The Metra from my neighborhood to Ogilvie takes 15 minutes. The El takes an hour.
Metra, for our convenience, has hourly trains to Ogilvie today, a couple blocks from Union Station.
Except that ONE damn hour when I need it. It skips straight from 11:10 (arriving 11:25) to 1:10. My train leaves Union at 2:15. So I can either leave obscenely early, and then cool my heels for THREE HOURS at Union, or leave late and run a very real risk that any Metra delay at all will make me miss my train.
Or leave somewhat-less-obscenely early (by all of a half-hour) and spend an hour getting there. With twice as much walking (about half a mile) at the end of the trip. With a very large suitcase.
Weather is iffy enough that I may not know about travel delays until after I’ve left. It may or may not be freezing rain when I’m walking to Union; it’s supposed to sometime today, just no one knows when.
[stoopid question]Are you sure there isn’t a mistake on the schedule? It’s happened to me on the Metro North (a line out of NYC) before. Might be worth a quick phone call.
It was fine enough… took the earlier train, took my sweet time walking from Ogilvy to Union, had way more than enough time to wait in line at the ticketing kiosk, and cooled it in the waiting lounge for a couple hours. At least the train left on time this year (it very much did NOT last year, and the delay wasn’t posted until just before I got to Union); and everyone in the lounge was fairly cheerful.
Of course it’s a weak rant. I was venting. The world wasn’t coming to an end; I was inconvenienced. Not worth deploying an army, but sometimes it’s just helps to bitch a little.
Next up… why the return trip can’t have a more reasonable departure time. 5:14am. No wait, 6am. No wait, 6:30am. No wait, 7:15am. No wait…
