There are some days when you take a ride that appears to be completely and utterly uninteresting. You are riding along, and you are resting quietly. Your head starts to slowly relax; your breathing steadies, and you feel yourself drifting off to sleep. The driver appears to be cautious, so you feel relatively confident that you can sleep without too much worry.
It's always those rides that end up surprising you the most.
I rode in with 2 men. I was sitting in the front seat because the bubbly, optimistic little man behind me snagged the back seat, but not before opening my door for me and calling me Ma'am. He greeted our driver with great enthusiasm, and off we went. Our driver was listening to a local radio station's morning talk show at a respectable volume. Everything was smooth as molasses, and I was really starting to settle into a stress-free morning commute, for a change.
I was half listening to the talk show host as the show returned from commercial. He was talking over an old song that I vaguely remembered but wasn't really paying attention to. I started to tune his abrasive voice out and slip into a temporary coma, when BAM--in a loud, booming, entirely inappropriate voice that broke the silence and stability of the car, Mr. Backseat Bubbles began singing along to the song I hadn't really realized was still playing.
"THROUGH THE FIRE....TO THE LIMIT.....TO THE WALL...."
He hit a falsetto that I didn't know any man could really hit, but I had mad respect for his skills.
The driver and I were startled, and I just busted out laughing. This of course encouraged our enthusiastic Chaka Khan wannabe to sing even more, and he went through the song until the DJ turned it off and continued his conversation.
Then he settled down and went to sleep.
I guess when you gotta sing, you gotta sing.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Thursday, June 18, 2009
PRIMAL SCREAM!!!!
OK, you guys can all stop giving me crap about not blogging lately. I know, I know! For the most part, I’ve just been too busy or too lazy to do an update, but things have been somewhat predictable lately. I do have a couple of “reserve” stories, so I will probably do a couple of updates close together. So sit back, relax, and shut the hell up.
There are days when I hate everything. Those days are growing to be more and more frequent, but –good grief—today offered me a whole new collection of things, and people, to hate.
I rode in today with a man who normally slugs in alongside me. In fact, I have blogged about him hogging the backseat and snoring. He’s a nice, older man who appears to be gentleman for the most part. Yet, I hate him and his car. Here’s why…
I was the first rider to arrive in the car, and of course, I chose the premium backseat real estate. I always get a funny look from drivers when I am the firs to get in but I choose the backseat. It’s like they take it personally that I don’t want to sit up front with them. And they should take it personally, because I don’t want to sit with them up front. He gave me an awkward glance and then started to chit-chat while we waited for someone else who would be going to our location. He had all the windows open in this fancy little SUV, and it wasn’t too bad because it was pouring rain yet. I was only getting slightly drizzled upon through the front and back windows. He slurped his coffee and talked about how his wife loses everything, and I sat back there praying that he’d shut up and close the windows soon. Finally, a nice man hopped in, and we were ready to hit the road.
Shortly after pulling off, Mr. Chit-Chat rolled up the windows and turned on the air conditioner. It was at this point that I realized why he had the windows down to begin with. As the cold, dry air of the air conditioner began to replace the humid, fresh air in the car, the smell of rotting dead Trout guts began to fill my nostrils. I gasped for air and began to choke and cough. It was putrid, to say the least. I don’t know who he pissed off to have them put dead fish in his car, but that person is downright cruel. Oh God, the smell. I was trying to bury my face in my clothes, and at one point, I think I even grabbed a handful of my own hair and started breathing it in.
But, being true to my rugged slugger’s composition, I decided to just sleep through it. If you sleep through it, it will end more quickly and won’t smell as bad. Unfortunately, Old Man Fish Guts decided he wanted to listen to political radio AND comment on it. This was just too much. Since I work in politics, I put in a solid 8 hours centered on political issues, and I am forced to make myself aware of all sides to every issue. I can sit and discuss politics with anyone of any party on any topic. Just because I can does not mean that I WANT TO while I am riding to work and trying to get caught up on sleep! He starts going on about the “wisdom” of Obama, and how he’s the smartest man he’s ever seen in America. How, HOW can I sit in the backseat and sleep through this??? I mean COME ON! I can guard my senses from the nauseating smell of steamed, rotting fish guts, but I can’t withstand the assault on my intellectual sensibilities that declares Obama to be the smartest man in America. OH MY GOD!
My legs started to twitch. By the time he had moved to a discussion of Obama’s “amazing” policies, my leg was in a full-on fidget going about 100 miles an hour. I was squeezing my purse and sending him finger gestures from behind it. I put my sunglasses on, despite the dark clouds and rain, so that he couldn’t see the evil eye beams I was sending his direction. I’m pretty sure that my leg twitch was rocking the SUV.
He was up there slurping and laughing and basking in his Obama-glory when he almost rear-ended not one, but two different vehicles. He started chuckling, CHUCKLING about how I did the auto-Oh Shit response of pumping the air brakes with my twitchy leg. That’s when I lost it.
For the remainder of the trip, I produce a primal scream in my head that, should it have actually been let out, would have deafened the entire population of the DC metro area. It was guttural, and angry, and it involved a lot of cussing. The good thing about doing a primal scream in your mind is that you never run out of breath and your voice never gives out on you.
We arrived at our general location, and I attempted to get out when the front seat passenger jumped out. Our gentleman driver stopped me and insisted that he drop me off at my office because it was raining and he didn’t want me to walk in the rain.
I hate him.
There are days when I hate everything. Those days are growing to be more and more frequent, but –good grief—today offered me a whole new collection of things, and people, to hate.
I rode in today with a man who normally slugs in alongside me. In fact, I have blogged about him hogging the backseat and snoring. He’s a nice, older man who appears to be gentleman for the most part. Yet, I hate him and his car. Here’s why…
I was the first rider to arrive in the car, and of course, I chose the premium backseat real estate. I always get a funny look from drivers when I am the firs to get in but I choose the backseat. It’s like they take it personally that I don’t want to sit up front with them. And they should take it personally, because I don’t want to sit with them up front. He gave me an awkward glance and then started to chit-chat while we waited for someone else who would be going to our location. He had all the windows open in this fancy little SUV, and it wasn’t too bad because it was pouring rain yet. I was only getting slightly drizzled upon through the front and back windows. He slurped his coffee and talked about how his wife loses everything, and I sat back there praying that he’d shut up and close the windows soon. Finally, a nice man hopped in, and we were ready to hit the road.
Shortly after pulling off, Mr. Chit-Chat rolled up the windows and turned on the air conditioner. It was at this point that I realized why he had the windows down to begin with. As the cold, dry air of the air conditioner began to replace the humid, fresh air in the car, the smell of rotting dead Trout guts began to fill my nostrils. I gasped for air and began to choke and cough. It was putrid, to say the least. I don’t know who he pissed off to have them put dead fish in his car, but that person is downright cruel. Oh God, the smell. I was trying to bury my face in my clothes, and at one point, I think I even grabbed a handful of my own hair and started breathing it in.
But, being true to my rugged slugger’s composition, I decided to just sleep through it. If you sleep through it, it will end more quickly and won’t smell as bad. Unfortunately, Old Man Fish Guts decided he wanted to listen to political radio AND comment on it. This was just too much. Since I work in politics, I put in a solid 8 hours centered on political issues, and I am forced to make myself aware of all sides to every issue. I can sit and discuss politics with anyone of any party on any topic. Just because I can does not mean that I WANT TO while I am riding to work and trying to get caught up on sleep! He starts going on about the “wisdom” of Obama, and how he’s the smartest man he’s ever seen in America. How, HOW can I sit in the backseat and sleep through this??? I mean COME ON! I can guard my senses from the nauseating smell of steamed, rotting fish guts, but I can’t withstand the assault on my intellectual sensibilities that declares Obama to be the smartest man in America. OH MY GOD!
My legs started to twitch. By the time he had moved to a discussion of Obama’s “amazing” policies, my leg was in a full-on fidget going about 100 miles an hour. I was squeezing my purse and sending him finger gestures from behind it. I put my sunglasses on, despite the dark clouds and rain, so that he couldn’t see the evil eye beams I was sending his direction. I’m pretty sure that my leg twitch was rocking the SUV.
He was up there slurping and laughing and basking in his Obama-glory when he almost rear-ended not one, but two different vehicles. He started chuckling, CHUCKLING about how I did the auto-Oh Shit response of pumping the air brakes with my twitchy leg. That’s when I lost it.
For the remainder of the trip, I produce a primal scream in my head that, should it have actually been let out, would have deafened the entire population of the DC metro area. It was guttural, and angry, and it involved a lot of cussing. The good thing about doing a primal scream in your mind is that you never run out of breath and your voice never gives out on you.
We arrived at our general location, and I attempted to get out when the front seat passenger jumped out. Our gentleman driver stopped me and insisted that he drop me off at my office because it was raining and he didn’t want me to walk in the rain.
I hate him.
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