It’s Not Gambling If You Know You’re Going to Lose
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Lizzie: If you’ve been reading this newsletter long enough, you’ve probably heard our idea for a podcast. (Everyone reading simultaneously closes the tab.) It’s called The Amazing Race, and, in the style of the TV show The Amazing Race, it involves us racing somewhere in NYC. But, and stay with me here, the twist is: We’re forced to split up and take different modes of transportation to get there. Will two subway lines be faster than a subway and a bus, or a bike ride, or a bike ride to the subway? On the way to the finish line, we’ll record our thoughts on the travel experience in real time—Seat or no seat? Public sermon or no public sermon?—and pepper in relevant context about the history of the MTA or stats on the number of people who insist on exiting through the front door of the bus even though the voice is always reminding you to exit from the rear.
We’d never actually tested the structure of the podcast until last weekend, when we decided to go to the Aqueduct Racetrack in Ozone Park, Queens. Since the horses would be racing, we figured we should race too. Make it even. A race for a race, if you will.
Kaitlyn: I’ve never watched the TV show The Amazing Race. I don’t see what it would offer me. But The Amazing Race (podcast) will make my daily travels so much more exhilarating and rewarding. (When I win them!)
To prepare for our first experiment with the show’s format, I went straight to the archives. A from September 1894 noted that a new racetrack would be opening in Queens the following day and informed all “intelligent racing men” that the place—named for its proximity to the Answer: “Long Island Rail Road is a commuter rail service, and it is faster than the subway.” Then I went to Liz and proposed our routes. I would take the Long Island Rail Road, I suggested, with an “lol” to convey that this was just me being, you know, down to clown—willfully choosing the goofier and probably losing option. She could feel free to take the more logical subway route (“haha”).
