The Driver (Public Transport in general)

Member Name: SlyClone2k

Product:	Public Transport in general
Date:	05/06/03 (168 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Its a form of transport

Disadvantages: Too many to mention

Or why public transport isn't the peoples friend.

I awoke with the sun shining straight in my eyes. The winds of the night had blown the curtains open just enough to allow the 7am sun to stream in directly onto my face. Blinking and rather irritable, I flicked all the covers on to the sleeping body of my wife. She mumbled barely rousing from her slumber and shifted under the weight but didn't awaken, so as I launched myself from the pit I ensured my feet landed with a suitably solid thump.

Wordlessly she stomped to the bathroom to relieve herself while I stood for a moment to gain equilibrium, I had the dawning hope that the sun was just peeking through a rare break in the clouds. No such luck. The sky was bluer than a freshly chlorinated pool. Only one cloud hung in the sky and that was going to be burned off quicker than a spoonful of sugar at a bodybuilding convention. All the more annoying because sun meant no rain, no rain meant no puddles and no puddles meant no unexpected soakings. Often the highlight of the day, particularly if I should happen to chance on some Armani draped ponce dandying down the high street.

The mood came down like a flash of lightning, thunder clouds rolling in behind my eyes. A brooding tumultuous darkness that swept through all the momentary joy I'd gained by unnecessarily awakening my missus.

"A blue day. All I need" said I to no one in particular. She heard it though and laughed out loud to further compound my irritation.
"Screw you." Said I.
"I should be so lucky." Said she.
There's a reason I thought, but couldn't be bothered to carry the argument further. I slunk noisily to the bathroom, just to make sure any chances she had of getting back to sleep were well and truly blown. To satisfactorily increase her anger, as I showered, I started singing a tuneless song about how I'd like to murder her in her sleep. I revelled as my l

ess than dulcet tones reverberated around the bath room to produce a beautiful cacophony of noise.

Dressing and cleaning provided a sufficient respite from the thoughts of the day ahead, but before too long it was time to get on the bus to work. Harry was driving, I could clearly see him through the windscreen, I could see his weasel smile as he put his foot down and flew past me. You can imagine what word I used. Fortunately the next bus was more accommodating. It was Hilary, nice lass. Shouldn't be doing the job, but then she'd only been a driver for a month or so. It still hadn't got to her.

We pulled up at the depot; I was 15 minutes late 'cause of that git Harry. He'd be long gone so I didn't even get the chance to give him a piece of my mind. But that was okay, when I told the guv that it was his fault, and could back it up 'cause I knew it was his route and when he'd have come by I knew that he?d get a right rollicking later on. It didn't stop the guv docking me an hour's wages though. It's not like we even get paid a lot. Does 15 grand sound like a good wage to you? What about 16? That's what I get. So that was three pints out of the window, which meant three pints longer spent with ?er indoors. Still she'd be as cantankerous as I was about it, which kind of made it worthwhile.

Joe pulled my bus up. It was another five minutes late; so far I'd accumulated a total of 20 minutes. The queues would be building up. I was already hot because even at 8:40 the sun had warmed up enough to raise the temperature to about 20c. It wasn't as if there was even a breeze. The company polyester shirt and trousers were hot, sticky and itchy. On the whole they were fine in the winter but like wearing damp sandpaper on a day like today. The chaffing had already begun under the armpits. I was actually looking forward to the bus's air conditioning.

Joe stepped off and we excha
nge scowls as I got on. It took me five minutes to count the float of five pound coins, ten fifty pence's and another five pounds of shrapnel. Read "The Star" for a few minutes and dwelt upon whether the speech marks should have gone over the word read instead of The Star ("read"). Anyway it was time to set off. I took considerable comfort thinking about the scores of people that would have had to have waited for ages for my services; many of them would be seriously late for work. Best of all there would be a bus another 5 minutes behind me so I could wind up a few people toward the end of the route.. You'll see how.

I drove alone to the first stop. A queue of 8 people waited to board my 40 seater bus. Two old dears, three middle age women and two young twenty some things awaited my arrival. I stopped. The kind young folk let the old dears get on first and they faffed and fumbled for their passes. One had expired.

"Listen love. You cards done."
"What's the deary?"
It was Molly. Deaf as a post and twice as thick.
"No more money on card." I bellowed.
"Oh." She says "I only filled it up four days ago."
"Been doing the rounds have you Molly?"
"No," she pauses "ooh yes I have I suppose."
I can see the young folk cursing their manners. Coming down on the folks for their middle class upbringing.
"That's seven quid love."
She fumbles in her purse some more. She has a fiver. Good. She has a pound coin. Even better. Then, just as I thought she pulls out a bag of tuppences. She waves them at me advising me they are all there. I contemplate for a bit whether I should count them. But I'm already cutting the finale fine so I stick 'em in my pouch and fill her card, up issue a ticket and on she gets. The rest of the folk follow on. The last to board, a young tall (six three at least) upstart,
I've never seen before, has a two pound coin and wants a 76p ticket.
"I haven't got change for that." I say, knowing full well he's seen me putting all that change in my pouch.
"You have, I just saw you stick a bunch of change in there." He points at my bag and I scowl.
"I ain't here to argue mate. You got summink smaller??"
He mumbles under his breath while digging through his pockets. He has 75p. I give him the ticket which was a mistake because he instantly brightens up and starts thinking I'm a nice guy. Luckily for me he sits right over the wheel arch. That's okay because there's a sleeping policeman just up the road. No brakes for him.

We pull off and I head toward the speed ramp in warp drive. The bus lurches violently upward, momentum carries the lad way of his seat and he hangs in the air as the bus crunches back down, bouncing his skull on the roof. I barely stifle the laugh as I call down the aisle "sorry mate." I'm not sure if he knows whether I did that on purpose or not but he didn't look impressed and can't even rub the bump because it would mean destroying his carefully sculpted hair.

For the most part the rest of the journey continues in much the same way. Though as the morning got warmer I decided it was time to turn off the air for the rest of the bus. It would be roasting back there, sun streaming through the windows, this one fat bloke in a green tee shirt looked like a tomato plant, his plump arms and red face getting redder by the second.

I missed a couple of stops altogether, this is best when there is either one solitary, would be, passenger or a large group. The loners tend to leg it up the road shouting and waving. I had some bugger the other day manage to catch me up because the traffic slowed. He was going red and punching and kind of jump kicking the door. I just looked in the rear view mirror on the driver side
until I knew I could make a get away, at which point I turned to look at him as he practically bounced down the side of the bus.

But as I was saying earlier, the best part comes toward the end of the route. If you are late you can sometimes momentarily glance the second bus behind you. It'll dip in and out of view of the rearview mirror, catching all the people you left behind. But the best fun, the ultimate jape is pulling into a stop when no one wants to get off. Pull in. Get a few people to crush in to the meagre space of standing room only and then wait for the half empty bus behind to pull up. This really winds people up.

The next piece of fun depends on who is behind you. Today it turned out to be Mick who was nearly as adept at providing the ultimate in bad service as I am. We knew the score. Today I was going to let all the people on, even if this meant being a couple over the limit. People would wedge themselves on, desperate to get to where they wanted to go, fed up with having had to wait for so long. I'd apologise, unconvincingly, for being short of space and get them nicely crammed in and close the doors. Ideally you'd catch the arm of some wayward fool who had no business actually getting on. Those doors don't half close with a thump.

Fun was to be obtained from watching the faces of the folk change in disgust at having to go nose to sweaty arm pit as the passenger in front clings on to the ceiling rail for dear life. Even better the tramp, Giles, had boarded; his own personal stench had occupied a third of the bus by itself. He was standing about halfway down, rubbing shoulders between two finely dressed gents in pin stripes. I'd make sure they got plenty of bounce just to get the grime well rubbed in.

Anyway; the choices. Get Mick to stop and move some of the passengers from this one to that one (the best option for them. The least fun for us); Wait until Mick was about to get behind us, ensur
e people knew he was there and they'd have been better off waiting and then pulling off. Get Mick to stop long enough for the passengers to think that they are going to be transferred. Wait while we discuss "how good page 3 was", and "how bad a job the company are doing at running the service" before waving ta-ta. Let Mick pull off first, this helps remind the good folk behind you that you are the last two buses for another 20 minutes. There is no point in them getting off, well not unless they care for another wait. Finally, as their hopes and dreams of a cool spacious bus journey are smashed, continue on the journey. I can assure you there is very little so satisfying in this world as the culminating expression of disappointment.

There were two more stops. Mick had done his duty and picked up any that stood at the first, and managed to slip back on to the road just so he could be sure to stop at the second to let me end the route before he did. There were some pretty harsh rules about being beaten in by the bus behind, but you could always get away with being late as long as a decent stream of people were seen to be alighting at the end.

I pulled up at the bus station, strategically lining up with the dog turd that occupied the pavement and within fractions of a second of coming to a halt released the doors. The last guy on, who had already had his arm crushed, was leaning back to the door and head in a book and hadn't even noticed we'd stopped. He literally spilled from the bus and landed on his backside with a squelch. Wary of being trampled he quickly scooted himself up and without thinking went to wipe at whatever it was that was soiling his jeans. I think I saw his shoulders heaving as he looked between his palm, pants and me.

My shift ended and really things had gone better than expected. At the end of the day the crowning achievements of the route had pushed aside the moments that make up a dull day
. Just as I was set to get on my bus back home Peter, the security guard, legged it across the forecourt carrying a video tape. Apparently the cameras had been on the spot where I stopped and he'd caught the whole lot on tape. He'd already boot legged it and passed it around. I had the original.

And you don't want to be a bus driver?

Authors Note.

Sometimes inspiration comes from the strangest places. But credit where it's due, this was thanks to Deano76's rant about buses yesterday (4/6/03). So thanks to him for providing me with what I've been missing for the last week or two, a subject.

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