Riding off into the Non-Sunset

We’ve come a long way since prehistoric man inventing the wheel. Native Americans learned to hollow out tree trunks to make canoes. Sailing moved from Viking longships to the Spanish Navy to Old Ironsides to German U-Boats to Royal Caribbean hotels-on-water.

Then came the horseless carriage. It was steam-powered until Henry Ford invented what we know to be the modern automobile. Now our cars have Wi-Fi, navigation systems, crumple zones, more cupholders than a movie theater and can even parallel park themselves.

Man had been obsessed with flying for a millennium until the Wright Brothers took off from Kitty Hawk, N.C., in 1903. Only about 20 years later, Charles Lindbergh made a solo transatlantic flight. By World War II FDR made this country into a war factory. He mandated we produce 50,000 aircraft for battle in Europe. We failed. Our plants made 100,000. Fast-forward to modern times and we have planes with Stealth technology, Internet connections and beds! (And if I were a rapper or NBA star I’d probably have my own!)

So tell me, why-oh-why does our rail system stink so badly? Locomotive technology, on tracks as we know them today, came to prominence in the 1820’s—and they haven’t made a lick of progress since! Oh, the trains are pretty now; they have electronic voices and maps and ergonomic seats. But putting our fancy new trains on our old ass tracks is like putting wagon wheels on Ferrari. If there’s a cloud in the sky they are slowed to a halt, like a baseball game.

Name me one instance when it rains or snows that you are not delayed on the LIRR, Metro North, New Jersey Transit, Path or Subway? You can’t. Because they suck! Every … single … time it rains the trains are delayed. In nearly 200 years we have not developed the technology to make our trains capable of running on wet tracks, yet there are disposable underwater cameras? I had a friend who dropped her cell phone in the toilet and it was still working the next day. Sure it smelled like piss, but it made calls!

There are major delays on the LIRR today, as I write this, at 4 p.m. on Monday. What is the cause of such delays? A track fire. That’s right, a fucking track fire. Fire! On the tracks! In the middle of the pouring rain! How the FUCK does that happen?? It’s as baffling to me as the popularity of Justin Bieber. It’s like farting out the smell freshly baked cupcakes. Some things should just not happen.

This is just great, because I know, when I leave work here today, I’ll be stuck on an overcrowded, wet, slippery subway, where someone will inevitably sneeze all over me, and I’ll have a woman’s bag jabbing me in the ribs and I won’t be able to finish my book because I won’t be able to lift my arms. So I will prepare for this by doing two things: A) Putting on my iPod and B) making sure I look really pissed off.

Oh, don't worry, it comes naturally to Mr. Sinister.