Ahhh.... kickin' back on the train from Ann Arbor to Chicago, about two hours to go, and I thought I'd put down a record of the last few days as a way to pass the time.

Pretty much the only disadvantage to traveling by train is the schedule. As long as you're not too constrained by time limits, rail is THE way to travel. The choice is obvious- cram yourself into a turbulent airplane flight, subjecting to cavity searches and food so bad that they provide a neat baggie at each seat that screams "if yer gonna spew, spew in this," cram yourself into a car that one of you has to drive and the other can't even drink to pass the time, or sit drinking in a diner booth watching the countryside roll by as you sip martinis or sample from the full-service restaurant menu? Plus, Amtrak is subsidized by the U.S. Government and has never made a profit, which explains the ridiculously low fares, especially with their rail sale- $5.70 Chicago to Detroit, for example, and once they were offering Chicago to L.A. for $15. If you can handle the schedule, I recommend traveling by train.

Unfortunately, our train left at 7am, which means getting up earlier than anyone should on their vacation. Back in the day my parents would always start our family road trips at 4am, carrying us out to the car one by one so we'd sleep until 9 or so and thus crop five hours off of their "are we there yet" test of patience. So I have this learned ability to sleep on command in a moving vehicle, which makes me a poor road trip companion, but once I took a bus to Maine and it came in handy as I simply slept for 22 hours of the 24 hour trip.

When I awoke, I didn't really feel like drinking, just yet. Maybe if they had Bloody Marys, but the bar car suffers from a somewhat limited selection, though the prices are actually cheaper than in a Chicago bar. If they really wanted to fill the train they would offer more booze, as the train is the best way to get from point A to point B without an interruption in one's drunkenness, present company being an excellent example. What is it the old man said to the doctor when the doctor told him he'd have to give up his whiskey or lose his sight? "I reckon I've seen just about everything worth seein'."

At one point, I was coming back from the bar with another drink when I passed a rather large and hairy fellow who had fallen asleep across two seats in a sort of fetal position, which had hiked his pants down quite a bit and gave me much more of a view of his ass than I wanted. Ack! I thought I ordered a no-ass ticket!

Ass-glimpse aside, it was a pleasant trip, and we arrived to find the Pope waiting for us. I'd never been to Ann Arbor. It's a college town, and school was out, and college towns when school is not in session are particularly pleasant. They have all the amenities that a fellow like me needs, but- uh oh, last call. Be right back.

Ah, here we are. So a college town has all the nice bars and entertainment, but when America's Adult Day Care is out of session, its patrons headed off to Florida to lose their dignity on MTV, the town itself becomes a quiet and uncrowded utopia. I liked the architecture in Ann Arbor particularly.

Check in, and then a nap, and then we got to meet the Pope's wife, who was absolutely wonderful. She had all the good humor and grace you would expect from someone who had to put up with the Pope on a daily basis. I could quite sympathize with the Pope, for I know what it's like to be a big goofy nerd put to shame by a classy and beautiful companion.

Soon after we headed deep into the Michigan countryside to visit a couple of old bandmates of the Pope who wanted him to lay down a fiddle track for a song for their upcoming album. I mean DEEP in the countryside, as we left the paved road at one point, and finally found their very quaint log cabin with its rustic old barn. As our host prepared for the recording session in his basement studio, we sat in rocking chairs on their wraparound porch, listening to the silence and drinking beers in the cool night air. I couldn't have been happier doing nothing.

The experience was marred, and only slightly, by a neighbor's peacock, my least favorite bird. The peacock's cry sounds very much like my real name, so that whenever one is within earshot I find myself perking up every few seconds because I think I hear someone calling my name. You've probably heard how similar the peacock sounds to a human cry, and there are plenty of stories of people rushing through the woods to help someone in distress only to find one of those cursed birds. Just imagine me trying to relax while some bird cries out "Johnny Payphone! Johnny Payphone! Johnny Payphone!" This became a running gag for the weekend, as anytime one of my companions wanted to get my attention they would imitate that frickenfracken bird, much to my chagrin. For your annoyance, I have provided three examples: Here, here, and here.

But once we went inside, I had a blast. The bandmates were very warm and friendly people, and it was great to hear the Pope fiddle, as he is very good but would never play a tune unless the situation was just right, with the right acoustics and either an audience or a studio there to properly appreciate his art. He'll play a guitar for anyone, sure, but oh no, the fiddle is a sacred thing... never mind the fact that he'll whore himself out to any country band that pays him to play songs that he hates, like "Thank God I'm A Country Boy" or (as he put it), "The Devil Went Down To Fucking Georgia".

the author, with his banjo-uke

After the recording session was over, we had some more beers and I asked to see our host's "Banjo-Uke", which I had heard on one of their albums but had never seen. This is, as you can imagine, the ukulele equivalent of the banjo, a teeny tiny banjo that's played in that strummy dink-a-dink style of the uke and sounds exactly like you would imagine a cross between a ukulele and a banjo would sound. I fell in love with it, as the Pope rolled his eyes and bitched about it combining the worst qualities of both instruments. Then one of our hosts pulled out his brand-new zydeco accordion, and with the Pope on guitar we jammed out a shaky version of "When The Saints Go Marching In" with me dinka-dinking along on the banjo-uke to the best of my abilities. I'm sure the Pope would say it's not like I could have made it sound any worse.

The next day, we met for lunch, and then went thrifting while the Pope did his math conference stuff. Then we met him and his wife for dinner (I told the waitress it was the Pope's birthday, and he got an Italian song sung to him, and I managed to color with crayons on the tablecloth), and he invited along a fellow in town from Berlin for the conference who had nothing to do, and we managed to convince them all to go dancing afterwards, which we did at a club described in the town entertainment guide as "New-York Style" which meant "gay". It's a wonder New York City has the population it does, if it's all gay. They must all adopt.

The German math nerd didn't seem to be put off at all by being dragged to a gay club (you know math nerds, they hardly get out at all, much less to such a hip locale- we certainly didn't run into any of their colleagues in there) and the Pope and his wife danced far more lively than a married couple should. Married couples are supposed to be fuddy-duddy and boring, you know. Especially ones with kids. They're certainly not allowed to enjoy themselves out on the town.

Present at the bar was also a fellow handing out condoms and demonstrating how one puts one on without using one's hands, a procedure that involved him deepthroating a dildo. I hope our nerdy friends didn't find going to that club to be biting off more than they could chew, ha ha.

The next morning, we didn't have time for much more than a breakfast coffee before it was time to wait for the train. A couple of meatheads were guffawing loudly in the train station, and when the train arrived they asked for the "so-and-so party", which should have been forwarning for the ride to come.

These meatheads had a good idea: Everybody come to the nearest train station, and the party will grow as the trip progresses, no doubt to end in some bash in Chicago. There were about twelve of them in the diner car when we arrived, playing cards, drinking, waving porno mags about, and generally making asses of themselves. At one point, one guy yelled out "Man, this is a PARTY" and another said wisely, "No, man. It's not a party unless there's some hoochie."

Classy.

Speaking of male asses, I was thinking to myself as I boarded the train, "Gee, I hope this is an ass-free trip." But not fifteen minutes into the ride, we passed three large fellows giving the train a triple-browneye as it passed. Ack! Three times the ass of the last trip! I can't escape it!

At one point, the meatheads called a town down the line, ordered pizza to the station, and hopped off and bought it when the train stopped to pick up passengers. That took skill! They also got a pair of eighteen-year-old girls drunk. That didn't take skill. The girls gushed as the train neared the station that their dads would be waiting for them, and that they'd have to pretend they weren't drunk. Heh. Serves 'em right.

And now we're heading through the industrial hell that leads up to Chicago. Time to meet the other nerds!