2-21-08 This Old, Cold World

The bus lumbers up to the frozen morning busstop, packed to the windows with commuters on their way to work, bodies and jackets and blank, bored, sad faces. In spite of this, more people do their eager best to get on, earning looks of disgust and exasperation from their fellow passengers. I have decided that I am not an animal, and so I let this bus go. There will be another bus, and besides, I don't really want to go to work that badly anyway.

1-23-08 L'esprit de l'escalier and the power of music

A woman on the bus looks askance at me after I accidentally brush her with my backpack to make room in the crowded aisle. I apologize, but I should have said, "Why don't you just go to work and beat up a co-worker for fun like you usually do instead of giving me attitude for trying to be courteous in a crowded city, ya bitch!"

The music on the Weather Channel today was the guitar solo from "Shine on You Crazy Diamond", which not only sorta made my day for some reason, but totally gave the lie to yesterdays post. I listened to my beloved iPod on random, and the good Lord saw fit to give me a slew of awesome tunes all in a row, including the Dambuilders, Mountain Goats, Wu Tang, Brad Paisley (feat. George Jones), Prince, and a bunch of others that also made me ridiculously happy, and helped to (hopefully) put the last nail in the coffin of this mood I've been carrying around like a sack of shit for the past three days or so.

1-5-08 out and about

Hang out at the bar after the show and Katie, Pete and I get clocked by these two hipster douchebags (one wearing a fedora!) who apparently didn't approve of our Williamsburg credentials. Katie offers to beat the shit out of them, but Pete kindly declines her generous offer.

We leave the bar at 12:30 to catch a bus back to Queens (unfortunately, it take you back to Queens, but on the plus side, if you've gotta go to Queens, at least it's direct), and the 12:37 almost roars past the bus stop where we stand huddled in the cold and rain, stopping only when I step directly into the road waving my hands and holding up my metrocard in the universal sign for "stop the fucking bus, I have to go back to Queens."

"What, you think I need a seeing eye dog or something?" says the bus driver as we clamber on board, and I successfully restrain myself from replying "Yes, actually, I think you do."

12-18-07 - scrabbling for change

I tore apart my room searching for the extra fifty cents that would ensure that I will be able to get on the bus to go to the airport tomorrow to fly to Phoenix for Christmas. For a good twenty minutes I looked under things, through things, I opened drawers and boxes, but no luck.

Finally, on a whim, I looked where I keep my old cassette tapes and, lo and behold, there were two quarters that probably hadn't seen the light of day for years. I walked around the room in a big circle, laughing maniacally to myself, thinking "That may be the last money I have in this world, right now."