I wanted to make sure I wasn’t late for work today (very bad form to be late the first day!), and — taking an earlier bus than I needed, as I was not at all confident that the bus would actually be on time — I wound up being just shy of a full hour early. Luckily I remembered where the nearest McDeath was located near my building, and I was able to get a cheap breakfast. But, since I took the bus that was nearest my home instead of my work, the closest stop from my work building was 8 blocks away, and McDeath was several blocks past that. My morning sure involved a lot of walking…and my afternoon was almost as bad.

Due to the fact that I had training & orientations at 2 different sites today, I wound up taking each of Portland’s public transit methods (on Trimet) at some point in the day. Here’s how it went:

Bus — to get to work, and eventually to get home
Tram — to leave the second orientation site (up at Pill Hill)
Streetcar — to get from the bottom of the tram, back to downtown
MAX — from the streetcar stop, to the bus stop I needed to get home

Plus I rode in a Mercedes-Benz for the first time in my life, to boot: the center director happened to be headed up to Pill Hill at the same time I was, and she gave me a lift. Being in a car with a sticker price of more than the average price of a new home in 1969 (when I was born) was just mind-boggling. I absolutely can’t imagine why anyone would need to spend that much on a vehicle. (Conspicuous consumption makes me ill.)

And when I got home, I made pork chops and au gratin potatoes. It’s 8pm and I’m so tired I could scream…if I had any energy, that is. Definitely must drink more coffee tomorrow morning than I had today. Definitely.