Wanna Be Amazed? 

The LIRR is coming to Grand Central Station.
The $8.4 billion (current estimate) project commenced construction in November 1969 and is the biggest mass-transit construction project under way in the U.S.--and designed to bring trains from Long Island to the east side station (supplementing and taking some of the load off westside Penn Station) at the end of this decade.  It's an astonishing feat of modern engineering.  When I watched the workmen at my local Metro-North stop restore the original 1888 abandoned station and convert it into a Restaurant/Bar, I was in awe as they combined math, muscle and creative ingenuity to modernize an old ruin in ways that brought it back to beautiful life. 

But a project like this is in a league of its own.

Every time I ride the subway I try to wrap my head around what it took to get that done and wonder if thousands of years from now people will still be talking about it like we do today about Ancient Rome, The Pyramids and Machu Picchu.  And as I searched for more info on the LIRR at GCS I grew more amazed as I learned about the many steps (and mis-steps) that this One Hundred and Forty Feet below street level project has taken over the last 40 years--which seems like a long time until you understand what it entailed and then you can't imagine how they could do it so fast.    But then I came across this....

"To circulate some 80,000 commuters per day through the new station, the MTA will rely on a complex system of 47 escalators, some stretching 180 feet long and sinking more than 90 feet down, dwarfing any other in the city's transit system.  And the success of the new station is riding in large part on how well they work."  
                                                                                        --Wall Street Journal 

Escalators?  47 escalators?  Some 180 feet long?  At Grand Central Station?   Don't they know the history of escalators at GCS?   Do they know what this means?  Please, someone stop them before 8.4 billion dollars goes down the drain and 80,000 commuters meet their Sisyphean fate!

Wanna Laugh?
Joke that an IT guy at the office told me.

The programmer's wife tells him: "Run to the store and pick up a loaf of bread, and if they have eggs, get a dozen."  The programmer comes home with 12 loaves of bread.

<< And this math test answer is a classic.

Wanna Cry?
Friend gifted me Elsewhere: A Memoir by Richard Russo. Primarily about his mother, and though leavened by Russo's deft comic touches, it's a haunting tale about a troubled woman--providing some interesting insights into the novelist Russo grew to be.   Have read most of Russo's books and my affection for  his work no doubt is adding to my sympathetic reading.

Wanna Dance?
Few months back, Ellen and I took a Salsa dance lesson (actually won it at a fund-raising auction) with our friends Alex and Karen.  Our instructor brought a Marc Anthony CD for us to practice to.  Never paid attention to him before--but he's killer and the band behind him is scary great. Now if I could only remember those steps...

Wanna Bet ?

For upcoming wedding anniversary, care to wager that I can convince my wife to take me up on my offer of a 365 day stay at home trip around the sun? 

Odds: 100,000 : 1