and a happy new year to you too

As I was getting off the F train just now, I was blind-sided by a casual service change notice on the window with, what essentially amounts to, this information:

From January 10 through May 2011, there aren’t going to be any Manhattan-bound trains at this station (which is the station near your apartment that you use every day).  Sucker.

I re-read it at least 5 times, thinking, “What?  No, this can’t be true.  What?" 

But it is true.  Painfully, mindbogglingly true.  Apparently they’re doing work on the Culver Viaduct, so me and Katie’s and hundreds of other people’s stop is fehhhhcked. There’s gotta be a better way to handle this Viaduct work than straight-up closing down Manhattan-bound service at multiple stops.  I mean, right??!  And there’s gotta be a better way to inform people that this will be happening than with a lame piece of paper a week before.

I have no idea how to process this information.  The day after i just spent 15 more dollars on an unlimited metro pass, and I don’t even have a subway stop.  

Thanks, MTA.  You’re terrible.