Train Thoughts

I’m sitting in the Wurzburg Haupbahnhof (“main train station”) typing on a wide table in our ICE train. Another distinct advantage to the Eurorail pass: you can ride where the Bayern or Schoenes Wochenende passes won’t let you. ICE (“Inter-City-Express”) trains are like first class jets with less turbulence. I snapped a pic of Tiff so you can see what it’s like whenever my picture page goes back up. A project for when I get back to the states is to take all these pictures and link them directly to the text (probably with a cute little icon, a footnote number, or just an “*”) so you can click and see just what I’m talking about. Essential graphics are, of course, going to be scaled and integrated.
Ambitious, aren’t I?
It’s good to have a project.
So, we’re rolling now. How refreshing! I’m sitting on a train, typing away on a new laptop while scenery goes by. This is a mode I could get used to, because everything out the window brings up another thought or memory. The Wurzburg Hbh, for example, had a series of H-shaped roves in a series just like the Bauhaus Archive, which you can read about in my Berlin entry. A monastery we just went by had beautiful, if somewhat dead, English gardens. And the snowy countryside around Regensburg was like something out of a postcard.
I’m hoping it’s still like that when I get back. I’ll snatch up granddad’s Minolta (thank you Granddad!) and use up a few rolls of film. The Dom in snow should be quite a sight.
We actually have the laptop here for a practical purpose, too. Tiff and I are working on our Humanities essays. Hers is outlined, mine is still in the formative stages, which is to say that I’m putting it off for another few hours. Isolation in All Quiet on the Western Front, Heart of Darkness, and maybe Faust just don’t strike me right now.
Let me rephrase that.
They strike me alright, but in the mood I’m in now the paper would not turn out well.
I’ve had a lousy morning. I got up and piddled around, happy to have an hour left to just toss my things into the bag and head on to the train station at a leisurely pace. I went down to Tiff’s room to grab my daypack and she’s flittering about tossing things into her bags. I settle down onto my laptop, which now lives in her room since we’re only supposed to have one PC per room. About 10 minutes into my email run and msuracers visit, she’s asks if I’m ready yet. I mutter a mostly, and am told to make it a now. I shove everything into my pack and we race out the door. I’m in my big puffy blue coat, so I nearly fall down the stairs trying to get my backpack on. Halfway to the Bahnhof I lose my hat, a nice little gray ski-cap that had kept my head nice and warm for several weeks now. I’d pulled it off quickly because I was roasting in my artic gear, despite the snow falling around me. I’m not really sure where it went from there. I thought it was in a pocket, but it must have fallen onto a street corner. Not that I realized at the time. It took me until the train to check all my pockets and realize I didn’t have it.
Wow, we just passed a frozen over creek. It has to be seriously cold out there, even if there is no snow here.
So I once I was on the train I just collapsed into a cozy snooze. An “Urban dressed” German in front of us had his headphones loudly blasting Eminem, so my nap wasn’t exactly peaceful, but at least it was something.
I wouldn’t be so tired if I hadn’t stayed up all night last night, but yesterday was such a good day that I couldn’t just come home and crash. I tried to tell you about it then, but I couldn’t really find the words, so I’ll split off into a separate post and tell you about it now.