| 3/31 | ||
| Last month sometime I found a 31 Day bus pass that still had a couple weeks left on it. So when I turned it in as lost and found, I checked the box to return it to me if no one claimed it. I figured I'd give it to a random passenger if it was still good when I got it back. | ||
| I got it about ten days later. In addition to the card, there was a ring in the envelope. I didn't turn in the ring. It was a cheap ring (very visible seam, super light, etc.) and I didn't want it. I told the dispatcher that I hadn't turned it in and gave it back, in case another driver claimed it. | ||
| About a week later, the dispatcher told me I had lost and found. It was the ring again. I laughed and explained that I never turned it in, I didn't want it, etc. | ||
| Another week went by and the dispatcher handed me the ring again. I laughed again and repeated the story. | ||
| So today when the dispatcher told me I had lost and found and it was the ring again, I threw it away. | ||
| It was a chilly, but very nice day today. There were a lot of people out and about. I saw Carl, who I worked with at Kincaid's. I was at a stoplight, so we didn't really get to talk much. And I saw da Mons. I drive by da Mons' house five times every Sunday and beep my horn. I saw one of his tenant/roommates, John, last week and again today. The next time past his house, da Mons and John were outside. I had an empty bus, so I stopped and talked for a little while. | ||
| At the first stop of my last trip, I saw a 60-something guy and thought, "That guy looks like a stereotypical Minnesotan." He had on old dress shoes, jeans, a purple and gold letter jacket (unadorned) and a scarf. He had big grey hair parted on the side and combed back and thick black-rimmed glasses. He boarded my bus and delivered one of the more amazing monologues I've had the pleasure of hearing. I really need to get a little tape recorder for occasions like that. It was ostensibly a conversation, but I never got more than four words in before that gave him something else to talk about. He primarily talked about the buses, winter parking, meter maids, and the riots in North Minneapolis in the '60s. He was on the bus for about forty action-packed minutes. | ||
| 3/29 later | ||
| Uneventful day on the 18, so here are some fun things to look at. If you're like my parents and are tired of hearing me cry about W and his cronies, you might not think they're very interesting. Well, the second one should be safe. | ||
| Thanks to Eric for this one. You'll need to turn up the sound. | ||
| Mike in Omaha sent me this URL. Funny. | ||
| And if you haven't read enough about Halliburton yet, read this. (Thanks, Mand.) | ||
| 3/29 | ||
| In case you were wondering, I'm the yahoo who was passing out bad transfers yesterday. I failed to notice that the date on my farebox was set to 3/21, basically making all the transfers that came out of it a week old. At least one other driver refused to take them and made about a dozen people pay. (Again.) | ||
| I had the opportunity to "help an old soldier" and buy a DVD of Friday, the first of the three (so far) Cube 'n the hood comedies, that he couldn't return at Target. He was hopping mad and telling anyone within earshot all about it. I passed... | ||
| 3/26 | ||
| Two of my favorite passengers rode the 17 with me this afternoon. They're a couple of older guys and they always have a piece of candy for me. One of them isn't doing very well at all. He's having difficulty walking and talking and he has lesions on his face that don't seem to be healing. I hate to think the worst, but of course, I have. | ||
| I didn't have my game face on today. I was really out of it. I told a guy that I wasn't going to University and Central when, in fact, I was. I still feel bad about that. Hopefully a 10 came along soon. | ||
| I saw Shichinin no samurai (Seven Samurai) yesterday at the Uptown Theatre. It was 3½ hours long. I really enjoyed it. I think I'll rent The Magnificent Seven soon to compare. | ||
| If you live or ever have lived in the Twin Cities, you might be interested in this. If you live in Omaha or Rock Island, you might like it, too. I voted for the Baron von Raschke. | ||
| The Baron was my favorite wrestler when I was in junior high. I quit watching wrestling when Hulk Hogan won the WWF championship after being completely unable to defeat Nick Bockwinkle for the AWA belt. (How bogus was that?) So I guess it's safe to say Baron von Raschke is my all-time favorite wrestler. | ||
| And for some reason, you're supposed to be 21 to look at that Grain Belt site. I licked my monitor twice and I can't say I've caught any kind of buzz. | ||
| 3/24 | ||
| I checked my NCAA tournament picks this morning. I played three online brackets this year: Yahoo, ESPN, and a private one run by some of Corey's coworkers. I put in $5.20 for that last one. I'm in no danger of taking anyone's money. I'm not really much of a fan of basketball, I just like to make picks. | ||
| So, do you watch Fox News? Do you mind that they happily lie to you? Check it out. Not that anyone reading this really thinks we get any solid news from any of the big guys anyway... right? Well, it seems that growing numbers of Americans are starting to look elsewhere for their news. And while we're at it, check out this open letter to my close personal friend Bill O'Reilly from one of his guests. | ||
| Um, after all that, here's something to make you smile. | ||
| 3/23 | ||
| Today is the day I'm not too happy with my schedule. | ||
| The score looked like this: Fun things CJ got to do in the last couple days, 1. Fun things CJ didn't get to do in the last couple days, 3. |
||
| The one thing I got to do was have brunch with some former Cambusers. Jessica, Jeff and Janet were visiting some friends here. It was great to see them. I've kept in touch with Jess, but I didn't necessarily expect to ever see Jeff and Janet again. | ||
| Regrettably, I missed: 1) my grandfather's 90th birthday party, 2) a chance to see my friends Mary and Annette, and 3) an Oscar party at Wyatt and Tina's house. Well, OK, me at an Oscar party is usually a lot like most of the women at our typical Super Bowl party. I just don't care. But I cared a little this year. Manda's husband Pete was up for one. I see he didn't get it. He'll have more shots at one. |
||
| I drove the 6 today. A Camp Ojibway camper got on my bus at Southdale. She was on the phone. She got off my bus at 31st Street. She was still on the phone. I didn't get to dazzle her (or, as usually happens, freak her out) with my impressive memory tricks. | ||
| 3/22 later | ||
| I just got home from a nice full day of the 18. | ||
| Driver Groupie found me. I told her that she could ride with me for a little while. She didn't even make a full round trip. I can live with that. I don't think she knows that I picked work yet. But she'll probably see me next week at the same place and start to figure it out. Oh well. | ||
| A guy got on my bus at my layover at 56th and Lyndale. He admitted to me that he had been drinking. That wasn't much of a secret. But he was a happy drunk, so I wasn't too annoyed. As he was fumbling through his pockets, he pulled the grip of a handgun part way out. Best not to say anything about that... He talked to me the whole way up to Franklin and Nicollet. | ||
| He told me about stealing $3200 from his older brother when he was about 10. Apparently his brother stole safes. Anyway, this guy treated all the other kids in the neighborhood to ice cream. Then his brother found him. He made him tell him where it was, then gave him $20 for finding such a good hiding place. | ||
| He told me how, as an adult, he gave the same brother one of his best suits. Raw silk, navy with pinstripes. He said that he had on a black pinstriped suit and people told him he looked good, but that his brother looked even better. He finally came around to saying that the occasion was his brother's funeral. | ||
| 3/22 | ||
| Yesterday was, schedule-wise, the worst day of my week. I went in at 1:30pm and got done at 1:00am. I drove the 9, had about three hours off, then drove the 18. | ||
| The 9 was pretty eventful. | ||
| As I was driving into downtown Mpls on Glenwood Ave, I saw a girl, maybe 11, standing in an empty lot about 50 feet back from a bus stop. She was watching me approach, but didn't seem very interested. Then, as I was about to pass her, she kind of waved her hand and then I saw her grandmother (?) running our way. So I pulled over and waited for them to get on. The lady started to chew me out. "Didn't you see her? Why didn't you stop?" etc. I pointed out that the little girl wasn't really even close to the stop and that, um, I did stop and that's why she was on the bus. She settled down and even patted me on the shoulder and thanked me on her way off the bus. | ||
| School had just let out at Richard R. Green Central Park Community School, on 4th Avenue S. between 34th and 35th Streets just about the time I was driving by. As that page points out, that's where Central High used to be. Anyway, the intersection at 35th St. was abuzz with excited kids running around and screaming and ultimately congregating on the NE corner. Girl fight. It got broken up pretty quickly. | ||
| If you live someplace where you're fortunate enough to hear the National American University commercial jingle every twenty minutes on TV, you might appreciate that three girls sang it for my whole bus. | ||
| As I mentioned, I finished my day on the 18. I did the trip that goes south into Bloomington, almost to the Minnesota River. Not very many people ride that far. The stoplights are timed. I was tired. It felt a lot like when I used to drive from Sioux Falls to Minneapolis in the middle of the night. | ||
| 3/21 | ||
| I haven't seen the news this morning. Did we "win" yet? | ||
| I had a long day yesterday. But it wasn't too bad. I drove the 17 for a few hours, had a two-hour break, then drove the 18 for a few more. Things were pretty peaceful. I had quite a few talkative people on the 17, but I was driving an old bus. The old buses are really noisy. I couldn't hear much of what anyone was saying over all the rattling. So I just smiled and nodded a lot. I know one guy was mumbling about being 37 and getting drafted. He was drunk. And another guy was trying to figure out what Governor Pawlenty is thinking when he refuses to raise taxes. He was not drunk. | ||
| We're on high alert or red alert or something at the garage. I think the biggest change for me is that I'm now supposed to wear my photo ID while I'm on the property. To save on the hassle, I made an appointment at the tattoo place across the street from the garage to have it tattooed onto my forehead. | ||
| From the Way Too Much Information Department, I would like to publicly thank McNeil Consumer & Specialty Pharmaceuticals for their fine line of Imodium products. I couldn't have done it without 'em. | ||
| 3/19 | ||
| Well, we started it. And I do mean we started it. Thank goodness because I'm pretty sure Iraq was going to invade us next month. | ||
| I'm a pacifist. But I understand the concept of a just war. And I have no idea what the hell monkey boy thinks he's doing here. All I know is that Jackass W. Jackass is finally getting what he's been craving. It'll help take the sting out of not getting to trash Alaska. And speaking of Alaska, in a moment of fairness, I should point out that Norm Coleman, our Senator from MN, voted against the drilling. Nice job, Norm. You just bit the presidential hand that fed you. | ||
| I went to the Half Time Rec with Wyatt and Tina for St. Patrick's Day. The Irish Brigade and others were playing. A good time was had by all. Well, Tina didn't feel too well. We knew Casey, who is Tina's sister's boyfriend's roommate, would be there. Casey and I almost got into a fight with some kids down the street over a deck of cards that one of them sold me and Tina. It was about eight cards short, so Casey went back to get our money back or another deck. I went in case things got ugly. I wasn't going to be worth anything if things got really ugly, since I won't fight, but I was there to do some clear thinking. Things started to get ugly, but Casey and I both did some talking and we got a new deck and walked away unscathed. I can't remember the last time I went out/to a bar and thought that there might be a fight. It was probably when I lived in Sioux Falls, which has much more of a cowboy feel about it than many of its residents would probably like to admit. So it was a little strange to even have that thought cross my mind. | ||
| Today was my short day on the bus. I drove the 17 for four hours. It was quiet. | ||
| Then Eric and I went out for a burger. We played some cards at the 5-8 and watched the news. My friend Mel called me from Alex's phone in San Francisco. Nice to hear from her. | ||
| 3/17 12:17am | ||
| So I was telling my mom and dad and Aunt Judy about seeing the Daff last night and my mom remarked that it was amazing how often I run into him in a metropolitan area like this. And I thought that I don't really run into him all that often, considering he lives across Crosstown (Hwy 62) in Richfield about six blocks away. Then, while I was driving this afternoon, I thought about that conversation and I thought about a guy who I do see a lot, and not ever on my bus. I don't know this guy, but he's a very interesting-looking guy. He always has a scarf in his big curly hair and he often wears all black with little red loafers. And he has a pencil-thin mustache. If I had to guess his profession, I'd go with interior designer or hair stylist. And I see that it looks like I'm insinuating that he's gay but trying not to say it. He probably is, I guess, but if he wasn't, I suppose I might not be too surprised, either. Anyway. I see him everywhere. One day Wyatt and I were in the car and this guy crossed the street in front of us. Wyatt said, "Oh, there's that guy." He sees him a lot, too. So I had this string of thoughts in my head this afternoon and it culminated with the thought that I never see him on my bus. Three hours later, on my last trip of the night, that guy got on my bus. ha. | ||
| 3/16 9:58am | ||
| It looks like my Saturdays might be pretty decent. I met the bus at about 5:30pm to do the second part of my work and the guy I was relieving said, "Good luck! That work sucks!" I pressed him a bit, thinking that he'd done the piece that I was about to do, but he meant his shift. Um, yeah. It probably was busy during the afternoon, but it slowed down the whole time I was out there. | ||
| It warmed up a lot in the last couple days, and barring another arctic blast, it looks like we're heading into the Stinky Season. The smelly people have already begun to stink. | ||
| Since it was Saturday night, I got plenty of drunks on board. One guy thought he was going to get into a fight with another passenger. Fortunately, we were driving by some cops. I pointed them out and he settled down. | ||
| And one guy got on, patted me on the shoulder and said, "Hey, my man! Where have you been?" I think he might be the guy who patted me on the shoulder and told me I was a good driver a couple weeks ago. That was the first time I remember seeing him. As he was getting off, he asked me if I could do him a favor. I assumed he wanted a new transfer, but even better, he wondered if I could spot him a couple bucks. "You know I'm good for it." Uh, yeah, and be sure to tell the wife and kids I said hello. | ||
| But the best part of the night was after work. I was giving driver 2165 a ride home when I saw the man, the legend, the Daff waiting for a bus! He was headed to Perkins. On the way, he told me that his brother-in-law was recently in a car accident and the other driver told him that he had the left of way. "The left of way? THE LEFT OF WAY?!? I never heard of such a thing! The left of way!" I apologize if you've never met the guy and you can't appreciate the delivery of those lines. It was great to see him. He rides the 18 a lot and I'll be driving the 18 a lot, so I'm hoping to see more of him. | ||
| I dropped him off at 11:30 and I still had two things to do. First, I took Duke for a walk. Then I picked up Eric's girlfriend Nancy from the airport. | ||
| Then I went back to Duke's house and went to sleep. | ||
| 3/14 | ||
| I had a nice day at work. | ||
| I'm usually able to put 2 and 2 together. The company tries to be secretive about it, but I was paying attention. It's safe to say that I drove a bit of the 21 while the guy who usually drives it got (randomly) tested for drugs. And he was clean because he met me and took over after I had been driving for thirty minutes. (Yeah, it's not really very hard to figure out who's getting tested...) | ||
| Then I got sent on an S-98. Very exciting. I made a bus change. By the time I returned the bad bus to the garage and got a new one, I had about forty-five minutes left until I headed back to the garage. | ||
| And then I sat around and enjoyed the rest of the last call shift that I'll have for at least twelve weeks. Tomorrow I start my picked work. I think I'll be OK. | ||
| Tomorrow I also start Duke-sitting again. I'm watching him until Wednesday, which is the one-year anniversary of my slipping on the ice and fracturing my ankle on my way into the house to let Duke out. I'll be careful. | ||
| 3/13 | ||
| 'Cause I'm a fool for the city, I'm
a fool for the city, Fool for the city, I'm a fool for the city. |
||
| Let's see... | ||
| I drove the 18 today. I think a guy who tackled a woman and took her purse last week got on my bus, but the picture I saw of him was blurry so I couldn't tell for sure. All opportunities for action were lost when he got off a couple blocks later. | ||
| Someone had a bad day on the bus yesterday. Those links don't tell much, I guess. Sorry. I don't know any more than that. My mom suggested in an email that I watch out for trucks running red lights, so that must be what happened. I refuse to watch the local "news." That must be where she heard about it. | ||
| Eric and I caught a matinee showing of Old School yesterday. I can't say it's a good movie, but I can tell you that we both laughed hard and often. It's definitely worth the $5 we paid. |  Alex. He's Haitian. |
|
| My friend and former roommate Alex called me last night from California. He's doing well. It was great to talk to him. Hope he doesn't mind me putting this picture up... | ||
| Tomorrow is my last day on the extra board. At least for twelve weeks. I'm on call at 1:00pm. Love it. | ||
| Well, I think it's time for Home Movies on Cartoon Network. | ||
| 3/11 | ||
| I finally started a links page today. | ||
| 3/10 | ||
| And then he dropped off the face of the earth. | ||
| I got a new modem today. My old one wasn't making the cable connection and I've been internet-free for a couple days. So I signed Mark's name on the dotted line and traded in the old Toshiba PCX2200 for a new PCX2500. | ||
| It's not like there was a lot to report anyway. I don't have any notes in my calendar from the last few days at all. Except a note to myself to check out these guys. Fellow driver Ryan made their site, his is here, naturally. And that's a cool site. | ||
| And this is pretty cool, too. | ||
| I drove the 18 for a while today and I went up to NE. The other night I told Paul and Jolana about a regular rider who I haven't seen for a while. I always assumed he rode the 18 a lot because I saw him quite often and I wasn't driving it regularly. | ||
| He looked like Rob Halford minus the goatee and he told me that he used to work for the railroad. He also told me that he had stomach cancer. And I wonder where he is. | ||
| 3/6 much later | ||
| ha! It's the librarians! Should've known they'd find me sooner or later. | ||
| I got a call from Tina this afternoon to tell me that she and Wyatt told Dan and Teresa about this mess. (I didn't know that they didn't know.) I assume Dan told Chris and Chris told Jessamyn, who can be found here. Thankfully, one of the librarians was nice enough to tell me where she'd seen it. Check that site out. It actually looks nice and stuff... | ||
| I was on call at noon today. I (sort of) volunteered to Connect-the-Drunks on the 2 until 11:05. And I was mildly disappointed. I only picked up one really drunk guy who didn't pay his fare. | ||
| I had to make relief at 1:29 at Nicollet and Franklin, so I stopped in to the Acadia Cafe for a bite to eat and a small chai. One of the baristas was clearly a little rattled by some of the new artwork that was on exhibit. He asked several fellow employees if they liked it and even asked one guy if they should "censor" it. He said, "This kid seems to really be into breasts and dismemberment," at least twice. Um, the stuff on that wall is more cartoonish than most comic books. And I noticed one pair of breasts. It'll be OK, dude. | ||
| The one bit of excitement on the bus, besides my sweet fishtail rounding the corner onto 8th Street SE, involved a sight-impaired guy. We were heading eastbound on Franklin. Unbeknownst to me, he needed to catch a southbound 22 on Portland Avenue. A 22 crossed Franklin in front of me and pulled over, very possibly to wait for this guy. I was checking my mirrors to pull away from the curb and cross Portland when a guy on my bus shouted. I let him out and he ran into a big empty lot where the sight-impaired guy was wandering around. My helpful guy was shouting at the 22 and running that poor sight-impaired guy to the bus. Some folks on the 22 had also seen him and a lady was getting off that bus to go get him. Between the guy from my bus and the lady from the 22, he got on OK. | ||
| Oh, and we got some snow this evening. I wasn't going fast enough to fishtail on dry pavement. And there was enough caffeine in that chai that I'm still a bit jittery. And I have to get up at 5:30 in the morning. | ||
| And I see, because there's a copy next to my keyboard, that Mark Wagner's highly-anticipated debut CD is done. It's called Pages and you can listen to a few tracks at mp3.com. | ||
| I think there was more, but I have to get up in five hours. Oh. Hannah is quite the cute baby. | ||
| 3/6 | ||
| I'm going to leave for work shortly. But something strange is going on here. After weeks and weeks of averaging 20-25 hits per day, yesterday I got 273. And I'm at 96 today as I write this. Does anyone have an idea how this happened? Is someone trying to hack my site? Are you reading this for the first time? How did you get here? Someone give me an idea... | ||
| 3/5 | ||
| I've had a nice weekend. I went over to da Mons' house last night. We had originally planned to go downtown, but I sort of wussed out. I was really tired. | ||
| Today I read to my friend Angie's 1st grade class. I started with The Mysteries of Udolpho, but they didn't seem too interested. Fortunately, I also brought along The Incredible Painting of Felix Clousseau by Jon Agee and Squids Will Be Squids by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith. It was really fun. I miss hanging out with kids and I'll probably get back there. |  |
|
| And tonight I'm going to meet Paul and Jolana's new daughter Hannah. | ||
| 3/3 | ||
| Hey, it's 3/3/3! Yeah! Among about three other things, I heard the world was going to end today. We've got an hour and a half to go, I guess. | ||
| Other crazy things: | ||
| I was on 2:00pm call today. That's 3/3 of an hour before 3:00 and and 3/3 of an hour and three minutes before 3/3/3/3:03! | ||
| I got an email from my old friend and boss Gordon at 3:33 this afternoon! | ||
| I'm on my second beer of the evening. That's 3/3 of a beer short of three beers! | ||
| There were three of us talking at the garage who knew who the Driver Groupie is! | ||
| I got a sandwich for a friend at Subway this evening and she ordered three different sauces! | ||
| I drove the 156 today. If you add those numbers together and divide by three, you get... four, which is 3/3 more than 3! | ||
| I can't wait for June 6, 2006! | ||
| 3/2 | ||
| Another early morning, though I got to sleep in until 4:30 today. | ||
| I drove the 17, then the 18. | ||
| I saw the 17 Lady waiting for a southbound bus when I was on my way north. There was a southbound bus before mine and I was a bit disappointed. Imagine my joy when, southbound, I turned the corner onto Central Avenue and saw her standing there! She had to stop at the Holiday Station before she went downtown. Sadly, it's been too long since I talked to her last and she didn't really remember me this time. But I did find out that she was going to Irv's for spaghetti today. | ||
Well, I guess I have about this
much  patience for whiny, bigoted ladies. At least that
was it today. A 40ish lady got on the 18 downtown. I think there were two other people on
board. She asked me if this was a loud bus, because if it was, she was going to get loud
back. I knew what she meant, but I couldn't resist playing the dumb game. I told her that
the brakes were really loud and squeaky. We had a sitcom conversation for about a block
with her talking about loud passengers and me talking about the brakes. Her end of the
conversation got rather unbearable very quickly when I realized that by loud, rude, noisy
people she meant black people. <sigh> I get a lot of that crap being a white guy
who's a captive audience. Anyway, the lady was clearly looking for a battle and she found
one. Sort of. A couple of black women were carrying on a conversation across the aisle and
she started in on them. Honestly, I could tell that they were talking, but I couldn't make
out what they were saying. In other words, their voices were at normal conversation level.
Well, the bitchy lady started in on them. "It's too bad your mothers never taught you
any manners!" They basically told her to shut up, then ignored her. She came up to
the front, mumbled something about "trash" and eventually struck up a
conversation about rude people with some other folks, speaking at least as loud as the two
women in the back. Naturally. |
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| 3/1 | ||
| I got up at 2:45 this morning. Fortunately, I had gone to bed early and got a decent amount of sleep. When I got ready to leave the house at 3:40, I opened the back door and went back into the kitchen to turn off the light. On my way, I heard something that I thought was the door being pushed by a draft or maybe the wind. Then I heard a voice say, "I'll take over the morning shift at this house." That's when an expletive very loudly made its way out of my mouth. It was just Mark coming home... | ||
| I drove ten hours of the 18 today. it wasn't too bad, really. I had two half-hour layovers early on, so I got a couple naps. | ||
| I don't really admit to many people that I spent some time working at the Olive Garden. (And even putting it here, I still haven't admitted it to too many...) When I was there, I wrote a book called Raising Children the Olive Garden Way: Child-Rearing Tips From Olive Garden Customers. For instance, here is a popular method for dealing with misbehaving kids. Say: "If you don't start behaving, we're going to leave you here." | ||
| I'm working on a companion book called Raising Children the Metro Transit Way: Child-Rearing Tips From Metro Transit Passengers. This book won't quite appeal to the suburban sophisticate the way the OG one does, though. | ||
| Tried-and-true gems like "Shut up!" and "Sit your ass down!", while certainly effective, aren't quite as mind-twisting as the one offered by a sagacious gentleman who I overheard one night at the Olive Garden in Sioux Falls. After sitting for three hours and several refills of his never-ending pasta bowl, he demonstrated a clever way to work over a five-year-old's head. His son was quietly playing on the floor next to their table in an otherwise completely empty room. A hostess, seeing that the child was bored, but clearly behaving very well, gave him a balloon. And his dad said, "You don't get to keep it because you're naughty." Beautiful in its simplicity, no? |