You can’t go out wearing that!

Rain, rain, rain and more rain. And after that, it’ll probably start raining again. My house is right next to a great big parking lot. Nobody ever uses it, so the clever politicians decided that there’s no point in maintaining it anymore, and it’s since been reduced to a collection of very impressive cracks and holes.

Before it started raining, it snowed for a while. Then the rain turned the snow into ice and the parking lot into a skating range, basically. A skating range with large pools built into it. As I walked across it to get to the bus stop, I tried my very best not to slip’n slide directly into one of them. I haven’t bathed in a puddle since I was a kid, and I can’t quite remember what it was about getting my pants full of muddy water that was so hysterically funny.

The morning bus was bursting with teenagers on their way to school, as usual. I don’t get that trend where guys wear pants that only cover the bottom half of their ass. And I really don’t understand wearing half-ass pants with white underwear in the rain, especially if you’re planning on doing a lot of bending over. I’m not interested in looking at either one of these guys' bums for at least another ten years, and probably not even then.

That’s not to say that I don’t have some strange things sitting in my closet, also. I have this huge belt, for instance. It’s got a bunch of gold plates on it. Someone gave it to me as a present once, and I’ve never worn it, because every time I look at it, all I can think is “heavyweight champion of the world.”

Then there was that period in the mid nineties, when I had the animal print outfits and ridiculous plateau shoes. Not to mention men’s shirts and big hats.

I’m hoping that in another ten years, I’ll be able to look back on myself without blushing from shame.

Hat pic by brndnprkns for www.Flickr.com

risking my life in the photobooth

As I might have mentioned, I take the bus into town every morning in order to get to my math lecture. The drive is about ten minutes or so. There aren’t that many morning buses, so I have to leave the house at seven, even though my class doesn’t start until nine. I also think that there’s a rule around here that says the busses have to be at least ten minutes late. This rule applies with one exception: if you’re not on time, it’ll turn up five minutes early and leave before it’s supposed to, so that you miss it. When that happens, you stand there forever, confused, because unless you actually see the damn thing, there’s no telling whether it’s gone already or if it’s just late again.

It’s not as light out in the morning as it used to be, only a few weeks ago (although I’m still denying the existence of fall until I see snow), so the bus had the inside lights on. None of which worked properly. They all blinked in unison every five seconds. I counted. It was a bit like riding a photobooth.

Another thing about the morning bus, is that it always drives in the middle of the road. This has nothing to do with who is actually driving, because all the drivers do the very same thing. I guess that’s just another one of those weird rules.. It will (and does) stop absolutely anywhere. There aren’t all that many actual busstops, so you just pull it over where it’s most convenient to you. Even if that happens to be in the middle of an intersection, where you can’t see a damn thing in either direction. Not that there’s any traffic to speak of. This is Hellhole, after all. Of course, the moment someone decides to take a morning drive, we might all be screwed.

Sometimes, riding the bus into town is the most exciting point of my day.