Bridgeport, CT 2014 - Sister visit, the countdown begins

[taz_39]

I decided to ride the train to Bridgeport, so that I could use the "free" day to sort through my room and figure out what needs to stay/go before the end of the year. I was really hoping that my bass trombone would fit under the sink, so I cleared it out.


Totally didn't fit :( But I did reorganize under there.
.....ok, yeah, it looks just as messy as before :P


The New England scenery on this run was lovely. I didn't stay on the vestibule as it was very cold (too much time out West, I'm becoming a wuss) but sat near my window and enjoyed the view.




Jameson was traveling overland, killing time at a nearby casino. The train arrived in the yard around midnight, and he was there waiting with several other overland peeps. Three hours later the train was still not spotted. I'm guessing everyone waiting out there in the cold finally decided to hop on the train while it was sitting still for twelve hours. You're not supposed to do this, but there are situations that call for it.

So around 3am I finally got to sleep, and woke up late the next day. The yard is as I remember it; we're parked behind a Home Depot in a shopping plaza with a TJMaxx, Target, B&N, and a movie theater. Nice! But you have to cross a live track and climb through a hole in a fence to get to all of that. Circus life.


I did nothing on Tuesday except watch Game of Thrones and Trigun, laundry, cooking, and get groceries at the Target. Slow days are good days too. On Wednesday I took a 30 minute circus bus ride to the arena, and from there walked to the Bridgeport Amtrak. It took about 1.5 hours for the train to get to Grand Central.

My sister Raven works at one of the businesses near Times Square. She recently graduated from Fordam and is working hard to get her poetry published while working on her novel and trying to pay the rent.
You Go Girl!!!
Here is the link to her website, featuring several samples of her work including live readings: (CLICK HERE)


The long and short of it is, my sister is awesome. She's basically put herself through school in one of the most expensive cities on the planet, and now she's pursuing her dream of getting a full-time job as a writer. She's so determined and SO talented. I can't help but admire her :)

We had only a very short visit, grabbing dinner at Butterfield 8 after she got out of work. She had fancy grilled cheese and fries, I had fancy seared tuna and veggie rice. We each had a fancy drink too :D It was less weird for me this time that she was drinking. Hey, my younger siblings are forever young to me!! Anyway, it was great to catch up and talk about this and that.

Thursday was opening day. The Wheel act was back in (dude only cut his hand) but one of the hand balancing duos was out, so we made a few changes in the music to accommodate that. Otherwise it was an average show.

If I describe my Friday you'll be bored. It was lazy. After last week, maybe I needed extra time to destress. Let's just say I slept in and spent half the day in my pajamas. You know how it is :P The show on Friday had a decent crowd.

Saturday was a typical day. I should perhaps mention that my day got off to a great start thanks to an unexpected early morning love-tackle from Lady Meatwad, our trainmaster's adorable bulldog puppy!

(photo courtesy Eryn)

Raven and three of her friends came to the middle show! I got to show them around a bit backstage, though the backstage here is kinda lackluster, it being an older building and all. Luckily the weather was decent so the elephants were out for them to see. When we went back inside, Oscar the clown came over and picked my sister up, absolutely terrifying her. Great job Oscar!!! ;D

I'm writing this on Sunday, in between packing for a hotel stay and getting ready for work.
The internet has been craptastic in this yard, so I'm having to tether my phone to finish this post. Plus the hotel we're going to doesn't have free internet (can you believe it??? New York...) so I'm posting earlier than normal.

Next week we're in Rochester. Only three cities left until Winter Quarters!!! How time flies! Hopefully I'll find some fun stuff to post about :)


Other stuff:

As I was setting up my stuff on Friday(?) two of our awesome KCT performers were going through the motions. Too cool, needed a pic.