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Why the hell it means so much to me
On the second day of my stomach flu, my true love brought to me a ninety-five-year-old timetable for the Boston and Albany Railroad.
(Today was actually, noticeably better. I'm still more or less on liquids, but miso soup, goat's milk custard, and beef broth are a substantive improvement on ginger beer. My fever came down a full degree. I no longer feel as though my only options are active nausea or exhaustion.)
The timetable is "Corrected to June 29, 1919."![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
derspatchel picked it up on his way home from a recording session at Harvard. I needed information on B&M's Western Division for a story, but it was also just a wonderful thing to be handed among the new bottles of ginger beer and seltzer.
I shall now attempt to sleep the same number of hours as last night, only hurting much less.
(Today was actually, noticeably better. I'm still more or less on liquids, but miso soup, goat's milk custard, and beef broth are a substantive improvement on ginger beer. My fever came down a full degree. I no longer feel as though my only options are active nausea or exhaustion.)
The timetable is "Corrected to June 29, 1919."
derspatchel picked it up on his way home from a recording session at Harvard. I needed information on B&M's Western Division for a story, but it was also just a wonderful thing to be handed among the new bottles of ginger beer and seltzer.I shall now attempt to sleep the same number of hours as last night, only hurting much less.
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Hingham, Taunton, and Worcester: Hoot, Toot and Whistle
Lake Erie and Western: L.E.&W: Leave Early & Walk.
I dunno, there was this nineteenth-century meme of giving sarcastic names to railway line acronyms. I learned a bunch of different versions for a show about railroads once. They never truly leave you.
I hope the flu leaves you entirely alone soon.
I'm going to push this bottle of mandarin orange seltzer to you through the internet. Tell me if it reaches you OK.
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TWA: Try Walking Across
BOAC: Better On A Camel
I hope the mandarin orange seltzer arrives iced.
Nine
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In a similar vein, one of the old cast member chestnuts at Disney World is that EPCOT stands for Every Person Comes Out Tired. You want to believe it. You really really do.
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I hope there was one for Republic, which I associate inextricably with a jaunty, pissed-off Tom Paxton.
TWA: Try Walking Across
That I'd heard!
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That's fantastic. It makes me very happy to know that even in the nineteenth century people were as sarcastic as possible about their available forms of transit.
(What was the show about railroads?)
I'm going to push this bottle of mandarin orange seltzer to you through the internet. Tell me if it reaches you OK.
Slightly flat by the time it got through the firewall, but recognizably citric. Thank you! Next time we can try for cocoa.
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There was this whole long list of sarcastic railway acronyms. I'll try to dig up more, as I'm curious now too.
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(a) That's actually extremely cool. I didn't know there were canals in Chester.
(b) Hey, do you want to audition for the upcoming PMRP show? Summer Radio Mystery Theatre: Super Sleuths. It doesn't pay, but you don't have to dress like a tea cozy. It just struck me that radio theater might be something you would enjoy.
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Chester didn't have canals itself, but at that point I was living in Northampton, where the New Haven canal used to terminate, so I talked a great deal about that. It even had its own folk songs--they weren't that great, but they sure were canal-specific.
Canals don't get enough love. We could have our own canal travel system all over New England and New York State, if they hadn't been filled in/neglected in favor of the train lines. I dunno how they kept the canals in good condition in England as well as they've done, but I wish we had that here.
Wouldn't it be great? Live in a narrowboat in the Charles River and vacation by puttering off to New Hampshire for a week or so. Explore the Berkshires by a system of causeways, locks, pumping stations and pounds that I just made up and that run from hill to hill.
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Awesome! Sign up! Get your name in the audition times!
Wouldn't it be great? Live in a narrowboat in the Charles River and vacation by puttering off to New Hampshire for a week or so. Explore the Berkshires by a system of causeways, locks, pumping stations and pounds that I just made up and that run from hill to hill.
It would be great and you should write about it. Consider it alt-industrial history.
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Sleep well.
Nine
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Thank you! Today I went out for a movie and ate semi-solid food, so things are definitely on the upswing.
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Thank you; I am!
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Thank you. I am working on it and apparently even succeeding!
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That would be lovely. Thank you! I am very fond of the previously mentioned signal tower by North Station.
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I really like him.