We got busted.

We got busted.

Slow train

This train has spent much more time stopped than it has spent moving. We're still not even to Springfield. I don't think it had even reached 35 MPH until about now. It's about time. Now get me to Indy so I can feel like I'm accomplishing something... I seem to appear kind of pissed off in the picture, do I not? Well, I'm not. I guess I just look like that whenever I hold part of my body outside of a moving freight train. Try it and see how you look... This thing is truckin' now.

Choo choo

I ran into Ronnie and Bill again a few hours after they took off to make some money. We sat around and shot the shit for a while before the Pilot manager evicted us. We then headed to the nearest railroad tracks to catch us a train to Indianapolis. Well, we found that train and we've been on that train, motionless, for at least three hours now. (It's actually not quite that simple.) ... The train began rolling at 2:14 PM. Wow! I mean WOW!!! I'm riding a fucking freight train! And believe me, this is part of the story. This is a big part of the story. I am not worried about wasting tape right now because these tapes will be priceless. Whatever doubts I had about Aimless's future, they're gone now. This is for real! I have work to do now.

Bad train

I ran into a couple characters here at the Pilot station a little bit ago. Ronnie Burton (18) and Bill (27) are what you might call young hobos; they hitchhike and ride the rails. Two years ago Ronnie had a bit of a run-in with a train. The train won, so now the lower part of Ronnie's left leg is a metal rod. He was 16 when the train ran him over. I got at least a half hour of footage of them. It might be pretty good stuff... I've been up all night and I'm really tired. Hope I get a ride soon.

Premature adjudication

Jay told me some girl he works with said I seemed creepy because of how I looked at her. When he described her, I knew exactly who he was talking about because the place only has a handful of people working the floor at any given time. I thought it was kind of funny that she particularly would think I looked at her creepily because I barely looked at her at all, even though she walked by me dozens of times and I am a very field-dependent person. Now, I can understand why Lidia may have thought I'm sorta creepy because I know I kind of came off that way with her. Regardless, she's stupid IF she has concluded fully that I am indeed a creep, because I also gave her more than enough evidence to suggest it would be worthwhile to delay judgment. Hey, if she wants to make inaccurate premature judgments, I'm not gonna stop her, but I hope for her sake that she eventually realizes it's wise not
to judge people so quickly. Doing so lets a lot of great people slip through the cracks.

That old familiar feeling

The hat in the picture is just like the hat I lost in SC, except this one is green. (The other one was blue.) This one is my dad's, but he let me use it... This is the first time I've been at a truck stop in a couple weeks, but it feels like it was just the other day. It feels a little weird hanging out at a truck stop in my hometown, especially only a few miles from my high school (and about a mile from where I bowled in junior leagues). I'm only a few hundred feet from neighborhoods where a lot of my high school friends lived, although I am about 15 miles from my mom & dad's house, which is also where I lived when I was in high school. (Toward the end, that's where I usually was INSTEAD OF high school.) I've never done this anywhere in Ohio... Jay, I have a favor to ask you: Will you take a peek at a ground beef package/container where you work and tell me what brand it is? Y'know, I
might be a restaurateur someday, and when that day comes I'll need to know what brand of beef to buy.