Home.

Amtrak good for not driving, and for catching up on reading, but for on-time performance in the territory north of New York City? in my experience, yech. Too many stretches of track only permit one train at a time through and my train had to cede to another - or two or three - both on the way up and on the way back. I'm not faulting Amtrak or VIARail for Customs, just for the track stuff... I was supposed to be home by 11 PM on the 16th.

le barf.

Oh well, I'm home, I'm safe, I'm sound, all's well.

More on Spineless Ijjit Accident Man tomorrow when my semicircular canals have accepted we ain't moving any more. I'll post from work or something.

Stupid Dorkface Ijjit Man

Well, I'm back at work...

I called Vicki yesterday from the train because, well, it was late and we were stopped without power outside Albany. After some discussion to establish that yes, I was still on the train, Vicki revealed a few things about the guy who hit her.

1. The day after the accident, he went to an insurance company and got a policy, claiming he had no accidents.

2. He did not at any point within his 48 hour window report the accident to police, insurance, or any other authorities.

3. He is now claiming he was never there or anywhere near the scene. But:

4. He had already spoken to Vicki's insurance broker (in the States, that'd be the same thing as an insurance agent, I think). Also,

5. The tow truck operator who was there knows the guy's car and license plate number, and is willing to give a statement, as am I.

I don't know how moronic he's going to get as all of this goes on. I was smelling scam artist in the beginning; I'm smelling a spineless, stupid, dorkface of an idiot now who thinks he can get away with stuff because he drives an expensive car. I don't know how far he plans to take his insistence on coming out on top in all of this, but I've told Vicki I'm willing to talk to the insurance people or the cops, and if it comes right down to it I still have some time-off days for the year and would be willing to go back to Toronto for a trial or something.

Gad, I hate stupid people.

Stupid Dorkface Ijjit Man II

Not only is el schmucko saying he wasn't involved in the accident, but apparently he's decided to take up harassment as a hobby... assuming one phone call to my friend counts as harassment. A phone call that terminates in 'Big mistake.', followed by el schmucko hanging up.

His name is Lloyd. He drives an Acura Legend. He has a big black dog with a graying muzzle and a chain-link type collar. He has designer sunglasses that I think I almost sat on. He tries to bribe his way out of bad situations.

If anyone knows of a person in the Toronto area who matches this description, would you mind suggesting to the next band of teenagers looking for something to do on Halloween that they consider investing in extra eggs and toilet paper this year?

Totally unrelated to the accident

When Vicki and I went up in the CN Tower, we stopped at the glass floor/observation level and got to go outside and walk around in the area where the only thing separating you from about 340 meters of freefall is heavily reinforced screening. It is FECKING WINDY up there at this time of year, but I enjoyed it; I haven't been that high up and outside in ... well... ever. Even when the Twin Towers were still standing, I don't think I ever got to stand on the roof. I had to look out at the world from the indoor observation deck. It got cold fast, though, so we went back inside, got on line*, and took the elevator up to the Skypod - highest observation deck anywhere on the planet Earth, 447 meters up.

The view is impressive, I gotta say. And thought provoking, although the thoughts are of the 'Marcel, the number three fan above 360's kitchens went out again, get the climbing harness out and go fix it!' variety. I took a few snaps, so we'll see how they develop, but one of the things I pointed out to Vicki was just the same as back in New York, at the top of the Empire State Building: the international graffiti. Seriously, I don't know how many visitors to the Tower - and the ESB - feel the compulsion to leave behind a little token of their presence. usually it's just a name and a date, but a lot of people put what country they're from, and a number of Americans slapped those little return address labels up instead of scratching their names into the metal. There was graffiti from Poland, Hungary, the States, Egypt, India - I'm guessing on that one, the alphabet could have also been used in Bangladesh or Pakistan if I recall aright - Italy, Korea, France, Britain... you name it. What got me was that in amongst all of the other 'name - point of origin - date of visit' graffiti there was one particularly unusual one. It wasn't that it was written in Chinese characters. It was that the characters were punctuated twice: once by '(ANTHONY)', and once by 'ICQ: ' followed by a number. I didn't have a writing implement on me, stupid stupid stupid, so I did the next best thing - pulled out my celphone and saved it to the phone book.

I've just punched it into my ICQ client. Anthony Cheng is 19 years old and has a nickname in characters my client can't read. Wonder if I'll ever catch him online? 'Hi, yeah, you don't know me, I don't even know how good your English is, but you left your ICQ number in one of the biggest tourist spots in Canada, so an American copied it and took it home...'

*Long before anyone had heard of the Internet, or even of Arpanet or Milnet its ancestors, Noo Yawkahs were on line. People from my native city are just about the only ones in the country who say this, but if you're from New York, you don't stand in line. You stand on line.

Look, mommy, quizfoo!

( Gimme a break, I just did two good posts. )