Why I Hate Public Transport*

*this will not be politically correct.

You've been jerked out of peaceful slumber by the screech of the alarm clock. You've scarfed down some breakfast and prepared your lunch. Somehow you've managed to put together an outfit that is incredibly chic and accessorized it perfectly. You've lumbered in a stupor of not-quite-completely-awake semi-consciousness to the bus stop.
That's when it starts to go downhill. There is a woman in a Cookies by George t-shirt standing there with two children approximately 84 months and 60 months old. They are clinging to her thighs like staticky socks fresh from the dryer. They are whining and being bratty. You fumble in a vain panic for the MP3 player that could tune them out and transport you via Bach to your happy place, but it's not there. It's laughing at you from the kitchen table where it sits beside your increasingly tepid and equally forgotten yogurt.
That was a true story.
The reasons to hate public transport begin right at the beginning - the bus stop itself can be a cesspool of expectorating degenerates, squawking rugrats and vacant-eyed clueless 'mothers'.
It comes as no surprise to me that almost anyone who has the means to drive to a destination would choose to eschew this proletarian utopia, rubbing shoulders and sometimes more personal places with the often literally unwashed masses.
After a long day at work the last thing I want to deal with is a crowded bus and that is one reason why I often walk home instead. Sometimes though despite one's best efforts it may be low-energy day or it might be pouring rain and so Transit Tom and I will have a date.
So here is a list of reasons why I hate public transit!

1) The welfare moms who despite being at their liberty, choose to go home from a day at the mall during rush hour. Their SUV-sized strollers demand the flipping up of at least three seats and often the kid isn't even in the thing. The cavity is filled instead by various shopping bags - usually from Dollarama, Giant Tiger and/or The Bargain Shop. The moms proceed to ignore aforementioned offspring by texting/talking on the cell phone or listening to tunes on their iPod. Passengers have the privilege of a running commentary on the journey from the prattling pre-verbal progeny or worse yet- the crying fit. Strangely, despite the shopping odyssey earlier, a soother seems to be the one thing nobody sells anymore.
I have seriously considered buying a half dozen of these things and keeping them in my bag. They could be plugged into gaping pieholes with or without permission where necessary.
2) Lack of personal hygiene - people who have had too much garlic at lunch, adult diaper wearers, and toters of colostomy bags included. There should be a body odour detector at the door of the bus. If you're too smelly, the doors close, an alarm sounds and the bus speeds away.
3) People who are not aware that wearing a huge backpack increases the amount of space they occupy, and other spatially-challenged individuals. When you are sitting in the aisle seat on a bus, your head is at exactly backpack and shoulder bag height. I can't count how many times I have been doofed by some stoned university or high school student who just happily breezes by me completely clueless.
4) Crazy people. a) Some of them talk to you. They don't make sense and they're scary.
b) Others try to get on the bus without paying a fare; they get into an argument with the driver and because he can't or won't argue and drive at the same time, you just sit there as the traffic signal goes from red to green to yellow to red to green to yellow to red...The kicker is that the driver almost always knuckles under in the end, so it's all for nothing.
5) Tards with or without attendant. See 4 a).
6) Lack of ventilation. Despite the bus being an extremely stinky place at the best of times, I seem to be one of the few passengers who have figured out how to open the window. Je ne comprends pas.

The powers that be are so far removed from us plebs that they can't understand why ridership continues to decline. I wonder when the last time a city councillor much less the mayor, rode a city bus - apart from a campaign photo-op publicity stunt that is.
Oy vey.

Bitch pleeze.

Random thoughts

Stainless steel is the avocado green of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

If the world had its head on straight the status and salaries of teachers and movie stars would be reversed.

Fancy schmancy packaged and designed gum is the new cigarette.


That's all for now.

Bitch pleeze.

Coco, a.k.a. Puffin, 1991 -2009

She fought. Maybe she wasn't ready. Maybe I wasn't ready. But it had to be done.

She had been ill with thyroid problems for several years and while she was on meds there had been a decline as of late.
She was old.
I had brought her home from the Humane Society in September 1991. She was a birthday present. We had played with some string that first afternoon and gotten to know each other a bit.
The years passed and after we moved to Carlton Street, we got Huey. At first they got along like a house on fire - Huey was a small, just-weaned kitten and her mothering instincts kicked in big time.
We moved to Hart Avenue and both got to be outside cats for several years, but after Huey went missing for a few days, then got sick with kidney problems and had to be put down, she became an only cat.
After about 3 years in our present home, by which time we already had Stanzi, she began to lose weight and became terribly thin and rather wobbly on her feet. Reyn took her to the vet and that's when we got the thyroid diagnosis. Once we started the pills she gained some weight and seemed happier for a while, maybe two years or so. But these last six months at least she was not very happy. She didn't want to be held or petted. Sleep was paramount. She became obsessed with food, following me to the kitchen literally every time I went in, and meowed for food even if she had just eaten. She became obsessed with water, but wouldn't drink it from her bowl, begging at the side of the bath tub or the bathroom sink instead. She began treating the litter box as optional. She would rouse out of sleep suddenly and begin walking out of the room only to stop in her tracks and look around as though unsure of where she was going or why.
So we found ourselves at the vet. She tried to get back into the carrier. She struggled to get up and get away from the table after the initial injection of sedative that was meant to calm her enough so that a catheter could be placed. Instead she lunged and attacked the vet's assistant. In the end it wasn't serene and peaceful, it was heart wrenching. She looked at me without seeing me as she got woozy and stoned and weaker. I stroked her head between the ears and spoke to her so she would know she was not alone, that there was nothing to be scared of. They carried her away, eyes droopy and crossed, but body still tense with life and administered a dose a anesthetic so that the lethal injection could be given. We heard screeching meows from the back room. The vet carried her back in and explained that she had defecated during the injection and that the meows came as they cleaned her up a bit before bringing her back in to us. She must have been stressed and terrified in those last moments of consciousness if that happened, which brings me so much sorrow to think about - like I let her down right at the end. So they set her down on the table once more, this time wrapped in a blue and white checked blanket, shaved a spot on her right forepaw, and at last gave her the drug. She slipped away from us as I whispered to her and stroked her head. I closed her blank and empty eyes and sobbed. She had gone, but not gently, into that good night.