The Wonder of it All

To anyone who watched Super Bowl XLII, just imagine being a Giants fan, just imagine watching the game where the Giants went down in acid-soaked flames to the Ravens and coming out of the most improbable playoff run ever to watch that marvel of a fourth quarter... eight long years later, another try worked out so much better. Good on you guys!

It was incomprehensible. I keep on re-reading the articles, and watching the footage and trying to make it seem real. It hasn't sunk in yet, and it hasn't worked.

One more insane moment out of a long series of them in the past few days... hard to fathom.

We may have found a Bernese Mountain Dog to take into our new home, and I need to settle in with the idea that after twenty years of wanting a dog, I may just wind up with one.

And now, having said that, I'm going to get back to something that I was thinking about a few days ago, and it's easier to process this:

I was on my tired way home on the subway just the other day, luckily enough on one of the brand sparkly new cyborg subway trains (6 Line, for the connoisseurs) where the conductor's voice is pre-recorded, has a male and female pair of identities, and everything still seems like it may not have been pissed on more than a few times.

We were happily flying along at a mighty three or four miles per hour when we ground to a halt yet again in the tunnel between 51st and 42nd Street Stations on Lexington Avenue. Please note, for the record, that I get on the train at 51st Street. It was not what I had been eagerly anticipating in terms of the ride, let's just say.

Roboconductor cheerily pops up over the speakers after a few minutes, to announce that we were

"...delayed due to train traffic ahead."

Now, gentle reader, consider that phrase for just a moment, and think hard about which parts of it are actually necessary.

We are clearly not being blocked by a herd or angry subterranean barristas, so it wouldn't be anything other than a train, right?

"...delayed due to ----- traffic ahead."

Good.

Clearly, smoothly running trains would also not be at fault, so traffic might just be the most likely cause.

"...delayed due to ----- ------- ahead."

So, if there were to be a TRAIN causing TRAFFIC, it would have pretty much no bearing on my life it happened to be breaking down or filled with sick passengers somewhere behind me, would it?

So...

"...delayed due to ----- ------- -----."

We can clip out the 'due to', as it explains no statement anymore. Final version would be:

"...delayed --- -- ----- ------- -----."

Hey there, how about just plain old "We are delayed"... how about that shortcut? For that matter, I'm pretty sure I can TELL when I'm delayed on the subway as it happens every time we stop in the tunnel, and remain in one place with the doors closed, while not in motion.

Two options:

1) Just say "We are." if you are going for the whole zen thing.

or

2) Just maybe, maybe leave me the hell alone.

Also, roboconductor, when you thank me for my patience, you're doing so in a situation where I am:

a) Captive
b) Royally pissed off
c) Really, seriously feeling IMPATIENT.

Are you trying to induce patience by incantation? Let me satisfy your scientific curiosity: it's not working. I hate it more than Andie McDowell's presence in a movie, understand? Those of you who've watched a movie with know well what that means, but fill in your own name if that's not clear enough. God, she was almost bad enough to ruin Goundhog Day, and we are all lucky that she had as few, paperishly two-dimensionally scenes as possible in it when all of her sickening bits and pieces of film stock settled like a Newcastle flurry of coal-gray snow on the cutting room floor.

So there.

Be well everyone.

Go Giants!