Ouch. One of my early morning rituals is to roll over in bed and snuggle with Bill the Boyfriend. When I did it this morning, I got a sharp pain in my right side, going from under my armpit to under my breast. It hurt to breathe deeply, it hurt to roll over, it hurt to sit up. Scared? Hurting? You better believe it. I managed to shower, dress, and call in sick to work, then Bill took me to the doctor. His opinion: I had managed to pull one of the rib muscles. He prescribed a high-powered anti-inflammatory (naproxen) and the use of heat pads, told me today would be the worst day, smiled and left.

I got the prescription filled and have spent today letting the miracle of modern medical science (aka drugs) work on my achy self. Improvement is expected to be slow and steady (the doctor's words).

Yesterday I found a piece of yesteryear. Just for something to do, Bill and I went driving westward, following the tracks of the Raritan Valley Line. (For those of you not from New Jersey, that's a branch of New Jersey Transit that serves my town. For those of you from New Jersey and old enough to remember, the branch used to be part of the Jersey Central Railroad.) We made it to three of the five stations, because at the third station (Lebanon) I saw something that made my jaw literally drop:

The Hickory Creek. A fully-restored round-ended observation car once owned by the New York Central Railroad. And not just any round-ended observation car: this car had been part of, and still carried the illuminated sign proclaiming, the 20th Century Limited. The car is owned today by the United Railroad Historical Society, which purchased it, refurbished it, and allows it to be shown off at events like last year's big railroad fair at Hoboken Terminal. I got to stand next to it, and touch it, and have my picture taken with it. I was in heaven.

They also had, at Lebanon station, other pieces of equipment in various stages of refurbishment, including a Pullman car with markings from the Frisco line, and another NY Central lounge car, number 47.

By the way: the URHS is one of the main driving forces behind the creation of a New Jersey Railroad Museum in Phillipsburg. Go to their website at http://www.urhs.org, see what they're doing, and consider either volunteering or giving them money.

We also had dinner afterwards, at our hometown branch of the Lone Star Steakhouse. If you can get steak anywhere else, do so. Not that the food was bad, it just wasn't very good, and the decor was just trying too hard to make it feel like Texas but not succeeding. The staff, however, was just fine. (Note for beer drinkers: Bill ordered a bottle of Kilian's Red, and got two: one opened, the other one unopened in a little tin bucket of ice. A nice touch.)