wooo... wooo... wuhwooo...

i just got back from a neat trip! i took THE TRAIN from bellingham to seattle -- what a blast from the past! i think the last train ride i took was back in the late 50's when we went from st. louis to oklahoma city. trains had bigger seats back then, but today's amtrak isn't too shabby.

i met up with my girlfriend, R, then we ran errands and had lunch before heading over to the Bodies exhibit. what an intriguing bunch of stuff to see! i understand there's controversy surrounding the acquisition of some (one? all?) of the bodies, but controversy seems to be everywhere these days, so pass me the salt.

at any rate, the exhibit was very interesting, particularly the display about blood vessels! wow! pure art! and the body has 62,000 MILES of blood vessels! whooooaa...

anyhow, it was interesting, overwhelming, and educational -- i recommend it to anyone who has ever thought, "Hmmm, just how big is my liver?"

on the train ride home, it was dark outside. the seats were comfortable (two per side, unlike the airlines), the leg room, er, roomy, the food very reasonably priced, the bathrooms bigger than the airlines, and the ambiance peaceful. there were tv monitors overhead and after the movie, the train route with our position on it was posted and updated as we flew down the track, along with tidbits like, "You can see Chuckanut Bay off to the left" which i took at their word since it was dark.

the car ahead of mine was dimly lit and i could fairly clearly see two of the three monitors -- the connecting doors were clear glass with white cross-hatches. all of a sudden i noticed the monitors in that car were slowly sliding away to the left. seconds later we made a shallow turn. seconds after that the monitors slowly slid back to the right. it was hilarious and i enjoyed watching the whole scenario several more times before i arrived at my destination.

all-in-all ... grab a book and take the train!