My morning commute is certainly getting more
"interesting" these days and I'm not sure how I feel about that.
It's been a while since I've actually been in the office; it
was the Monday before Thanksgiving when I last did the "fun"
commute. Thanksgiving week was hectic so
I was only in that one day. Then last
week I had a cold that prevented me from going in.
(https://bfthsboringblog.blogspot.com/2023/11/not-sharing.html). Monday I was still a little "off",
so today is my first day in two weeks.
It's no secret that I like working remotely better,
especially as we are in the 4th quarter which is the busiest time of the
year. With no commute to bog me down, I
can get more done. And trust me, there
is a LOT to be done. When I'm home my
computer does not get turned off; it goes to sleep. (It gets more sleep than I do.) When I have to commute, I'm offline from the
evening until I arrive at the office. I
TRY to get in early, but that also means that I shut down early and I don't
always come back online when I get home after an 8+ hour day in the day in the
office with an approximate hour commute each way.
This morning, when it looked like the bus that I usually
take was going to be delayed, I quickly switched to an earlier bus. I couldn't decide as to whether I should
break out the winter coat or not. It's
always an issue. It's cold when I leave
and coldish as I wait for the bus when I head home, but on the city light rail
and on the bus it's warm. What's a girl
to do? I decided to forgo the winter
parka and instead bulk up with a down vest under another weather resistant
jacket. I was warm enough as I power
walked to the bus stop, but waiting 5
minutes for the bus, my fingers were pretty cold.
The bus driver floored it all the way down to the city rail
station. I don't think I've ever made
such good time. Of course, he did
"skirt" a few yellow/red lights and almost ran over a
pedestrian. (Who was walking in the
middle of the street. PAY ATTENTION.)
The timing for the light rail was off, as I had to wait 5+
minutes for it to arrive. Usually it's
right there. The good thing about the
city light rail is that there is rarely a wait and it's pretty fast from my
stop to Penn Station. The downside? It gets crowded. (I am still wearing a
mask. I was doing so even before I got a
cold.)
The strange thing about today's arrival at Penn Station was
the presence of security. I've seen this
once before when I got off the train, but I could not hear what they were
saying. So just kind of went with the
crowd and got on the escalator up. Today
was the same, only I could tell they were asking for proof of ticket (my ticket
is on an app which I can never get to work underground) or badge (I'm assuming
ID badge). My ID badge is in my
backpack, and I could have dug around for it, but again I kind of got caught up
in the crowd. The question is are they trying to make sure that everyone has
paid for their ride (I have heard plenty
of people say that the light rail is free -- it's not, but I've never seen
anyone checked) or is there something bigger going on? Holiday time is crazy and with all that is
going on in the world, this makes me a little nervous.
Then when I got to the office building, security asked me
which elevator bank I use. Turns out,
our "lower" bank was being fixed.
So they had to let me in a different "gate" and I had to go
down the hall (past the elevators), turn right, through some other doors and
ring a bell for another door (which took longer than I expected) and then wait
for the service elevator. There was a
security person running the elevator, which ended up taking us DOWN before
going up to my floor. Which turned out
well for someone else who works for the company, as we stopped back at the main
floor again and she was waiting (looking a bit puzzled, like I was ).
When I finally arrived at my floor, there was only one other
person here; one of the VPs. Turns out
he had a similar elevator adventure, only somehow he got locked in between two
different doors before managing to get to the freight elevator! (Now that would have completely freaked me
out.)
The good news is that my co-worker did not experience the
"elevator adventure" which means everything is up and running
normally again. (Whatever normal
is.) And I'm just hoping that my commute
home is a little less adventurous. But
we'll see....
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