BusTales: II

More tales from traveling on the bus.

The bus after-dark is a world of its own. That's not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, when the sun's down, the arrival of the bus seems like the approach of a bright-eyed snorting creature, waiting for you to crawl inside it before it tears off into the dark. Okay, that sounds odd, but it feels good to be ingested by the bus.

I guess it's not surprising, then, that people seem so intent on ingesting on the bus themselves. Such individuals overwhelmingly respond to my scent. Several nights ago, I faced a classic case. Perched in the back corner of the noisy people-mover, I was trying to keep my nose in a lil' Linoln-Douglas debate action, pretending to be a responsible student. As the bus stopped near Towne, a curious couple boarded and retreated to my area of the bus.

Two things marked this strange pair:
a) The woman could have eaten me for lunch, judging from her tragic size.
b) The man refused to take his hand out of his backpack.

Upon the woman's imminent departure I witnessed two acts that directly relate to the above two points.
a) The couple kissed, a process which involved a horrifying and necessarily calculated process of girth-shifting on the part of the poor, poor lady (necessary in order to keep her balance...while sitting mind you).
b) The man had a Mickey's in his backpack.

A well-dressed, talkative, and kindly fellow, he was also putting away malt liquor at a rate that would impress most college freshmen (they're too jaded by senior year). And I wasn't surprised.

Frankly, the back of the bus is where the sh** goes down and the bottle goes up. The BOB, as we call it, draws the functional alcoholics and casual drinkers alike. It also attracts me, but I tend to be dry (or be coming from a mega-pint at Heroes', in which case drinking on the bus is secondary to sleeping on the bus).

They brownbag it, backpack it or brazenly booze. But they drink, and they love to drink near me. One guy was even brazen enough to ask the driver to wait, while he ran his empty cans to a recycling can. I'm at the end of my rope. The only solution seems to be the classic adage: if you can't beat 'em, then drink in public, get arrested and join them in jail.

Right?

BusTales: I

New feature here at The DTrav: BusTales. Just riding the bus has been sufficiently ridiculous to merit a descriptor of its own. Now, I know what you're thinking...what happened to those "regular features" introduced months ago? To that I say, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. And frankly, I have some great times in the past (I think), and I'd love to live them again.

Regardless, BusTales it is, with the first burst coming at you...now!

Two days ago, I missed the bus I was aiming for. Then, I gave the rifle to my little brother and he hit it, setting off a chain of events that would culminate in my death and the making of one of the worst movies in American cinema history (a close second to Manos: Hands of Fate, which at least was decently mocked by these guys), featuring, among other things, a deaf Japanese chick who constantly exposes herself for no apparent reason. Oops, that's the plot summary for Babel, a movie you need to see like Maria Shriver (aka "Skeletor") needs more plastic surgery.

Seriously, though, you shouldn't see Babel.

Even more seriously, I did miss my bus two days ago. I was shooting to get on the 7:15, but let's be serious. That means I was already an hour late. Rabadash! Join me in my attempt to get C.S. Lewis characters to double as exclamations of frustration). So, having to take the 7:35 was no worse spilling teriyaki sauce on an open cut...it's salty, but not pure salt.

Thank heaven I did miss my bus, however. Halfway through the trek, we came up on the 7:15, with its former riders clustered outside. As they piled aboard to make our bus a merry madhouse of metro mavens, a young lady with a stentorian bent recounted the adventure. If I was a clever writer, I would reproduce her urban accent and those unique phrases springing from her roots that peppered her telling. Not being half so clever, I fear I would come across as awkward and mostly racist, so I'll forbear.

In short, it went down like this--or, rather, this is how it came up. The contents of one man's stomach, that is. Yes, violent nausea of the explosive kind overcame one of the occupants of the ill-fated 7:15, provoking a geyser that would have brought out the crow's nest jack in all of us ("Thar she blows!"). The poor (besotted) soul couldn't stop himself and they all musta cussed cuz the bus had a musk of bile. Miraculously, no one got in the line of fire, but I doubt somehow that I would have been so lucky.

Today, I judiciously slept through my alarms.

~~~

Coming up soon, "Drinking on the Bus: Who Does It and Why?"