Adventures in Commuting, Part II:
* I have fundamentally come to accept that there is no secret, fast way to get from the house I'm staying at to campus. Nor is it really worth worrying over the ten minute difference than constitutes an 'easy' commute versus a 'difficult' one. The factors are largely out of my control, and given the at-least-90-minutes involved, what appears to be a good strategy when I set out can become a bad one. Sometimes it takes two hours to get from one place to the other: there's nothing to be done about it.
* I believe I have worked out a way to shave some time off my morning prep, ever so vital for those 9:00am classes: invest modestly in an electric kettle and instant oatmeal, which means I can fill up with coffee before I head out, and postpone breakfast until I arrive. This also marginally reduces the desire to cheat and go out for food. Marginally.
* The commute puts a tremendous stress on my sanity, and therefore on my music collection. I have decided it is a reasonable expenditure to buy one new album a week, the better to keep what I'm listening to fresh.
* It is still ever-so-slightly surprising that one cannot get directly from the north or west suburbs to Hyde Park on mass transit without having to walk at least part of the way. If I were trying to spread gentrification, that'd be the first thing I fixed...
"Thou shalt not extinguish thine anger, but shall master it,
that thy conscience may not be blunted by adjustment
to wrong causes."
-The Dutch Ten Commandments to Foil the Nazis
3 comments:
OK, I get the general idea of your commute from knowing Chicago, and you may have it worse than I do. My commute takes more time, but walking barely enters into it.
But yes, absolutely, re: the need to spend strategically when commuting. If buying breakfast out allows you to get through it, then do that, but if not, man does it add up.
The other catch about public transportation is that it's always going to be longer, on account of the walking. Consequently, I'm driving, which is its own kind of problem. But at least I don't have to worry about smelly people.
My spending restraint has been breaking down on the return trip, unfortunately: it's hard to avoid at least part of rush hour and if I have a pastry of some kind and perhaps something else, it might not be so bad...
Pastry indeed. This will be my economic downfall before it has a chance to be my metabolic one, thanks to Village prices.
Post a Comment