~Tuesday~ Hooray for today, as the university fall Wolfline schedule went into effect, which means four times more buses running about three times more often than over the summer. With that said, I didn’t take a Wolfline bus into work this morning.
I was rushed, however, to get to the city bus stop by 8:15, but I made it in time after all. Stagnant Driver (now an officially named buscapade character—can’t believe I’ve waited this long, actually) was at the helm, and the bus lived up to her name. Stagnant.
As if playing a cosmic joke on me, one of the three people already on the bus when I boarded had one of these sitting on the floor next to their seat:
If I’d only had a plug. Mercifully, the air came on at the corner of Kaplan and Gorman, which is just down the street from where I boarded.
A couple of students boarded along Gorman street, all sporting their brand-spanking new, shiny white and green GoPass cards, which went into effect yesterday.
School’s back in session, which means the dining halls are open again and Logorrhea boarded with her name badge on that said University Dining on it along with her name. She sat way in the back, but of course, I could hear, word-for-word, her entire conversation, which was non-stop the entire trip.
This sign, which I’ve shared before, is displayed in the front of the bus over the fare machine:
|
For passengers‘ safety, federal law |
Today I have two things to say about it:
- Stagnant Driver stepped on the gas this morning even while a Hispanic woman was “standing forward of the yellow line” right under that sign still depositing her coins.
- The word “passengers” calls for an apostrophe after it. Also, I would put a comma after that introductory clause. Because I care so deeply, I’ve dutifully added both above.
And today’s buscapade ends with a near-miss crash. Stagnant Driver became Totally Distracted Stagnant Driver for a minute on Hillsborough Street, looking over and frantically trying to get the attention of a guy at the wheel of a truck stopped at an intersection waiting to turn onto Hillsborough Street—someone she evidently knew and thought it was important enough to risk about 20 lives to say hey to. She turned back just in time to slam on the brakes and keep the car in front of us from getting a trunk full of bus.
At about 9:30, my officemate mentioned something about our weekly staff meeting, which was supposed to be from 9:00-10:00. I’d totally forgotten about it, as did our manager evidently. She came around not long after that and the three of us agreed that we could forgo it for this week.
In the afternoon, my colleague and friend, Jen, and I were having a work-related conversation on our work instant message system, and I was kidding her about something after which I said, “I love you!” And she messaged back this affirmation, which is particularly poignant to me considering I’ve been working with her coming up on two years now:
| You know, every now and then I look at you and think “Dude it is so unbelievably AWESOME that we hired John and I get to work with him every day!” |
And then she added, “And I’m not just saying that to get in your blog.” Thanks, Jen! I love working with you, too! Fun, fun, fun!
I wanted to catch the 5:00 bus home, but at 5:05 noticed the time (I see a trend here), and thought, “Damn!” Two seconds later Jen instant messaged me asking me if I wanted a ride home. Right on time!
After grabbing a quick turkey burger for dinner at home, I headed to the gym, which is where Jen went directly after dropping me off. I did an upper body workout, followed by 150 ab crunches. I know both my abs and my arms are going to be killing me tomorrow.
There are two identical machines that both work “Chest Pecs” and “Rear Delts,” and which they have facing one another. When you use the machine facing out, you exercise your rear delts, and when you use it facing in, you exercise your pecs. I was working pecs, and there was someone on the other machine also working pecs, which meant that we were staring at each other when we did look at one another.
There are bars in the way, around which you can manipulate your head in such a way that it’s difficult for the other person to be definitely sure if you’re looking at them or not. This is what I was doing while I tried to figure out if the person facing me was a man or a woman. A quick check of armpits—afforded by the tank top—didn’t help, as they were hairless.
The person finished their workout, and then walked around behind me and my machine, and tapped me from behind on my left shoulder while I was in the middle of a set.
“Drop this shoulder,” the person said tapping it.
At first I just ignored this, but then three more taps, a little more firmly, garnered my attention.
“Drop this shoulder; it’s too tense. You’ll get a better workout with it relaxed.”
This series of thoughts went through my head:
- You talking to me?
- I don’t remember asking anybody for workout advice.
- And your qualifications would be?
- I’m pretty sure you’re a woman, but your gender has nothing to do with anything, so I’m just going to acknowledge your humanity.
- I’m going to take the higher road here, and interpret this as a helpful and caring gesture, as opposed to one of presumption, criticism, condescension, or arrogance.
“Thank you,” I said.
Not long after Jen did, I left the gym, and after a quick stop in the next door grocery store, I went to Jen’s house. She offered me some Red Stag bourbon by Jim Beam, which she’d tasted (and loved) at the Beer & Bourbon Festival she attended recently. It was most delicious, and after a quick taste “straight up,” I had some with Diet Coke—”bourbon & Diet” being my “drink of choice.” I popped a bag of popcorn, which I ate while she had her dinner.
We had plans to watch three episodes of Glee, thinking that would finish off the first half of the season, or in Glee parlance, “take us to sectionals.” But at the beginning of the third episode, it occurred to Jen that something wasn’t quite right—some things that she knew happened before sectionals hadn’t yet happened. Turns out there were 13, not 12, episodes in the first half of the season, so we had to watch a fourth episode to see the Sectionals episode. Which we did.
So, we watched Ballad, Hairography, Mattress, and Sectionals. That mid-season finale, Sections, finally resolved two things I’ve been waiting for for quite some time now—the issues around Quinn’s and Terri’s babies. Yay!
I left close to midnight, looking forward to seeing the remaining nine episodes as time permits over the next few weeks. We won’t be able to watch any this weekend, as Jen will be out of town. Thanks, again, my friend, for sharing the show with me, and for just being you!