Schenectady

Woke up on the train with a swollen ankle that felt sprained. Which I found weird, as it's not like I had been doing any strenuous activity. Arrived finally in Schenectady. Late, of course. Wandered to my hotel and checked in, then proceeded to use all the hot water in my first shower in five days. It was glorious.
After I enquired as to the safety level of my temporary lodgings, I hobbled off to explore the "downtown" area. Not a whole lot going on, truth be told. Finally, hunger demanded I make up my mind. I picked Mexican Radio, because margaritas. They were good. Struck up a conversation with a fellow named Rob and his lady, whose name I forget (sorry Rob!). They gave me some tips for Montreal and we chatted about travel in general and it was the start of the gradual dissipation of my travel anxiety. The further from Seattle I got, the less anxious I was.
After a couple of drinks, I bailed to let them enjoy their date, which I feel like I inadvertently crashed. I wound up at Center Street Pub, which had a pretty good beer list. It started to get a bit full of bros for my taste, so I bailed and found myself at Great Flats Brewing. The IPA was good. The wingnut sitting next to me was not. He started his rant talking about how stoned he was, but he quickly segued into a rant about how the Jews and the Illuminati ran everything and blah, blah, blah. I rapidly made my exit and proceeded back to my hotel. This is the point where I realized that I was staying in a rather sketchy place. The parking lot looked like some sort of highschool/gangster after party. It was weird. So I called it a night.