£

On the bus today, I found a pound.

Late break

The bus I take to work is on a loop and my town is the eye of that loop. This means that sometimes I see the bus going the other way down the road before it negotiates the health centre at the apex and then returns to pick me up. Today I was leaning against the window in my little shelter marvelling at how green the world has got in the last two weeks, and then out of the corner of my eye just as I see a bus going the other way down the road it comes to a screeching halt and starts to reverse, the driver then opens the window leans out and asks me where I’m going, I reply he say “get in I’m twenty minutes late and going that way” I gratefully board pay my fair and settle in for a five or so minutes of free travel, though I couldn’t fully shake the feeling that we wouldn’t be so late if the driver used a more orthodox Bussing style.

tunnel vision

What makes you most tense on the underground? Is it the heat the overcrowding? Maybe it’s the scruffy man with the bulging bag and energetic eyes. Well I managed to put these minor concerns to the back of my mind and enjoy the unique delight of the tube. That is of course until when some one left there seat and the person nearest did not take it. Why why would you do that? you are on a train with loads of people standing up so very little space many people are hot tired and pissed off sue to the veal like conditions, but you my friend are not even courteous enough to alleviate the crowding by taking a seat, how hard is it to sit down? Many people do it automatically to some it is almost preferable to sit rather than stand for the duration of travel. Are you oblivious of the trouble you are causing well let me lay it out for you: you are the closest to the seat after you there are three other people who are equidistant and all covet that seat they need to weight a sufficient amount of time to make it clear that they are recognising your first dibs status but have to sit soon enough so as the others does not get there first. Can you not see the tension building up in these people? If you are not able to site for some unfortunate knee of hip reason the least you could do is select some one to usher to the seat thus elevating the standing congestion and seat tension. You my friend are a fo’.

Now the tube is underground and as such need means for getting the people from above ground where most people spend a lot of there time to below the surface where most tube trains spend a lot of there time. There are two main systems that they employ the escalator and stairway (you may be familiar with one or both of these) in rush hour there are a lot of people in a rush to many for the escalators alone to cope with so cues form for the escalator, yet curiously there are no cues for the stairs. Who decided that it is preferable to cue for an escalator rather than use the stair? Probably the Muppet that decided the escalator is a ride.

Cigar music

Today at the bus stop the other side of the road from me I saw an oldish (50odd) woman smoking a cigar one of them big Groucho Marks numbers, it was very incongruous I watched her for a full two minuets in amazement that is until she moved her head and it turned out it was actually a mole skin diary in her mouth.

listening to my ipod the track under pressure by Queen (ft David Bowie) came up after itself which got me to thinking I have paid for that track three times (once on channel four's music of the millennium two disk set and twice on the queen greatest hits set) what a rip off I have made a decision from now on I’m only gona buy music that I don't already own.

Silent chairs (like musical but without a vital part)

Today was a crowed bus day so I resigned myself to sharing the seat with a middle aged woman who has a daughter. To my delight she got (with her daughter) of in the middle of no wear to my horror immediately a bloke got off another seat and sat next to me! I know I’m piece of ass but this really is beyond the pail (he spent the rest of the ride looking the other way almost as if he was intimidated by my statuesque good looks so pretended to talk to his friend with whom he alighted the bus and had not had a chance to talk to until the seat move incident), just think of the blog of the bloke who was sitting next to the guy who got up to sit next to me. Will he feel liberated or shunned? Is he unaware of the revolutions that are a daily occurrence in the labs of Gillette, right guard and lynx? Maybe we will never know the answers to these questions (I recon I will know the answers eventually). Maybe I should just get on with my bus ride listen to my ipod and be less of a Judgey Mcjudge.

Private scratch I wish

Imagine if you will a length of twine or string with a loop in it now picture it bigger and made out of tarmac, there you have the bus station at work. Every day after work I get to my stop about five minuets before the bus is supposed to arrive (the bus actually arrives between five and half past) and everyday the number 1 to broomhill or sumsuch approaches the station, on the opposite spur of twine to the one my bus uses to get to my stop, but because it is the only other bus route that uses the same model as my bus I think for one fleeting moment that maybe due to roadworks/ bureaucracy /driver incompetence my bus may for once be on time and I may arrive home in good time. Again today no such luck

On the way into work I as usual paid my £5.10 fair with a £10 note and 10 pence this time the new driver said that he would give me my change at the end of the ride. The ride finished uneventfully I walked to the driver and asked for the change he took out a role of £5 notes I watched everyone get on the bus and pay (7 people as it was not a peak time ride) not one used a £5 note that means that he had many of these notes when I got on but just did not want to give me them. I have no doubt that he was an evil man with no good in his heart.

On the way home the battery died on my ipod so the journey was quite odd. The light that says bus stopping was stuck on which is fine for people like me who did not have ipods on but for every one else it must have been quite confusing for a good 15-20 minuets. I dont have crabs but I do on occasion scratch my genitals (testicles and penis) when I have a day of work I spend about 1 hour 20 minuets on the bus that is 6% of my day so naturally I rarely but sometimes scratch myself on the bus. Today was one of those times but today I managed to do it when the only other person on the bus (an old learned man I would call Leonard) was watching me. What are the chances? I spend a lot of my day not being watched I spend most of my bus ride not being watched but the one time during the day that I indulge in a scratch I am being observed and judged.

The Green'un

The green'un snack van that I pass everyday has changed its colour from green to maroon. However the name remains the same, the car is also still green perhaps he is waiting for a maroon car to change the name and thus complete the transition. Or maybe its a copyright issue.

Old grass

I like old people I really do, they are wise funny pragmatic and many other virtuous attributes. Obviously I only say this (I do actually believe it but I only say it here) because of what I am about to say (and what I said in a previous entry). I understand why old people move so slow, I understand why old people sit at the front of the bus, I even understand why old people take so long to carry out the normally fairly speedy transaction of buying a ticket. However one thing seams to have slipped through the net that is my comprehension (your comprehension may be abit out of whack at the mo cos of my appalling sentence structure) is why when it takes them so long to get on, buy the ticket, and sit down why o why o why do they then spring up immediately as the bus stops and take an age to get off the bus. These people were young once they know we go to the back of the bus so they can sit on the front cos it harder for them to move around, they know that they get the best seats and half fairs and make the bus late due to dithering. The least they can do is wait for us people who have jobs to be late for to get off before they do.

At the bus stop on the high street today was not unusual in that there were a lot of people waiting for the bus so it took abit of time to fill. What was unusual is that an old lady got up when the bus stopped waddled very slowly (not in a funny way in a heart wrenching way cos you could tell she was putting a hell of a lot of effort into it and in quite abit of pain) to the post box at the stop and then got back on the bus. It made me feel very lucky with my mobility. (oh big tone shift there wasnt it)

No old people on the way home. It was a sunny day very pleasant in temperature and ambiance so at the point of me getting off the bus I decided that I would mow the lawn tomorrow, I looked forward to getting up early getting dressed in gardening clothes dusting down the trusty mower after its annual hibernation unfurling the cherry red cord and setting out to my first cut of the spring I would get all those dandy lions probably have to empty the box 2 or 3 times my reward would be a newly cut lawn and that smell of freshly cut grass I could almost smell it as I turned the corner. My dad was mowing the lawn. (that actually happened)

Speed kills (pride)

Today the bus was going to fast and had to break hard so it did not overshoot my stop (I rang the bell at exactly the same point in to road, just after the stop before mine so as to avoid this exact instance). I was just getting up to expedite my disembarkation. I nearly fell over due to the suddenness of the breaking. Turns out it’s not so funny when it happens to you.