Bus Report #473

I know I've been slacking. Let's blame National Novel Writing Month, and leave it at that.
Not much going on with my commutes lately. The usual gang of loud kids, regulars, and crazy people of varying degrees.

This morning there was a crazy bible thumper on my 22 Fillmore. No, really, and nothing against decent church-going folk, but this guy was having a very interesting silent conversation with himself, gesticulating (in what actually looked like very deliberate, choreographed motions) to the people sitting across from him, the people sitting back where I was sitting, and to himself. He crossed himself in the manner of old Italian priests from horror films, very seriously, with lots of looping hand gestures.
And then there was the bible.
He had a black regular book-size bible in his left hand. He would tap it on his shoulders, his head, his thigh, the seat beside him, sometimes twisting his arm in uncomfortable-looking ways just to get a good thump out of it.
No one sat near him.

Yesterday morning on my way to the bus stop I passed a pile of trash on the side of the street. An old foosball (sp?) table was balanced on its side next to a pile of old pots and pans.
My heart leapt when I saw the handle of a small cast iron pan (readers may remember some older posts where I travel on the 38 with a cast iron I found on top of a trash can or the time I bought a cast iron at Community Thrift and took it on BART) peering out from under a scorched non-stick pan. Oh but I wanted that pan! I almost took it, too, before realizing I would have to carry it all the way to work and back home, and the bus was fast approaching. I hope someone else managed to scavenge it before the garbage truck came. Sigh.

Bus Report #472

Random observations.

Friday night - The Halloween revelers were already out in force. Strange, but in this city it is so hard to tell who is in costume and who is in their everyday wear. Was the guy in the BERKELEY sweatshirt a Berkeley student, or was he dressed up as one? Was the harried-looking tranny just on her way home from a tough day at work, or was she really just a man in a dress and messy wig? We'll never know.

This morning - The time change makes it sunny when I leave the house and I am not used to it, yet. My 38L was full. Everyone was quiet, either staring off into space or fiddling with an igadget. The woman sitting next to me drank hot tea out of a jam jar. The woman across from me lost her grip on her hot pink travel mug and it fell on the floor and rolled to my feet. I picked it up and handed it back to her, and she nodded at me in thanks.

At Fillmore I waited with a guy wearing a White Glove Services T-shirt, and I wondered what kind of high-end furniture he would be moving today. We got on the 22 and I sat alone, up against the window. After a while, the bus filled up with teenagers on their way to Mission High.

The kid sitting in front of me has always been a curiosity to me. He acts like he's crazy half the time, talking to himself, laughing for no reason, and the other half of the time he is making eyes at the girls. He actually bats his eyes at them and presses his lips together, and they seem to like it. He told my seatmate, another teenager, about a conversation he had with his toddler son.

For the past two days, the same woman has been getting out at Dolores. She has the same metallic blue hot cup from a cafe in Austin, TX that I do. Seeing someone else clutching that cup jolted me, and when I got to work yesterday I immediately checked to see if the cup was still in my drawer. It was. What an odd coincidence. The cup was a gift from a friend who used to live in Austin, and I have never been in the cafe before.

In front of the Roxie a youngish man with great, thick curly hair readjusted his duffel bag and when he did, his T-shirt rode up exposing his back tattoo. I didn't get a good look but it was small, with fine black lines. It looked good against his milky-coffee-colored skin.

Valencia Street is still all torn up. In the window at Abandoned Planet Books, the lights twinkled like the stars I rarely see in my neighborhood.

Muni Diaries Under The Influence - Awesome!

Thanks to Muni Diaries for such a fun night and thanks to everyone who showed up! Great costumes and attitudes all around. All the acts were great. It was especially great to meet people like Julie, the brains behind I Live Here: SF.
Thanks again, Muni Diaries, hope we meet again soon.

Meanwhile, here is a photo of my Muni-themed cupcakes I made in honor of the night...

Muni Diaries Under The Influence, This Friday!

Did you come to the fun Muni Diaries event in June? Did you have the best time ever? Did you miss the event and wish you hadn't? Well, either way you are in luck.
This Friday, Oct. 30 at the Make Out Room Muni Diaries is doing it again.
Here are the details, but suffice it to say we will have a fabulous time and you will leave the event happier than you arrived.
I hope to read something funny and I think I might bring some cupcakes (first come first served, of course!) for us to enjoy.
See you then? I hope so!
Thanks Muni Diaries. Fog City Notes thinks you're cute and dreamy.

Bus Report #471

On the 44 O'Shaughnessy yesterday afternoon, I saw one of the creepiest interactions I've seen on Muni and there was nothing I could do about it.
A girl got on at Lincoln and 9th, a college student, I guessed. She was very drunk and maybe on something, and she stumbled down the aisle and finally landed in the lap of an open-mouthed young man who did not seem to mind. He looked pretty average: early 20s, baggy clothes, sideways baseball cap for an out of state team.
The girl had long wavy hair, a tank top, shorts and mid-calf-high cowboy boots. She had dime-shaped bruises on her legs. I got the feeling she had been up all night and was heading home to one of the USF dorms in my neighborhood.
She flirted with the open-mouthed boy and he flirted back, put his arm around her shoulder and gave her his igadget to fool with. He brought his face close to hers and talked to her in a low voice. She kissed him and then giggled.
Now, maybe I'm in the minority here, but she was obviously impaired and any decent guy (I imagine), even if he was super excited to have this chick fall all over him, should have just sat back, kept his hands to himself, and NOT taken advantage of the out-of-it girl.
Open-mouth boy asked her if she'd like to borrow his igadget so she could, "put some of your own music on it, then like, we could get together and you could give it back."
She giggled, said something I couldn't hear, slurring her words together.
He offered her some of his juice and she drank it.
He tried to impress her, asking her what music she liked besides rap (because she told him she didn't like rap and that he should listen to something else).
The whole thing was creepy and I wasn't the only person thinking so. The woman in front of me turned in her seat and raised her eyebrows at me. I just shrugged.
I hoped that he would get out first, but he didn't.
"You getting out at Geary?" he asked her.
"Clement, actually," she said.
They both got out together at the last stop.
I hope she made it home okay, and without him.
Is there anything any of us could have done in this situation? It definitely felt like an unsafe situation for her. Potentially.

Bus Report #470

My 38 this morning was not very crowded, and it was quiet.
Except for the ogler, who stood up from his seat and went up to our driver, leaned over her shoulder and said something that I didn't hear, but I am sure it was something he wanted her to laugh at. I wouldn't have let him get that close. Especially if I was driving a huge bus. But our poor driver didn't deserve it.
Man. That ogler. He's a menace.

At Fillmore I waited for the 22 with one of the regulars, a nice older lady who must be a nurse or someone else in the medical field. She always wears pink scrubs. The bus came and I hung back for a minute so she could get on first. I sat behind a hulk of a man in a plaid shirt (plaid's back! Who else is excited?).
The ogler got on at the next stop. He got a prime seat in the front, perfect for stalking the unprepared older ladies on their way to work that he so loves.
A guy with a backpack, big headphones and dark sunglasses got on at McAllister and immediately started to open all the windows.
I was glad because the bus was stuffy, and I'd already opened the windows right near my seat.
He sat down, then jumped up and moved to a different seat, and opened more windows.
The ogler got up, shut a few of the windows, and sat back down.
Sunglasses man stood up and moved seats for a third time, opened another window.
The ogler shook his head and tried to engage two older ladies in conversation. Wisely, they ignored him.

Bus Report #469

I caught a 3 Jackson tonight, why not, the weather was good and I was in no hurry.
The Marina-type sitting in front of me took her igadget out of her bag and not-too-stealthily took a photo of an aging punk/leather man who was trying to loop his headphones through one of the buckles on his jacket. I couldn't figure out why she took the picture, and wondered what she would do with it.
The bus was almost empty by the time we skirted the park and pulled in to the Divisadero stop.
An elderly man got on. He held a wrinkled plastic bag in one hand and his cane in the other. He leaned heavily on his cane as he got in and sat down across from the driver. He had a black watch cap pulled down over his ears and a non-descript but slightly dirty winter coat on, and a plaid scarf.
His best accessory, though, was his smile: it was so wide it made his eyes crinkle.
He took a bright green apple out of his bag and tossed it in the air, caught it, then slowly stood up and hobbled over to the driver. He smiled even wider and handed the apple to the driver without a word. He sat back down and looked over at me. I couldn't help but smile back.

Bus Report #468

This morning I waited for the bus with the usual early morning regulars. Our fedora-wearing driver pulled up and I got on.
We booked it down to Fillmore, getting there earlier than usual.
I waited in the dark with a couple of people, watched the lights come on further down Geary.
When the 22 came, I was glad to see Carmen sitting in her usual spot, a seat saved for me, just in case.
We caught up on the latest gossip. All is well in her world. I watched her fold her igadget into a case, then into another case, then into a drawstring bag, then into her backpack.
The ogler sat a few rows up from us, ogling some of the ladies that get on at McAllister. I felt bad for them, and hoped they would ignore him.
At Mission Street the exit-door-blocking postal workers got on and blocked the exit door.
Walking to work from the coffee shop, I passed the garage (open but silent), and kept going. For the first time in days, no one was sleeping under the overpass.

Bus Report #467

Tonight, everyone on Muni was in a good mood. It was weird: People gave up their seats to elderly and disabled folks, no one minded when babies were crying, and the teenagers were more subdued than usual, and quiet.
A man with crutches got on and sat in one of the front seats. A few stops later, a blind man with a cane got on, and the man with the crutches slid over and guided the blind man into a seat. They shared a laugh, and it was nice.
There was a mom with a very flirty, adorable baby girl. The baby kept waving at everyone and at one point she toddled across the aisle to a woman who sat with her grade-school age daughter. The baby put her arms up and the woman lifted her onto her lap.
"Sorry about that," said the baby's mom, embarrassed.
"No, it's nothing," said the other woman. Meanwhile, the baby had climbed over to the daughter's lap and they were playing together. So cute.
A teenage girl in black clothes (including a sweatshirt that said: SENIORS on it) came and sat next to me. She had lots of eye makeup and a few facial piercings, and a huge beat-up backpack. I smiled at her and she smiled back.