation, and he was a bit sore. ’80s girl lapped up the details like a Pulitzer-winning reporter.

At 12:55, the PA came on again.

“It’s ‘Holiday’!” ’80s girl screamed, dancing in her seat. I turned the Flogging Molly up on the iPod Nano I’d brought for the night, due to it sliding easily into a pants pocket.

“Police activity in Valhalla,” it said. “We’re sorry for the delay. We should be moving again in a couple more minutes.”

Finally, at the stroke of 1–a full 12 minutes after we should’ve been pulling into Hawthorne–the PA came on again. More apologies, and the promise that we are “now on our way.”

In a few seconds, we were.

We pulled into Hawthorne at 1:10–22 minutes late. The station was beyond deserted, the new Hawthorne Taxi guys surely gone to bed.

I pulled a tiny keychain flashlight out of my pocket and hit Elwood. The light was weak and the button hard to press, so I pulled my Blackberry out instead. (Not that it really mattered–the streets are well-lit, and there’s nobody…nobody out in Hawthorne past 1 in the morning.)

The light of my Blackberry led the way, and got me thinking–of all the annoying iPhone apps out there, has anyone created a flashlight app? Now there’s smart use for your smartphone.

The man who works the security desk at my office.

You’re the last man I see as my daily commute concludes and my workday begins.

You’re a pleasant man, always with a warm smile and a good morning over the almost five years I’ve worked here. Some people engage you in small talk, and some ignore you, wrapped up in their Blackberrys and thoughts. I’m somewhere in the middle: always a good morning, occasionally a little baseball talk in the post-season–you like the Yankees–but not typically conversation. I was pretty sure I knew your name before we got the memo last week.

The memo.

The memo was just awful. It mentioned the terrible tragedy you suffered; multiple family members killed down south. Your children, murdered. I asked another front-desk man how you were faring the next day, and the man shook his head for a long, long time.

Late last week, someone posted a flyer about a memorial service, up in Harlem, for your family members.

I saw you back at work for the first time today. You had the smile on, but your eyes gave you away. I stopped and shook your hand, and tried to express my condolences in some meaningful way. You were gracious and told me you were taking it one day at a time. I nodded and gave a slight smile and headed over to the elevators, feeling I hadn’t said or done enough, but unsure as to what else could be said or done.

I hope you find peace. I thank you for putting on your suit and your smile and coming back to work, and for reminding me–us–that the things we complain about, the annoying train passengers and flight delays and fare hikes, are downright silly when someone else is dealing with a tragedy as deep and unthinkable as the one you’re working through.

I didn’t say enough to your face, and I’m not saying enough in this letter. There is no enough in the face of what you’re going through. I barely know you but I feel deeply for you. One day at a time, you said. I hope tomorrow is a tiny bit better than today, and so on.

Respectfully,

Trainjotting

Got to the station today, and my train was  cancelled.

Folks talking, phoning, muttering, making alternate plans. Some just waiting and staring at the puddles.

Usually in this situation I would get back on my bike and trek the mile to the Summit station hub. But I had driven to the station, on account of the rain. It was a thirty minute wait for the next train, and then unknown crowding and delays. 
 
So for some nostalgic reason, I opted for the bus. I walked a block to the bus stop, and lacking a schedule, hoped a bus would come by soon. I was joined by one other (blackberry-packing) train defector, so I felt my plan held water.

Fifteen minutes, and $9.30 later, I was aboard the packed Summit Express, and scored the last seat. It was a snug ride, but quiet. (A sign read: Cell phones for Emergency Use Only).
 
We made a few stops and took on some “standees” who were not pleased. Two guys actually got off after a few stops, to wait for the next bus. They felt it necessary to argue with the bus driver.

“Have a good day, sirs.” was the weathered bus driver’s weary retort.
 
I watched as the houses turn to highway, and soon fell asleep in the dim lights and splash of commuter traffic in the rain.

We parked at Port Authority by 8:20 a.m., and I joined the Monday walking fray.

I’m not sure how the train faithful made out after all.
 
-jerseyjim

First off, a big thanks to Straphanger Joe for stepping in to keep the site fresh in my absence.

The family vacay was great–sun, beach, and an endless supply of buffet food and cerveza in the Dominican Republic. All we needed was a decent flight home Saturday to close the happy loop.

Indeed, New York was downright besieged by nasty weather. Despite the Male Stewardess on Delta assuring me that a little wind in New York wouldn’t slow us down–the CNN on our tiny airplane TV said winds were about 68 mph at JFK–the plane banged a left as soon as we crossed the U.S. coast, and headed for a surprise stop in Atlanta instead of JFK.

Atlanta Hartsfield is legendary for its busy-ness; add untold thousands of pissed off New Yorkers, sunburned and perhaps even still sand in the crotch, rerouted from the likes of the DR, Puerto Rico, Orlando, etc., and it was just mayhem–no one knowing where to go or what to do, people cutting lines to nowhere, a jammed airport suddenly swollen like the banks of the Bronx River. The worst of human nature at its best.

Two little ones in tow, we saw no hope in crashing in the airport, and quickly booked a room at a nearby Hilton for what certainly seemed like a reasonable rate, at least by New York standards. Thank God for the Blackberry.

We checked in around 10:30 p.m. and, after getting Little Miss C and Little G to bed, I huddled over the Blackberry again from our bathroom. Calls to Delta’s main line got the immediate busy signal, but calls to the Sky Miles club (like I’m really a member) actually were met with a human. I got a nice lady named Bobbie who repeatedly attemped to get us on a flight the next day, but as soon as something became available, it was quickly grabbed.

“It’s like…moving pictures,” she said, not quite the apt metaphor but I got the picture.

She eventually got us on two flights: the Missus and Little Miss C on an 8 a.m., and me and Little G on an 8:15er.

It was close to midnight. We’d lost an hour coming from the Dominican, and were about to lose another due to daylight savings. We shut out the night’s misery and slept.

And woke up five hours later to get the kids together and get to the airport.

It was pitch black and cold behind the Hilton in Atlanta. The queue for the freakin’ airport shuttle was 50 deep, despite a pair of short buses making the run.

Our clothes better suited for the Dominican than ATL’s surprising chill, we lost about 10 minutes waiting for an available bus—an amount of time that would bite us on the ass later.

The airport was pretty much the same madhouse as the night before; massive lines for everything. We finally checked luggage and the Missus and Little Miss C bolted for their 8 a.m. flight, us boys a bit behind.

[LUGGAGE UPDATE: It’s noon on Tuesday and our three suitcases are still AWOL.]

[LUGGAGE UPDATE II: It’s 3 p.m. on Wednesday and our three suitcases are still AWOL.]

[LUGGAGE UPDATE III: No luggage as of 10:30 a.m. Thursday.]

Security was downright slammed; the girls breezed through, though, as Little Miss C was in a stroller. They made their plane.

Me and Little G, however, stuck in security, missed it by five minutes.

And so our 12 hour ordeal at Hartsfield began, as we rode the monorail to various stops (A, B, E) and attempted to go standby on various flights (9:50, noon, etc.). The standby boarding passes piled up in my pocket like spent OTB slips.

The system is more crooked than a New York governor. We were #s 17 and 18 for the 9:50 flight, then #63 and 64 for the nooner. If you think you’re prioritized because you’re traveling with a hungry, underslept 4 year old, you’re sorely mistaken.

The standby crowd gradually got to know one another as we schlepped from gate to gate like migrant workers. We got to talking with Tom from Ardsley, a 40-something who was traveling with two senior citizen females, perhaps one of them being his mother, and one of them in a wheelchair.

In between playing dinosaurs with Little G (Little Foot goes to a scary place called Meat-Eater-Ville and has a close call with a hungry T Rex called Sharptooth, played over and over and over with minor variations), we kept calling the Sky Miles hotline on the Blackberry, and were told the earliest possible flight to New York was Tuesday morning—a full 48 hours away.

Just as we’d looked into flights to Baltimore, Phila and Washington, Tom From Ardsley had tried Cincy, Detroit, anywhere that would get him and his ladies out of Atlanta and toward New York.

We realized there are two approaches to getting nasty with an airline employee. You can get just simply downright nasty with no real strategy for getting results, as we’d seen the mook dumbass in the Yankee shirt do the night before as he rammed his SmartCart (the only smart part of his operation) past a line of stranded stragglers to show an airline employee he was angry about the disorganization and lack of communication. (In fact I sat across from the aisle from that mook dumbass on the flight to the DR; when the 8:30 a.m. departure hadn’t happened by 8:35, he yelled, “It’s 8:35, c’mon, let’s go-oohhh!!”

The other approach is what Tom From Ardsley did—yell and scream but do it in a way that nudges the employee into producing some sort of gainful result.

After failing to successfully cajole an employee at the Blackberry store near our gate to let us have a courtesy charge, we bought a new charger–35 bucks, if you’re scoring at home. After a brief charge, we got on the horn again, and scored our first break in 24 hours: a flight the next morning.

Suddenly our mood lifted; I began seeing Atlanta in a positive light. Get a hotel room downtown, see the sights with Little G, drink the native Coca Cola, see where Andre 3000 grew up, be up in the air inside of 24 hours. It sounded eminently doable.

Meanwhile, Tom From Ardsley was working a Delta employee pretty hard, and got results: a flight to Newark that afternoon. Tom told me he’d told the man that me and Little G needed to get out that day too, and that we should talk to the Delta guy.

I weighed my options: the flight the next morning was OK by me, but leaving that day would be unthinkably good. I approached him, hoisting Little G up to eye level so the Delta guy could see the sadness and tiredness in the whelp’s mug.

The Delta guy was Michael Hagans, a handsome black man with a gigantic, winning smile. I told him my new pal Tom From Ardsley said he had some magic powers to get people home. Hagans smiled that megasmile and began typing.

He typed for several minutes. On cue, Little G whined about how miserable he was.

“It’s OK, Little G, I know you’re exhausted,” I said, pinching his bottom to maximize the look of despair on his face. “This man is going to do his best to help us get home.”

I may have muttered something about the kid’s emergency medication back in New York, I’m not sure.

Hagans asked if we’d go to Newark. Sure, the gals went to JFK, but they’d probably be home long before use anyway. Absolutely, I told him.

Typing. More typing. More freakin’ typing. Magic fingers coming up with the winning keyboard combination.

“OK,” said Hagans. “You’re all set. Two seats flying to Newark at 5:30 today.”

I shook Hagans’ hand, though I would’ve preferred to kiss him. Little G gave him an emphatic high five. I hugged Little G.

“Keep taking care of your family,” Hagans told me, words I may not forget for a long time.

We were over the moon. We celebrated by riding an escalator to a Heineken-branded restaurant, which was set apart from the rest of the dreaded airport. We got lunch and set about working on Little G’s airplane Lego model we’d bought at the gift shop. Buying it was alternately brilliant and foolish; it would occupy a bored, cranky four year old for hours, but it also required intense concentration to put together, and that was in short supply after the previous 12 hours’ events. Plus, I’m just not that hot at models and other spatial-relations-related exercises.

The food came, a chicken cordon bleu sandwich, a grilled cheese, some chips, Sprites. The house music played some country broad – Shania, Trisha, I dunno – covering, fittingly, Motley Crue’s “Home Sweet Home.” “I’m on my way, I’m on my way,” she twanged. “Home…sweeeeet…home.”

And, five hours and endless dinosaur role playing later, we were. I must’ve stared at my boarding pass a dozen times, making sure it was real, treating it like the golden ticket in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Our seats were in the rear of the plane, but that didn’t stop us from pushing to the front as soon as they started boarding the rich people and using the face of an exhausted four year old to our advantage. They let us on, and we locked into our seats like we’d never give them up—whether or not Delta found the nine people it needed to opt for the $600 voucher and night in Detroit to solve its little overbooking problem.

Soon as the wheels went up, Little G fell asleep. I looked down at him, curled up so tiny in his seat, and it just hit me, my mind a jumble of SmartCarts and droning Delta announcements and Monorail rides and Little G scared by the unnecessarily loud auto-flush toilets. I dropped a tear the size of a whiskey shot on my sleeping son.

PAST PLANEJOTTINGS INVOLVING DELTA HERE

From June 12, 2007

Oddly enough, Moses was on the 5:46 to Mount Kisco last night. He left these behind…which, come to think of it, is a transgression of Commandment #4.

1. Thou shalt leave the seat next to thou unadorned with books and bags until the train starts moving, thus making it available for fellow riders. Once the train starts moving, it’s OK to put thou’s crap there.

2. Thou shalt not stare at thou’s mobile device and impede the progress of the group while walking to and from the train.

3. Thou shalt emphasis the “personal” in personal music devices by keeping thou’s iPod volume at a reasonable level. Thou may enjoy Insane Clown Posse. We, however, do not.

4. Thou shalt dispose of thou’s garbage, be it beer cans, coffee cups or newspapers. C’mon, folks, this isn’t Shea Stadium.

5. Thou shalt not engage in personal grooming activities, such as flossing and nose-hair trimming, on the train. Applying makeup is OK, I guess.

6. Thou shalt not place soaking wet umbrellas and raincoats in the overhead rack so that they drip on fellow riders’ heads.

7. Thou shalt not snore. We’ll affix a Breathe-Rite strip to thine nose if we have to. Don’t think we won’t.

8. Thou shalt use thy cellphone only for essential calls, and only then with thou’s inside voice. Thou shalt not pore through thine phone book looking for people to call to kill time. Uh, read or something. There are plenty of free papers out there.

9.  Thou shalt have thy ticket ready for the conductor. Imagine thou is the conductor. How frustrated would thou be to have to wait for someone to fish their ticket or pass from their pocket? Thou knows the guy is coming.

10. Thou shalt not let thy leg, shoulder or elbow cross the invisible line in between seats. Unless, of course, thou is particularly large, in which case thou should drive.

Any others that Moses missed?

Words I never thought I’d hear.

I’d left the Blackberry on the morning train last Friday, and was too distraught to blog about it.

It was a rainy day (Oh yeah–that rainy day) and I was a bit discombobulated. Due to the rain, I had to walk to the train, and also had to wear a raincoat. As a result, I was sweating fairly profusely by the time the 8:16 pulled in.

After White Plains, I knew I’d secured my own two-seater for the remainder of the journey. As I’d been sticking to the seat back a bit, I shifted ofter to the window, which I never do.

All this is by way of an explanation as to why, when I stood up to exit the train, I was out of my routine–weird seat, coat in the overhead rack, etc. And the Blackberry was left on the seat.

I never thought I’d end up as one of those ***holes who simply can’t live without his Blackberry; in fact, I don’t even like those people, as evidenced by my barely concealed use of the word “asshole” in the previous sentence. But I was having a tough time without it–particularly while on Metro-North, and on the rare occasions when I couldn’t get Mets scores because The Missus was watching some reality show about a dozen highly emotional plus-size women fighting for some fat man. 

When I called in my loss to Metro-North’s Lost and Found office, I told the guy the Blackberry was blue, when in fact it’s black. That’s an honest mistake, as I’ve only stared at the thing, oh, 821,635,899 times. (My first Blackberry was, in fact, blue. And you know what they say–you never forget your first Blackberry.)

Subsequent trips and calls to the Lost and Found office at Grand Central revealed a lot more Lost than Found. I figured the Blackberry had gone the way of my wool scarf and the remote control car I’d bought for Little G  on a trip to the city in December–gone for good.

That is, until the call I got from Metro-North an hour ago:

“Yes, this is Metro-North Lost and Found. We want to let you know we’ve recovered your Blackberry.”

Amen.

I hate your Cellphone/PDA.

You know who you are.  You’ve got a Blackberry, iPhone or other modern device that is capable of making all sorts of obnoxious noises.

At this point, most train commuters have been socialized to speak quietly in a vestibule with your hand covering your mouth so you don’t disturb the other miserable minions marching like lemmings on their return to the ‘burbs.  In general, loud talkers aren’t a huge problem.

What’s starting to drive me nuts is the constant clicking (not the sound of the keys being pressed, but rather the external sounds associated with the keypress) as people scroll with their trackball (Blackberry) or press almost any button (IPhone).

We’ve all got pretty cool phones these days, so we’re not really interested in your phone when we stare at it.  We’re actually hoping to engage our Jedi skills and make you disappear so we can have a few minutes of peace & quiet.

Please, for the sake of your fellow commuters’ sanity, see the instructions relevant to your device below:

Blackberry:
Options>Screen/Keyboard> Trackball audible roll = MUTE

IPhone:
Settings>Sounds> Keyboard Click = OFF

Thanks!

–CTRider

As Easter approaches, we felt it was only appropriate to republish the Trainjotting “Commuter’s 10 Commandments.”

—

Oddly enough, Moses was on the 5:46 to Mount Kisco last night. He left these behind…which, come to think of it, is a transgression of Commandment #4.

1. Thou shalt leave the seat next to thou unadorned with books and bags until the train starts moving, thus making it available for fellow riders. Once the train starts moving, it’s OK to put thou’s crap there.

2. Thou shalt not stare at thou’s mobile device and impede the progress of the group while walking to and from the train.

3. Thou shalt emphasis the “personal” in personal music devices by keeping thou’s iPod volume at a reasonable level. Thou may enjoy Insane Clown Posse. We, however, do not.

4. Thou shalt dispose of thou’s garbage, be it beer cans, coffee cups or newspapers. C’mon, folks, this isn’t Shea Stadium.

5. Thou shalt not engage in personal grooming activities, such as flossing and nose-hair trimming, on the train. Applying makeup is OK, I guess.

6. Thou shalt not place soaking wet umbrellas and raincoats in the overhead rack so that they drip on fellow riders’ heads.

7. Thou shalt not snore. We’ll affix a Breathe-Rite strip to thine nose if we have to. Don’t think we won’t.

8. Thou shalt use thy cellphone only for essential calls, and only then with thou’s inside voice. Thou shalt not pore through thine phone book looking for people to call to kill time. Uh, read or something. There are plenty of free papers out there.

9.  Thou shalt have thy ticket ready for the conductor. Imagine thou is the conductor. How frustrated would thou be to have to wait for someone to fish their ticket or pass from their pocket? Thou knows the guy is coming.

10. Thou shalt not let thy leg, shoulder or elbow cross the invisible line in between seats. Unless, of course, thou is particularly large, in which case thou should drive.

Any others that Moses missed?

[image: judaica-art.com]

Oddly enough, Moses was on the 5:46 to Mount Kisco last night. He left these behind…which, come to think of it, is a transgression of Commandment #4.

1. Thou shalt leave the seat next to thou unadorned with books and bags until the train starts moving, thus making it available for fellow riders. Once the train starts moving, it’s OK to put thou’s crap there.

2. Thou shalt not stare at thou’s mobile device and impede the progress of the group while walking to and from the train.

3. Thou shalt emphasis the “personal” in personal music devices by keeping thou’s iPod volume at a reasonable level. Thou may enjoy Insane Clown Posse. We, however, do not.

4. Thou shalt dispose of thou’s garbage, be it beer cans, coffee cups or newspapers. C’mon, folks, this isn’t Shea Stadium.

5. Thou shalt not engage in personal grooming activities, such as flossing and nose-hair trimming, on the train. Applying makeup is OK, I guess.

6. Thou shalt not place soaking wet umbrellas and raincoats in the overhead rack so that they drip on fellow riders’ heads.

7. Thou shalt not snore. We’ll affix a Breathe-Rite strip to thine nose if we have to. Don’t think we won’t.

8. Thou shalt use thy cellphone only for essential calls, and only then with thou’s inside voice. Thou shalt not pore through thine phone book looking for people to call to kill time. Uh, read or something. There are plenty of free papers out there.

9. Thou shalt have thy ticket ready for the conductor. Imagine thou is the conductor. How frustrated would thou be to have to wait for someone to fish their ticket or pass from their pocket? Thou knows the guy is coming.

10. Thou shalt not let thy leg, shoulder or elbow cross the invisible line in between seats. Unless, of course, thou is particularly large, in which case thou should drive.

[The Commuter’s Ten Commandments originally ran in June.]

[photos: Jesuswalk.com, Ithinked.com, blog61.fc.2.com, geocities.com, alibaba.com]

The minute-by-minute breakdown of how the man across the aisle from me on the 6:59 spent his 33 minutes on the train.

7:01 Makes cellphone call, tells pal “I can get to White Plains in 23 minutes.” Accent hard to place, perhaps French. Pink shirt, blond hair, 45.

7:02 Loses call as the train takes off.

7:03 Stares at phone.

7:04 Takes Blackberry out of worn leather briefcase, stares at it.

7:05 Stares at both devices side by side.

7:05 Takes cash out of pocket, buys ticket.  

7:06 Stares at Blackberry.

7:07 Taps email into Blackberry.

7:08 Stares at cellphone longingly. Desperately wishes for service.

7:08 This is kind of weird. I’d been listing to the album “Pressure Chief” on my iPod. The second track comes on. It’s called, fittingly, “No Phone”.

Sample lyrics:

No phone No phone I just want to be alone today
No phone no phone
Ringing stinging
Jerking like a nervous bird
Rattling up against his cage 

7:08 Has reception, makes call. Tells pal “I left at 6:59, or maybe 6:58, and I’ll be in White Plains at 7:23.”

[Editor’s Note: He’s wrong. He gets in at 7:30.]

7:10 Hangs up phone.

7:11 Dials Blackberry

7:11:30 Stares at Blackberry, places it to ear. Checks voicemail.

7:12 “No Phone” ends.

7:13 Hangs up Blackberry.

7:14 Pulls out cellphone, tells pal, “We left at 6:59. Or 6:58.”

7:15 Checks email on Blackberry while on cell with pal.

7:17 Puts Blackberry in briefcase on seat next to him.

Over/Under on Blackbery staying in briefcase: two minutes.

7:18 Takes Blackberry out. Still on cellphone. 

7:18:30 Puts Blackberry back in briefcase.

Over/Under 1 minute.

7:19 Hangs up cell. Punches in new numbers.

7:20 Hangs up cell again.

7:20:30 Stares at cell, contemplating next move.

7:21 Makes call on cell.

7:21 Blackberry comes out. Left hand holds Blackberry, right hand holds cell.

7:22 Hangs up cell. Calls Blackberry. No answer.

7:23 Sends email on Blackberry.

7:24 Holds Blackberry and cell side by side. Seems to be thinking, if I were trapped on a desert island with only one of you, which would it be? Appears pained by the thought. Cheers visibly after reminding self it was only a hypothetical question.

7:26 Puts Blackberry away

7:27 Puts cellphone away

7:28 Fidgets: Strokes chin, runs fingers through blond hair, using window as a mirror. Straightens tie.

7:30 Takes cellphone out of bag, stares at.

7:31 Stands up, puts coat on, raises collar.

7:32 Exits at White Plains.