G Train or That's the Spot

so, even though i try to avoid it as much as possible, i went to brooklyn this weekend. going to brooklyn wasn't such a big deal this time, as i was going from manhattan, rather than queens. the hipsters and trendy, wealthy young families didn't notice as i slipped onto the train and snuck my way into fort green. so first crisis averted.

it wasn't until i was on the way back out that the great train debate began. do i take the a train back through manhattan and add an additional hour and a half to my journey? do i seek out the elusive g train and try for a straight shot into queens?

for those of you non-new yorkers who may not know, the g train goes back and forth between queens and brooklyn, effectively by-passing manhattan. the good thing about it is that it makes for a shorter journey. the bad thing about it is that this is purely theoretical.

since the g train doesn't go into manhattan, no one (e.g. manhattanites) cares about it, and so it only runs when, and strangely, where it feels like it. in fact, freud wrote extensively on how it doesn't even exist.

but the g train was actually discovered by whipple, and if you doubt its existence, you may just not be looking hard enough.

finding a g train station is the first hurdle in trying to actually take this train. it's kind of like in harry potter how the platform is hidden from site. only for the g train, it actually moves. so just because you may have caught a g train in one location previously in your life, it in no way guarantees that you will catch it there again. in fact, spotting a g train in the first place is likened to one of the most prodigious and unbelievable experiences in life:

but say you get beyond that first hurdle and you ACTUALLY discover one of these stations. then say that the train ACTUALLY comes to said station and ACTUALLY stops to pick you up. you may think that you're in the clear, but let me tell you, you aren't.

see, just because you get on the g train, it doesn't mean it's going to take you where you want to go. it doesn't even mean it's going to take you where it's supposed to go. no, seriously look:

note the dotted line. it sometimes goes to those places, and sometimes doesn't. and not on any schedule that i can figure out.

anyway, luck was with me this weekend, and the g train picked me up and dropped me in a place that was close enough for me to actually find my way home. and while that was nice, i'm in no way willing to endorse this train. i mean, i'm not even sure that it exists sometimes.

but for now, glide on the g train. oo yeah, ee yeah oo yeah. yes it's the g train. g train, holy roller....