What is Normal?

The trip started from the legendary Union Station in Chicago. The Amtrak train took us to places like Pontiac and Normal. Although in Normal things weren’t really normal: the trained stopped normally at the station, people got on board. So far so good, all normal.  Then the train reversed in the direction we had just come from before changing direction again, going back to the Normal station (to another platform though) where no one boarded this time.

A declination of flat

What is flatter than the Netherlands? Nothing, I thought. Today, however, I wasn’t so sure anymore as the train advanced across the prairie.