Amtrak

Well, its official. Mom and I are experienced transportation travelers. As we got on the train I learned one thing: Don't give mom a medium coffee before getting on a train. I think all 451 passengers already know our whole life stories from phone calls to aunt Susan in the lobby, bathroom breaks, and getting more coffee.

"Yes, this is my daughter, she will be working in Disney next week for a whole semester! We think Mickey will meet us on the train"

"This is our very first trains ride, recliner chairs! Sweet!"

"Let's look out the window and see if we can see Grandpop cooking on the grill!"

She is too much and I love it.

We lucked out. We are on the first level of the train and in a roomish thing with twelve seats, but not all are full. And I think it's the adult car because when you go upstairs to get to the dining car it's like a zoo of kids, juice boxes, and Nintendo DSs'. Mom is exploring the phone she has had for months, learning new secret gadgets and games. (When I read this out loud to her she said, "I don't even have games, the ones I have are lame! I wanted to try angry birds but my phone doesn't have it. I'm going to have to revert back to old fashion pencil and paper"). I'm mad at myself because I didn't bring any movies for my laptop thinking WiFi would just be a thing that would exist the whole time. It is quiet and I'm wishing I brought melatonin to fall asleep easier. Our dinner is at seven and the feature movie is RANGO. It had been a good start to a new way of traveling.

P.S. Before we boarded the announcer said not very unenthusiastically "Thank you for traveling the AutoTrain with us today. All aboard."-even though there was no whistle I'm still checking it off my bucket list.

Post-Night: Being lacked in preparation we did not bring pillows or blankets. So the question of the day is how do you know it's too cold to sleep?

-when you start using the flimsy pillowcases are min blankets

-when you can see through the complimentary "blanket" they provide for you...and take back

-when mom says, "I didn't know we signed up to the The Polar Express to Florida!"

-when you start to thank God that you decided against that bob haircut because then your neck would be cold.