Trekking? Amtraking!

Last week I had the opportunity to take the Amtrak from Washington, DC to Shelby, MT (the conductor told me it's nick name is Shelberia, oh train humor, you kill me!)
I got a variety of responses when I told people how I was getting back from DC. Everything from, "It's like you're going to Hogwarts!" (you know who you are...) to "The train? Who rides the train? That's so antiquated." I do obviously ... alright, I have now.
I didn't quite know what to expect from this experience, I assumed it'd be somewhat similar to taking the plane just a different view. I was delightfully surprised by so many aspects of my trip back to Canada. How un-plane like the whole experience was.
Don't get me wrong, I love flying. I'll take flying any day of the week over driving. However with all the safety measures they have in place now, it's taken a little of the joy out of it for me.
I met tons of new people on my trip, played games, napped repeatedly, saw a new city at my exchange point, ate some decent food, read a few books, saw the upper part of the U.S. from a different perspective, took endless pictures of random things/people/places ...People on trains seem to view travel differently; maybe cause no one is in a rush to get anywhere. Being on a rush while traveling by train would be ... ridiculous in the extreme. By the time we pulled into Shelby, MT we were nearly 7 (SEVEN) hours behind schedule because of various train maintenance issues. How many complaints did I hear the entire 56 hours in transit? One. By a lady simply concerned she'd miss her connection way further down the line. Everyone seemed to take it in stride.
The only down sides I found were:
1) The fumes. Every time we'd make a stop, I could almost taste the trains diesel fumes. Nasty.
2) I don't think the bathrooms got cleaned. Ever. Which forced this "slightly" neurotic person to have mild panic attacks every time I realized I'd drank too much water (again). Dude, the air on the train was dry there was no alternative!

I'd do it again without hesitation. I may even be willing to fork over the extra $$ to get a bedroom ... maybe. If only for the showers they have available to them.

Flounder. Not the Fish.

Having a space of my own is a pretty novel experience.
Scratch that.
I can't exactly claim that the space I speak of is strictly my own as I have two babies.Alright! They aren't "exactly" babies; but they are MY babies and I can call 'em anything I want. Babies, Punks... My DNA, my prerogative.

As I was saying, my own(ish) space.

When I came up to Canada to tie up loose ends, find my wits end and fall ON my "end" (no, I didn't come with the intention of falling on said end ...repeatedly ... but you gotta accept the knocks as they come in these parts) I had no thought out plan as to what was going to happen "next" I was just glad I was in the "now".
So when the opportunity came up to move into an apartment in the same town as my siblings I grabbed it with glee. Not realizing I didn't remember what I've done with my evenings for the twelve years. Or not fully coming into the knowledge that the majority of my evenings were spent cleaning up a huge house, doing laundry, small upkeep projects, lounging in my yard ... none of which you need to or can do in an apartment that is 1/8 of the size of the place you've come from, doesn't belong to you, doesn't have laundry facilities on site and is WAY too cold to be doing any kind of lounging.
Unless you're in bed under three layers of blankets.
And that's not lounging. That's self preservation.

I find myself floundering around trying to figure out what people do with their spare time. I don't enjoy tv unless someones watching it with me (laughing alone strikes me as sad), I can only play so many games of Solitary, hanging around FB only entertains for like thirty minutes, I can only shower and do my hair so many times, taking self portraits with various electronics then adjusting the images is fun ... but doesn't take up nearly enough time, I'm not "crafty" and have no interest in taking up scrap booking/needle point/sewing, books ... books have lost their glamor a while ago - I need to get into a different mind set.

I wonder if this is something I can research. I like to research.
Let the fun and games begin!

Fresh Start

I've made some major changes in the last couple months and honestly ... my heart just wasn't in my old blog.
It made me feel weighed down.
Hesitant about what to write.
Uncertain which direction to take it.
Frustration at the presentation.

So what did I do?
What any hot blooded CanAm does, toss it all and start fresh.
It's the way things are done in "rich countries" doncha know?

For those who has stumbled upon me by accident, by cyber stalking or by chance here's a short description of me (actually, it may not be that short. I'm rather wordy). In my words obviously, since I ain't gonna be asking anyone else. You never know what those crazies will say!... huh, isn't that funny. I went to give a description and my mind kind of froze. Like, "Uuuuuhhhh... who's going to be reading this? What adjective shall we start with? If I say "kind" does that mean I think I'm MOST kind? More kind than say, intelligent?" Thoughtful. Patient. Generous. Hot tempered, easily cooled. A little obsessed with cleanliness. Gypsy blooded, slow footed. Impatient. Contradictory. Argumentative. Agreeable.

I'm not sure what this is going to be yet. A monolog of brain matter. A general accounting. Maybe both. Let's take a ride and see where we go.