My Baby Takes The Morning Train...

I take the train to work, and the (roughly) 3000 feet between the train station and my store can contain some of the most frustrating experiences of my day. Let’s take a look at some of the people I happen upon;

-Gaggles of teenaged girls:

How is it that two or three teens happen to take up five and a half square miles of space? No matter how you try to get around them (they are, of course, walking at about the speed of glaciers), they somehow manage to be in the space that you were trying to walk through! So you’ll dart around to the other side and suddenly there’s another teenager there! My theory is that teenage girls don’t exist in the 3 dimensions that you and I (and everyone else in all the land) are aware of. They exist in like, 5 or 6 dimensions, so we can really only see about 40% of any teenage girl at any one time. Each one seems to exist in about 5 different places at once. Laws of physics be damned.

-Pedestrians who stand on the street waiting for the light to change:

I know that this has little to no effect on me whatsoever, but these people simply baffle me. We will be approaching an intersection, seeing that red “do not walk” sign illuminated, and both of us will be fully cognizant of the traffic cruising through the intersection. I will stop a few feet away from the curb, lest an errant rock or automobile come flying toward me, but the other person will keep right on going, and step off the curb, and only then will they stop. Cars and trucks (and errant rocks) will be zooming by them, honking (not the rocks), and missing the individual by mere inches. Is this some form of lame death-defiance? Is this how they get their rocks off? (Nyuck! Rocks. Get it?) I simply do not understand.

-Solicitors:

This section needs to be broken down into a series of sub-sections. Yep. I’m that insane!

i) Religious Enthusiasts;

While it’s easy enough to get away from religious enthusiasts who may ring your doorbell (one option being to close the door, or the other option, if you’re my younger sister, is to answer the door in a bikini in the middle of February caressing knives against your skin. Whatever works for you in your current circumstance), it is substantially more difficult to get away from them while out in public. See, they tend to follow you, and no amount of protesting will get them to leave you alone. Which is why I have taken up yelling at them that I worship the Prince of Darkness and that one day he will reign fire upon this Earth, and I will rejoice. That usually gets them to leave me alone. One of them threw Holy Water at me.

ii)The random guy who I always think is going to murder me;

This large (not to be racist) African fella works at an actual store (I think) selling actual hip-hop style clothing (I think) and routinely leaps out at passers-by from behind the bushes thrusting flyers in our general direction. He usually does this at night while wearing dark clothing, and his tone of voice usually indicates that if you do not take a flyer, your family will be receiving your various limbs in carefully wrapped packages delivered via Fed-Ex for weeks to come. I know I have a tendency to exaggerate here, but I am seriously not making any of this up. Seriously. And since he is currently lurking behind me (I can only presume), I should probably keep my limbs intact and encourage you to shop at his store which, despite the number of flyers I have taken, I cannot recall the name of. Ow! Give me back my leg! I need that!

iii) Canadian Red Cross Volunteers;

I know I’m going to sound like a charity hating jerk-wad here, but I seriously hate the Red Cross specifically because of these wholesome, cheery, peppy pieces of garbage who accost me on almost a daily basis. They’ll be set up in twos or threes on opposite sides of the street (so there’s no escape unless you leap in front of a large truck), goofing around with one another, being all wholesome and crap, and as a group of people from the train station approach, they will perk up and start sauntering toward the crowd. The best way to avoid them is to plant yourself in the middle of the crowd of people and sacrifice those on the outskirts, and sometimes fist fights will erupt among those struggling to not be accosted by the Red Cross Volunteers. I once saw a nun kick out the crutches from a teen with a broken leg in one of these skirmishes. His butt needed to be sacrificed for the greater good.

But sometimes you wind up as the unfortunate soul sacrificed to the RCV, and the conversation ensues thusly;

RCV: “How are you, buddy?” (She has like, 945 teeth in that huge grin)
Me: “Leave me alone, please!”
RCV: “Do you wanna talk about the Canadian Red Cross?” (Are there more teeth growing??)
Me: “I have to get to work! Please, leave me be!” (At this point I’m sprinting)
RCV: “Hey, those are some awesome sunglasses you have on! Can I try them?” (This is not made up.)
Me: “They’re prescription… I’m going to work now!” (Still not made up)
RCV: “Hey, maybe we have the same prescription! Can I see?” (STILL not made up)
Me: “Oh my God, I’m calling the police!” (Made up)
RCV: “Well have an awesome day, pal!”

Part of me died just writing about them.

-Indecisive Coffee People:

Some people go to coffee places for coffee. Other people go to coffee places to get in line, chat loudly with their friends for several minutes about something incredibly personal (“I started menopause last week! Sob!”), get to the front of the line only to realize they have forgotten where they are (“I’ll have a burrito!” “You’re at Second Cup.”) and only then start looking at what the coffee place has to offer. Many times, this period of intense decision making involves questions such as “Is the Iced Mocha cold?”, “Where is this ‘Ethiopian Blend’ from?” “What’s your smallest size? Small? Small is your smallest? Can I have an extra small? No? No, you don't have that? No extra small? Ok then, I’ll get a large.”

In some instances though, the employee is aware that the ten people standing in line may start getting upset, and since she would rather not spend her afternoon cleaning up blood, asks the next person in line what she can get for them. This, of course, offends the Indecisive Coffee Person so much that they demand immediate service, and vomit out the last words that they saw on the menu, taste the drink, and then inform the employee their drink is awful and they want a refund.

-Couples:

Good lord I hate couples so so SO freaking much. What is it that encourages two people to slowly walk hand in hand down a crowded hallway in a mall, forcing other people to fight it out to get around them? I have problems with these people for several reasons:

1) The mall is not romantic! It’s a mall for crying out loud! What is it about the mall that makes you want to stroll and hold hands? The lame music blaring out from generic emo store after generic emo store? The Bell Booth employees telling each other stories at a decibel that could destroy reinforced concrete? The burnt-grease aromas wafting from the food court? Seriously!

2) They always spread apart while holding hands. It’s as if they were actually playing with crazy glue, got their hands stuck together, and are now forced to walk through the mall hand in hand while trying to retain as much of their individual bubbles as they can. And for some reason, I always restrain myself from playing Red Rover with them, and I hate them for that.

3) Like teenage girls, they exhibit the same glacier-like speed of movement and somehow manage to exist in 5 places at once.

As I’m sure there are some I have forgotten, I encourage you to post comments reminding me of the other stupid people I have forgotten about. I also think that this post is getting a little long for certain items, such as those who treat the escalator like a ride, people who get off the escalator and immediately stop causing everybody else on the escalator to panic and scramble backwards, and possibly fall down the escalator and get those sharp teeth jabbed into their skulls as they bounce down the moving death traps, and groups of people who think it’s appropriate to stand in front of doors having a conversation.