I was climbing the subterranean Grand Central ramp that stretches from Oyster Bar to up by the 6 train entrance. (Uh, ever wonder why we have to go from underground to ground level just to go back to underground level?). A new song began on my iPod, “Gigantic” from the Pixies. Suddenly it had this strong undercurrent of bagpipes.

Bagpipes? My iPod Classic had been a bit wonky lately; what it says is the Hold Steady track “Constructive Summer” is actually Talking Heads’ “And She Was.” Had the iPod unwittingly given me a Pixies-Flogging Molly mash-up, bagpipes dissonantly sitting upon Kim Deal’s wail?

I ripped off my earbuds and the bagpipes got stronger; it wasn’t my iPod.

I flashed back to stumbling along that pedestrian district that heads down to the bay in Galway, a pre-kids trip with lots of pubs, a guy with a pockmarked face, greasy hair and desperate change cup filling the whole of the lane with “Foggy Dew” on his ‘pipes. Another flashback, a rugby match against Bayonne, city of my matriarch’s arrival on a ship from Ireland, pipes playing at some pitch along the river just before kickoff.

Where was it coming from?

Instead of hitting the subway, I banged a left near the Swatch store and went to the main Grand Central hall. Could it be a lone MTA-sanctioned musician, filling the entire train station with his ‘pipes, sounds bouncing off the stone ceilings, walls, floor?

I saw nothing. I headed toward where the noise was coming from, around Track 23. I looked up, I looked down the passage to points north.

Nothing.

I gave up the ghost, with work and all to go to. I went through Vanderbilt Hall to the exit. Scores of policemen stood in their dress blues. A banner saluted the MTA police.

Surely, the pipers were about to make a grand entrance.

I figure I’m about due for a good freakish train experience.

Seriously, it’s been some time since I’ve had a good eyewitness incident to blog about: a rider-conductor tiff, a rider-rider spat, snakes on a train, whatever it might be.

So sorry for the lame posts of late. I mean, yesterday morning, I overheard two ladies in their 50s–they were on board when I got on in Hawthorne and they looked like daytrippers–discussing an intervention one of them hosted for a troubled family member. Of course, when I heard that, the iPod was turned off, and then the nearest ear stripped of earbud. But I only caught the tail end of the tale–the intervention ended up working out OK, which isn’t a lot of fun. The daughter seems healed.

Two days ago, I saw the Buffalo Wing Man–the only person to get an Open Letter To: from TJ more than once. He spreads his awful Buffalo Wing dinner all over a four seater, dipping those wings in the dip, and–the worst part of it–leaving the whole greasy, bony mess for the help to clean up. Then he gets off in Hawthorne and yaps on his cell about his fantasy baseball squad.  Two days ago, it was peanut butter slathered all over a bagel, and a bright yellow Zaro’s bag full of refuse left behind. Jerk.

Then, last night, I broke from my very typical 5:27 or 5:46 routine to take the 7:22 after a few going-away drinks with a co-worker–now an ex-coworker. (Unlike the other half dozen going-away drinks things I’ve attended with a co-worker the past 12 months, this guy actually left on his own, for another job. Maybe it’s a sign.)

Man, was that 7:22 extraordinarily packed. You couldn’t even really get one of the good standing spots in the vestibules, which comfortably stand four. It reminded me of the dark days of commuting, before Metro-North figured out how to corral the Slippery Rail scourge.

I stood back by the conductor booth and 1 3/4-seater area, and had enough room to flip open the new Greater New York section of the Journal. Some tool got on at 125th, cellphone a-blazing. (Here’s a Word of the Week I could use some help with–people who enter the train yapping loudly on their phones.) The guy stood right across from me in the narrow passageway, meaning I could read the paper about six inches from my face. I gave him the look and he smartly moved back up against the door between cars.

So, if you’re still reading, for some reason, TJ obviously has not had much to blog about this week. I’m aiming for the 5:27, so if you plan on acting nutty on the train tonight, please be on that train.

The 5:27 home after a long day of work.

I board late, as usual, and search for the best option among a shrinking pool of aisle seats.

I conduct a little Spatial Profiling and grab a seat next to a Typical Commuter: White male, 40, black hair, pinstriped gray trousers. He’s got a Blackberry in one hand, a giant Foster’s oil can in the other, and a David McCullough book about the Brooklyn Bridge on his thigh. The book will remain on his thigh, unread, for the duration of my ride.

My seatmate is listening to his iPod. Within moments of settling in, so am I. His is on a bit loud; I can hear it over my own. So I turn up the volume a bit.

We ease off the platform, and his iPod is really freakin’ loud. I switch for something louder and buzzier, some Franz Ferdinand, to drown out the Fremix.

Suddenly, his iPod gets even louder when a new song comes on. I can almost make out the tune despite having functioning earbuds wedged in my ears; it’s a familiar melody that calls to mind acid washed jeans, mullets and the cheapest beer you could find.

The guy finally acknowledges the aural pollution and goes to turn his music down. As he hits his touch screen, it lights up the name of the artist and track: “Oh, Sherry”, by former Journey-man Steve Perry.

Good Lord, how can someone actually be listening to “Oh Sherrie”–that synthy pop treacle that ruled the 1984 music charts the way Idi Amin ruled Uganda–by choice? I can see if you’re stuck in Gitmo, and the former Administration is cranking it into your cell in an effort to coerce you into giving up vital terrorist intell. But this man was not imprisoned in Gitmo, he was a practitioner of free will. [Editor’s Note: I vaguely remember WBAB doing its own version of one of those July 4 weekend Top 500 countdowns that always saw “Stairway to Heaven” win. I believe “Oh Sherry” won the WBAB countdown. WBAB didn’t do it for long, for obvious reasons.]

No amount of amber nectar from a Foster’s oil can could make “Oh Sherrie” palatable.

I had plans for a few pints in the city with Big Jim, in from Ireland, and the reports of a blizzard weren’t about to keep me home. I got Little G to bed on the early side and set out on foot for the 7:53 train Saturday night with the bare essentials: the day’s Times, a flashlight, the old iPod Nano (easy to slip into a pocket when hitting the bars), and a Beck’s for the ride.

The snow had just started picking up momentum and was starting to stick. It blew hard on my face and instantly adhered to my pea coat.

Along the sidewalk on Elwood, I encountered another man braving the rough mid-Westchester night. I see him around our tiny downtown and the train station a lot; I believe he’s mentally impaired and he enjoys smoking butts with the cabbies.

“Good evening Sir!” he said cheerily, extending a gloved hand.

I returned the good evening and hand.

“Be safe!” he warned. “I hear we’re in for rough weather.”

I felt the rough weather pelt me in the face. We wished each other well and went our respective ways.

I saw bodies spill out of the soon to open Punta Cana Spanish-Portuguese restaurant on Elwood, the biggest addition to the tiny main drag since the liquor store opened earlier this year. I figured it was construction workers, but as I got closer, saw that the restaurant was actually open for business. It’s a wee place: three or four tables and a counter. But they had a few customers on this snowy night.

The 7:53 was right on time, and chugged through the arctic blast with ease. I was warm and safe in Central Bar, Sierra Nevada in hand, in 55 minutes.

Big Jim was late, as usual. I told him up front my plans to be on the 12:06 so I’d have a fighting chance to keep up with Little G and Little Miss C Sunday. He looked out the window, the snow blowing sideways, the drifts piling up, people entering the bar looking like snowmen.

“I don’t think you’re getting home tonight,” he said.

A few at Central Bar and a few more around the corner at Black and White, and two or three more “You’re never getting home tonight”s from Big Jim.

Midnight was beckoning. I said good bye and was lucky enough to score a cab at 10th and 4th in the East Village. The cabbie had been off-duty but saw a white mark that he figured was going in the direction of his home in Queens. En route to Grand Central, he peppered me with questions about Westchester, Long Island, good colleges, etc. He was Bangladeshi. I gave him an extra buck for being personable.

I harbored faint concern about what Big Jim had said about the trains; was I to be stuck in Grand Central all night? I stocked up on supplies at Hudson News: water, a Daily News, a giant Fast Break candy bar, and jumped on the 12:06.

She started out on time and seemed to have no issue with the snow whatsoever. Indeed, the 12:06 pulled into Hawthorne around 12:47–a minute earlier than scheduled. I was going to text Big Jim to tell him how woefully wrong he was, but was too lazy to do it.

The snow was blowing around like mad. I pulled my hat low over my eyes, cued up my flashlight, and headed for home.

It could’ve been much, much worse. Look at these tales of woe from today’s NY Times:

Helena E. Williams, the president of the Long Island Rail Road, reported that about 50 riders were stranded, shuttled and towed aboard four trains in a seven-hour ordeal that began at Pennsylvania Station at 1:17 a.m. and ended at Ronkonkoma at 8:45 a.m. In between there were snowdrifts, ice, an engine breakdown and no heat on a three-hour stretch going backward from Wyandanch to Farmingdale.

And in New Jersey, passengers aboard a train and a bus, both operated by NJ Transit, had a close call at Pennsauken on Saturday night. Officials said a bus with 26 passengers stalled on snow-covered railroad tracks as the train with 38 passengers approached. The bus riders were evacuated moments before the vehicle was struck by the train.

“There was a terrific impact noise,” said Ralph Mintel, a passenger on the train, “and the rail car rocked violently from side to side. I feared that we had derailed, and that the car was going to tip over.” He was relieved to learn that no one was killed and only two people aboard the train were injured.

A Hampton jitney left New York City at 9:30 p.m. Saturday with fewer than a dozen passengers and got to Southampton at 6:30 a.m. Sunday, a nine-hour adventure in the storm.
 

–Joe Lunievicz

Salt and Pepper

There’s a poster above me.

It’s hot outside, cool inside. The AC in this car is working. It’s too crowded to be able to read and I’m tired, swaying a little with the motion of the car.

We’re somewhere under the East River, just past Roosevelt Island. I’m on my way in to work.

The poster says:

Assaulting MTA NYC Transit Subway Personnel is a felony punishable by up to 7 years in prison. NYS Penal Code 120.05

The first word, Assaulting, is twice the size of the rest of the words. The number 7 is in red. The Penal Code information is in smaller print.

You’d think this wouldn’t have to be stated. Isn’t it obvious that assaulting anyone would be a bad thing? I guess the MTA personnel need some extra protection. As if they’re saying, “In case you didn’t know, assaulting this guy over here, in the booth, behind the bullet proof, inch thick plexi-glass, is simply not okay.”

Seven’s the lucky number – or up to seven is. Perhaps swinging and missing only gets you six months but connecting and battering get’s you the full seven. I’m not a lawyer so I don’t know what the parameters are. So… get pissed off at the MTA folks, whether they’re in the booth giving you your subway card, driving the train, or putting rat poison on the tracks – but don’t assault them. Or assault them and don’t get caught. Or get caught and pay the price.

I guess those are your only three options — if you were thinking about assaulting an MTA official.

I wasn’t, but now I am. And just what does that mean with regard to the effectiveness of this poster in preventing assault?

This is when you know it’s time to put the ear buds in and think of something else.

–Joe Lunievicz

We’d lamented the demise of the Westchester section of the NY Times, as it was always a good source of local news, much of it transit-related, because all we truly care about in the ‘burbs is a smooth ride to the city each day.

Well, the replacement for the Sunday Westchester section (not to mention the Jersey, the Long Island, the City, etc.) is the all-encompassing Metropolitan section. And the most recent one actually has two interesting stories about local transit–three, if you include the surprisingly moving Lonelyhearts subway poetry culled from Craigs List.

One story looks at the weird conundrum of train stations with long waiting lists for spots, juxtaposed with the fact that lots of people are laid off and no longer need their parking spots, at least for the time being. So there are long lists of people who cannot park at the station in their town, while spots are unoccupied because a permit holder is sitting at home, sending out resumes for jobs that will eventually get him or her back into the city.

Our fearless forefather Robert Meehan is quoted in the story.

Roughly 100 of the 573 spaces at the parking lot in Dobbs Ferry were free at 3 p.m. on a recent Tuesday. Over in Hartsdale, Stephanie Kavourias, executive director of the public parking authority, figures that about 90 of the station’s 900 permit spaces are empty on an average day now. And Robert Meehan, the supervisor of the town of Mount Pleasant, which includes Valhalla (191 spaces) and Hawthorne (355), has also seen growth in vacancies.

“I went down to Valhalla on a recent Monday and there were 30 spaces empty,” Mr. Meehan said. “Before the recession it would always be full.”

Some are pushing to allow permit holders to rent their permits (and spots) until they need them once again.

Elsewhere in the section, Timesman Ray Rivera offers an offbeat solution to the modern annoyance known round these parts as Fremix–the unwanted overspill of noise emanating from a fellow train riders’ iPod.

I sat down in the first car, empty but for about half a dozen people, including, of course, two teenagers blasting iPods. Each was playing different music, and the overflow collided in a discordant shrill that flooded every cubic inch of the car like a swarm of angry mosquitoes.

I sat two seats away and pulled out my crossword puzzle for the half-hour ride to Inwood. But those mosquitoes. … I gave the boys a stern look to telegraph my annoyance. They ignored me. Finally, I said, “Excuse me,” tapped my index finger to my earlobe, pointed to their headphones, and pantomimed, “Can you turn it down, please?”

“Go sit somewhere else,” one of the boys said.

“You can hear it through the whole car,” I said. Nothing.

Then Rivera gets clever.

Finally, a bit of subterranean poesy–with a System of a Down reference to boot–to brighten your otherwise unspectacular Tuesday.

metal train guy

i dont use this craigslist thing.

i was sitting right next to you.

long awesome Shavo style beard (soad).

you had headphones on.

chain around your neck.

backpack. big guy.

i had some tattoos.

my arm was touching your leg.

you got off at 42nd street and yes!

you looked back at me for a millisecond …

and i saw a very sad face.

im sad too.

[image: LACityBeat.com]

Geez, what a morning.

My rear wheel mud flap thing (what the heck do they call those things on bikes?) fell off a few weeks ago when I was jamming my trusty Trek into the back of our car after The Missus was kind enough to pick my sorry ass up on a rainy day. In the process, I knocked my rear mud flap off, and kept forgetting to put it back on until moisture sprayed my nether regions one day on the way home last week.

I haven’t been happy with the mud flap since I bought it. It’s affixed with a loose velcro strap and just doesn’t stay put. It’s called “Defender”, which strikes me as sort of funny, seeing as it really doesn’t “defend” shit.

Anyway, with rain on the pavement and in the forecast, I strapped the thing on this morning, and it just wouldn’t stay. I had seven, then six, minutes, to get to Hawthorne station, so I put it on as best I could and hoped for the best.

It lasted until the straightaway along Elwood, where my faithful “Defender” flopped into the road. Fortunately no one was coming (how is it that no one is coming on a town’s main drag at 8:40 on a Monday morning?), so I stopped and rode the rest of the way with the Defender in my hand. (Mind you, I didn’t have any rain splatter onto my hand the rest of the way.)

I was cutting it close for the 8:43. As I pulled into the station, the northbound train strolled in. As I arrived at the bike rack, the 8:43 came into view. I didn’t have time to lock up either my helmet or my stupid Defender, and bolted up the stairs to catch the 8:43, still wearing my helmet, slaloming through the former riders of the northbound train, yelling “Train to catch!” and head-butting the stragglers with my helmet.

Mercifully, the train, being a minute and a half early, sat on the platform long enough for me to board.

The misery didn’t end there. The crummy 8G iPod that I have not been thrilled with since I bought it in July was locked up on Green Day’s “American Idiot.” (Indeed, it couldn’t been worse. It could’ve been Black Eyed Peas.). Only my 12th attempt to reboot it freed it up from post-punk perpetuity. I think I’ll be in the market for a new iPod soon, and it won’t be the Triscuit-sized Nano.

Krispy Kremes

“Hey Ya!”

Seinfeld

Grand Central Terminal

The Gap

Jeter

EZ Pass

Fenway Park

Their iPod

Matt Lauer

Gramercy Tavern

“Caddyshack”

Paulie Walnuts

C’mon, folks–what else?

Reader Lisa, a fluent speaker of the ancient tongue of Biblese, has some suggestions and tweaks for Trainjotting’s Commuter’s Ten Commandments.

She writes:

Peace be unto you.  Please consider fixing a few grammatical errors in the commandments (corrections in all caps)

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 THY crap there.

2. Thou shalt not stare at THY 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 THY iPod volume at a reasonable level. Thou may enjoy Insane Clown Posse. We, however, do not.

If you are looking for additions, you might consider combining 2 & 3 and adding  — Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s gloves, hats, scarves, train pass, mobile device or other worldly goods.