Moments you think you're losing your mind.

alo

Well-known member
surely Men Only for that lad mag crossover style?

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There is always something incredibly poignant about travelling in general-- like the displacement of it somehow encourages you to to dwell on life. I always find my self looking at far i am toward where i want to be, what am i gonna do next etc...
Very melancholic at times.

Has anyone ever experienced the night train? Very weird. Many times i've done a London to Cornwall express and A) Theres no way you can sleep, especially on the fl;oor B) Its like a Lord Of The Rings mission: 8 hours, Sometimes followed by work in some instances.
Its very dark and strange, and then you hit Bodmin moor as the sun rises and stick your head out the window and you get hit by the beauty of the world smack bang.

.............
 

tom pr

Well-known member
alo said:
Has anyone ever experienced the night train? Very weird. Many times i've done a London to Cornwall express and A) Theres no way you can sleep, especially on the fl;oor B) Its like a Lord Of The Rings mission: 8 hours, Sometimes followed by work in some instances.
Its very dark and strange, and then you hit Bodmin moor as the sun rises and stick your head out the window and you get hit by the beauty of the world smack bang.
I did that journey as a younger a couple of times - it felt like quite an adventure back then, the sleeper train!
 

ripley

Well-known member
tom pr said:
I did that journey as a younger a couple of times - it felt like quite an adventure back then, the sleeper train!

I've taken the train from Cleveland, OH to Boston, MA, it's a 16 hour ride on the Lakeshore Limited.

When I could afford the sleeper car it was great, the cheaper version has a bed fold out from the wall so that there's no floor, it's just a bed enclosed, with a four-foot-wide window running along it, looking out across the countryside.

Add to that
1) it leaves at around 2am from Ohio, and
2) I brought my boombox for music,

and I had a near-spiritual experience, cocooned in sound, in this throbbing-rumbling cell, with the sun coming up across cornfields and industrial wastelands.

I once took the train from Cleveland to Los Angeles, which takes a couple of days and goes through the San Andreas valley. It was pretty gorgeous, but the deep thoughts came after the 3-hour unexplained halt in the Valley, after which we learned that a man had killed himself by stepping in front of the train.
 

Paqamaq

Member
michael said:
This probably sounds like I have lost my mind, but first time I saw a whippet I honestly thought I was going nuts. :)

I was walking down these obscenely steep steps and the dog was running up them, directly towards me. Since it was completely straight on it looked about 3mm wide and I remember seriously freaking, thinking "IT IS NOT OF THIS EARTH!" for just that first second or so until I had a bit more time to see what was coming.

Haha.


Remeber giggling at this the other night when I was strung out on something. Came back to check it was real. It is, and again I feel strangely elated. Answers the question: "whippets, what are they for?" They're for laughing at innit.
 

Tweak Head

Well-known member
^^^ fldsfslmn: no, it probably wouldn't. Sorry.

I frequently go into a trance when driving. Completely in control, but I realise that I haven't heard any of the music that's been playing for the last 10 mins or so.
 

D7_bohs

Well-known member
tom pr said:
I did that journey as a younger a couple of times - it felt like quite an adventure back then, the sleeper train!
once took a sleeper train from Bologna to Messina in Sicily - 17 hrs total 8pm to 1pm the following day. Fine except just south of Naples, the conductor came around and locked our cabins and then locked himself in - the explanation; 'bandits' ..... despite which, we slept soundly.
 
Service Stations In The GDR

Way back when East Germany was a Soviet satellite, I used to stop at a service station in the GDR on the drive from Hamburg to Berlin. It was eerily reminiscent of how UK service stations looked in the sixties. Very few petrol pumps and a shop selling Karo cigarettes (wood chippings rolled in bog roll) and some stale cakes. One or two GDR citizens were milling around but rarely many other people. These stations were still spooky desolate places that gave me the creeps.

I recently read Stasiland by Anna Funder (highly recommended) and discovered the following facts about these places.

1. They all had manned Stasi offices above the shop.
2. The petrol pumps had cameras in them at head height to photograph GDR pump users.
3. They had parked cars with cameras in the headlights at each station.
4. The petrol pump attendants were Stasi personnel.

No wonder I felt uneasy! I never felt uneasy to this extent anywhere else in the GDR. The Stasi monitored these places so heavily because they were transit points for smugglers of people and all kinds of other things and so they meticulously recorded the comings and goings.
 
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