Saturday, 15 November 1997 – Portland, OR

Then it was the Emeryville train station for several hours, waiting for the late Coast Starlight. The last game of the World Series was on—Indians and Marlins—and I had to listen to it there in that very nice train station—on my little transistor radio that thankfully Mom had given me before I left Sandusky. It went into extra innings—a great game, but then the Indians lost, and all the redneck Marlins fans were all happy, but not really happy, because they didn’t give a fuck about baseball, and just were happy because the Marlins are from the South and so are they, and no stock car racing was occurring at the moment.

Then the train was the most annoying train ride ever—it started out OK, but—the romance of train travel is starting to wear off—and Heather and I were unfortunate enough to get the dreaded “snoring coach.”