Around Austin, there's an restored, old-timey steam train on which people can ride for a nominal fee. On Saturday, an associate and I went for one of these rides and it was pretty cool. Being around all of that old equipment affected me in a strange way. A little while after we set out from the station, my cell phone began to ring. I pulled the tiny, buzzing object from my pocket and began to scratch my head. "What is this, a Jules Verne story?" I thought. Thinking it was a bomb planted by the kaiser, I threw the phone out the window and then dove for cover under a Chinese couple. A few moments later, I dislodged myself and went back to my seat, but not before telling the entire car that Calvin Coolidge could go to hell for all I care.
The train ride was fun, although it was lacking in one respect: no robbery. Every time I've seen a train in the movies, it was immediately robbed by desperados. What gives here, guys? All I'm asking is for a couple of guys to storm the train, shoot a crew member, and then ride off with a burlap sack that has a big $ painted on it. If they wanted to get elaborate, they could then try to round up a posse made up from the passengers. Give a few of us guns, horses, and a month: we'll get your burlap sack back!
Speaking of posses, the problem with the Old West, it seems to me, was that you could die from a paper cut. Imagine winning 100 gunfights in a row, and then going to the saloon for a celebratory shot of sasparilla. You get distracted for a second, only to look down and see you cut your finger on the napkin. It gets infected, and a few days later, you're puking blood all over the chuckwagon. The whole thing is insane, and it explains why the first person to invent a time machine should go back to the Old West with a box of Neosporin. He'd make Bill Gates look like a Haitian refugee.
Posted by Cody at January 24, 2005 8:12 PM