From snow to wind to rain to sun to spring to... rain again. Your basic, normal Portland weather. For the first time in the 12 years I've been a Nor'westerner, I am sick of it. Sure, we had a beautiful fall, not much rain until a few months ago, yadda yadda yadda. Cry me a river, you say. Well somebody must have, because the rivers are almost up my neighborhood's butt. I want to splash some little old lady waiting for a bus and laugh. Enough already!
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Raining hard one morning, dark. Trying to see everyone waiting for the bus. Burning some time, cop pulls in front, lights a flashin', gets out, holds up index finger as if to say 'wait a minute'. I'm wondering if I'm in trouble for running that guy in a wheelchair off the road. Said copper opens back door of his car, a lady steps into the pounding deluge, runs up and boards my bus. Seems I missed her a few stops back, running for the bus in the early morning soup, so the kind cop picked her up and brought her to my bus so she didn't have to wait 30min for the next one. Rain or not, I'd rather wait for the next one than take a ride in the BACK seat of a cop car. Another first: a police escort for an intending passenger? Guess the PD is working on improving its image.
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Fancy cars and inconsideration. Been thinking on this one a while. If someone has the money to plunk down for a Mercedes, Land Rover, Audi, gaudy Yukon or the likes, chances are good they don't ever ride a bus. Don't need to ride one, sneer at the very thought of the propsect. To them, buses are just a petty annoyance, another commoner in their way. People who never ride a bus, or just don't want to... they are the rudest drivers on the road. They take outrageous chances, act as if they own the pavement (even though they don't want to pay taxes for their upkeep), and are spectacularly impatient. Then you have the redneck 4x4's with rebel flags flying, a bed full of beer cans and misspelled bumper stickers who have to make sure they hit that red light first. Trying to make Richard Petty look like a rookie. They're surely going to display their middle finger as they whip around you with inches to spare, just so you can see the hairy wart they display with pride. In fact, all of them are warts on the ass of humanity. I'm supposed to let all this slide right off me like the slime doesn't stain me, but I'm loathe to do so. The rudest of them are sure to get a beep of my horn and a few quietly-muttered choice words. So here, where I can gleefully blast them From The Driver Side, I offer my own, wartless extended middle digit, I get my revenge! Grrr.
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Driving a particularly undesirable route one day, an old dude approaches me, saying "I got a question for you, so be honest." First of all, I abhor when people say "now be honest", for it implies I am not. So when I hear this it always gets my Irish up.
The old guy continues, "Did you find an illegal apparatus, in other words, a pipe, on your bus?"
"No, I did not."
"Are you sure? Cuz I saw you put something in your coat. Be honest now." There he goes again, telling me to be honest. OK, so if I had found this guy's crack pipe, what was I gonna do with it? Smoke it?!? Give it away? Put it on CraigsList? I certainly wouldn't put something that another's Hepatitis-ridden pipe in my coat pocket! Come on, dude, really. I got a bit hot with him.
"I said I did not find anything, which means that's what happened. If you're going to ride this bus, show me your fare. If not, there's the door. I gotta roll, sir."
Calling him "sir" really rankled me, but I remain professional. He left, mumbling something about crack-addicted bus drivers. He's lucky he didn't leave with my size 11 stuck in his crack.
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Can you tell I'm getting a bit jaded lately? It's been a year since I started this blog. I need a vacation. I'm tired, I'm sick. I'm sick and tired. People annoy me more these days, and I don't like it. Haven't had a commendation in about a month, and that's unusual. I'm the nice guy, usually. Lately I've found myself angrier than I've ever been... at management, at rude riders, at life in general. Time to meditate and cleanse my soul of negativity. Wish me luck!
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