Notes From Underground

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It is 3:00 p.m. on a Thursday, and you are listening to the fourth race at Aqueduct. Your horse loses, and you decide to do some subway riding to work out your frustrations. You grab your weekly unlimited-ride train pass (valid till Sunday) and a printout of the subway map PDF from the MTA website, and off you go.

You board the train at the beach station whose name also includes a multiple of 10 (if there is more than one option, take the one closest to an LIRR transfer point). Write down the first letter of this station's name. You travel ten stops to a station where you can change trains, changing trains en route if you have to, but not changing direction of travel. You write down the fourth letter of this station's name (or the second if it is also the name of a famous person), then change trains, continuing in the same direction. Travel on this train until you reach a station whose name's first word is the same as a word in the name of another station on this line. Write down the first letter of the second word of the name of the station you've stopped at. Disembark.

Wait until 3:30 p.m., then board a train from this station in any direction on any line that will get you in the fewest number of stops to a station whose name is the last name of a U.S. President. (In case of a tie, pick the President with the easternmost birthplace.) Travel until you reach a transfer point for a listed mode of airport transportation. From here, keep riding, counting station stops until you reach the end of this line. Write down the Nth letter of this terminal station, where N is the number of station stops you just counted (including this terminal station).

At 4:30 p.m., change your direction of travel, and board a train that is a different color than the train you just left. Travel seven stops, writing down the second letter of the sixth stop. Make a free transfer to a numbered train. (If no numbered trains are available, take a train whose letter is a Roman numeral.) Travel towards the terminus with most number of possible transfers. Write down the first letter in the name of the first stop you make en route (ignoring any numbers there might be in the name of the station). When you get to this line's terminus, transfer to an uptown train that won't be running at all in 12 hours (making sure that a handicapped passenger traveling with you could not get off at the next stop even if it were). At the next stop that includes the name of a cultural organization, write down the fourth letter of that organization's name. (If your handicapped friend can get off at this stop, you've taken the wrong train.) The next express stop on this track is named for a numbered street; a number of the following stops on this line are named for streets ending with the same digit as this one. Write down the Nth letter of the word for that digit, where N is the number of the following stops that end with that digit.

As the train begins to move uptown, you realize that the first syllable of the name of one of the termini of the line you're on sounds like a letter of the alphabet; write down that letter. When you reach 168th St. (or a station at least partially having that name) disembark and wait until 6:15 p.m. While you're waiting, you notice that there are three train lines running uptown (roughly north) from this point at this time. One makes five stops before terminating, another six, and the third seven. Find the fourth stop of the line that makes six before terminating. Write down the repeated letter in the station's name (as printed on the map); if there is more than one repeated letter, write down the one that is last alphabetically; if there are no repeated letters, write down the last letter alphabetically.

Head downtown on the lowest-numbered train available from 168th St. (where you have been waiting). When you get to a subway station with a police station ignore any numbered street in the name of the subway station, and write down the letter that appears twice in the remaining words (if you have more than one option, write down the letter that is not the same as the last letter you just wrote down).

Continue downtown, passing the station where you can transfer to the line with the fewest stops in the system. The next stop is one of three nearby stations between which you cannot transfer for free, but which share the same numbered street name. The initial letter of one word in the three names is unique among the three; write down that letter. You've spent an hour on this train line, so you disembark at this stop, changing to a different downtown local train without paying for a transfer.

You climb aboard, hearing an announcement that this is the last of these trains tonight, since service ends on this line in 45 minutes; you set your watch alarm to go off in an hour. As the train pulls out, you realize that ahead of you are a number of stations whose names are exactly the same as nearby stations on different-colored lines. ("Nearby" means roughly on the same horizontal axis, and not over a river.) The next stop, for example, shares the same name with two other nearby stations. Don't count this one. Rather, from here, begin counting stations whose name is exactly the same as exactly two other nearby stations on different-colored lines. When you've passed the last of these, note the number you'd counted, and get off at the next stop which shares its name with only one other nearby station and walk to that station. After eliminating any duplicate letters in this station's name (written without abbreviations) you could spell out a breath mint brand, if you deleted one more letter - write that letter down.

You board a downtown train at this station, and travel (without changing direction) the number of stops equal to the number of stations you'd just noted, then switch trains, continuing in the opposite direction on a different line. You take this train to the end of the line, noting the initial consonants of all the street or avenue names in the names of stops the train makes. (You're interrupted by your watch alarm at one point, and mistakenly note "G" as one of the initial consonants of these stops, even though it isn't.) When you get to the end of the line, write down the first consonant in the alphabet that you didn't note along the way.

You wait on the train at the terminus until it starts back in the opposite direction. At the first station with the name of a tree or shrub in it, count the number of stops (without transferring) to the nearest terminus of any train line other than the one you're on. Write down the Roman numeral for that number. Continue towards a stop that includes a nickname for a resident of the city you're in, changing train lines if you have to. As you ride, count the number of stops from that stop - the one with the nickname in it - until the train terminates. Take the Nth letter of the stop you're now at, where N is the number you've just counted.

Board an outbound train (other than the one you've just been on). When you pass a station sharing a name with a World War II Admiral, write down the second letter of that station's name (unless he was a United States Admiral, in which case write down the first letter of the station's name). When you reach a station whose name begins with the letter or number of the train you're on, disembark. It's late, so you decide to rest for a while. Since you're in a neighborhood whose name is the same as that of a Caribbean nation, you dream of sunshine and sandy beaches. When you wake up, it's 2 a.m., and you're still in the subway station - no sunshine or sandy beaches here. So you board a train with a different letter or number than the last one you were on, and off you go again.

The fourth station the train stops at includes the name of a type of road. Write down the first letter of that type of road, but don't get off the train. Continue on this train until you reach a stop on this line with a type of wine in its name (not a brand name, just a generic type). Write down the first letter of the second word following the name of the beverage in that station's name (counting hyphenated words as one word).

As you continue downtown on this train, you doze off, awakening at 3:00 a.m., after the train has reached its terminus and begun heading in the opposite direction. When you stop at the station with the most possible transfer options, you write down the last letter of its word with the most vowels (where Y is a vowel), unless that word contains a number, in which case write down the first letter. Note the smallest digit in the name of this station, and travel that number of stops. Change trains here, continuing uptown but on a different train line. Beginning at the next station stop, note the numbers in each station stop's name; add these numbers as you go, stopping and disembarking when you reach a station whose name begins with a compound word, where one part of the word is the last name of a U.S. President, but the other part of the word is not something you would normally eat. If the total number of the station name numbers is a date in the 20th Century, head downtown on a different train line; if it is a date in the 17th Century, head downtown on the same train line; if it is a date in the 15th Century, walk to the nearest station with the same name and take that line downtown.

Travel until the last stop before the train you're on crosses (or goes under) a body of water; disembark here and wait till 7 a.m. Board next a train in any direction whose second stop (in that direction) contains a numbered street that is a cube; if no such train exists, board a train whose fourth stop is a cube (as long as that train is not the same line you just got off of); if neither of those trains exist, board a train whose second stop is a even-number multiple of five.

Travel on this train until the end of the line (which includes the name of a type of coin). Write down either the letter of the train you're on, or the letter that corresponds in the alphabet to the number of the train you're on. Stay on board until the train resumes travel in the opposite direction. It is now 8:00 a.m.

When the train you are on stops at a station whose name includes a word that is also the capital of an island nation, write down the last letter of that word. Travel two more stops, changing there for a downtown train whose terminus in that direction begins with the same letter as that train line (or letter that corresponds in the alphabet to the number of the train line). Take that train three stops, then change to another downtown train that terminates in three stops (if you have more than one option, take the train line you haven't traveled on yet). At the second stop, you decide you want to be on a train whose next stop name contains a word that precedes "jump" in a common phrase, but not one that includes a word that anagrams to a name for something divers might jump off of. Change trains, if you need to, in the direction of that station (if you have a choice of trains, take the one that does not stop consecutively at stations with the names of Revolutionary War figures in them).

Stop when the train you're on reaches a station with a palindrome (numeric or alphabetic) in its name. You check your watch, realizing it's been 19 hours since you were listening to the horse races. Fortunately, you're on a train that is heading for a branch that leads to your original embarkation point. You count the stops from the palindromic station until this train reaches your original embarkation point, and get off the train. Divide the number of those stops into the number in the name of this embarkation (and now debarkation) point: Caesar shift the letters you've written down forwards by that number.

Your travels complete, you realize that all service changes happened exactly on time, regardless of where you were in the system, and there were no unexpected delays or reroutings. Comforted in this anomalous perfection, you head home to relax and enjoy the races once more.