And now, ladies and gentlemen: The triumph of utter stupidity.
That's a paraphrase from A Raisin in the Sun, the play by Lorraine Hansberry, not the poem by Langston Hughes. And it's what I witnessed in what, in nearly all respects, was an utterly shitty day.
It had been a fairly uneventful day up until I got out of class at 2:45 (save for nearly passing out and puking this morning, but that was because I hadn't eaten in maybe twelve hours and was quickly rectified.). I waited at the bus stop for the 125, which is usually late. I'd been there for about five minutes when a lady already there said she'd been there for nearly twenty, which wasn't really surprising considering the route doesn't start until 2:50. So I waited. And waited. And that stupid peddler went by, hauling his snow-covered wares. Some guy on a bike rode by, and rather flatly said "Bitch!" No inflection, no emotion, it sounded kind of like a car horn. Twenty feet later, he did it again. The other women and I just all kind of stared at each other, said "Did he just say 'bitch?'" and shrugged it off and kept waiting. And waiting.
One by one the women hailed cabs, and soon I was alone. By now I had lost all hope of catching the 3:18 train or even the 3:20 which makes every damn stop along the way and takes about half an hour longer because of it. I said fuck it, and hailed a cab. I got to the south concourse of Union Station at 3:24. The next train out didn't leave till 3:58.
So I grabbed something to eat and hopped on the train (since I got on it so early I got one of the one-seaters in the top). Sitting behind me were a bunch of 20-ish guys who talked nonstop about drugs and sex and drugs and sex and bitches and money and drugs and sex. And I waited. Eventually we left, and eventually I got home.
It had been snowing most of the day, not an uncommon occurrance in Chicago in January, but damn it when you're home 45 minutes later than you planned to be already and can't find your car because the space number signs are covered in snow and they're too high to wipe it off, and you find your car covered in a HALF INCH THICK LAYER OF ICE, boy howdy son, it makes your whole damn day doesn't it. So I got in my car, put my sweater on and got all good and bundled up as best I can in a new coat that's already lost a button, and chiseled. Chiseled. Chiseled. And finally I was done, and it was dark and damn cold.
I got home fine, just in time to catch Extreme Makeover- the only reality show I watch besides the Home Edition of said show. The lucky winner was the bird-dog-ugliest woman I'd ever seen, on the show or anywhere else. She looked like a cross between Jay Leno and a horse, was 5'4" and 100lbs, and was missing approximately half her teeth. I am dead serious. They gave her a kind of flesh implant to fill out her cheeks, and told her that if she took up smoking again (she'd recently quit), the tissue would die. The dentist who was going to work on her toothless piehole said he couldn't work on her if she took up smoking again because her gums were too damaged.
She started smoking again THREE DAYS LATER.
She got chewed the hell out by the doctors, and in the end got her shit fixed up so she looked like a white RuPaul. There's only so much you can do with some people.
The lucky guy winner was a guy who was actually pretty decent looking, if a bit skinny. Until he opened his mouth, that is.... HOLY BROWN GOOKY STUFF BATMAN. He said he drank up to 12 sodas a day and brushed his teeth maybe once a week. He had fairly advanced decay in every tooth in his head.
BUT THAT'S NOT ALL!
On the way to Denny's after seeing the fugly queen win the fugly prize, I hit a red light at 59 and Aurora and saw an ambulance coming, horn blaring, lights flashing, siren wailing. Only the cross-traffic to my left had the green, so the ambulance got halfway into the intersection.
About fifteen cars proceeded to go on through, as if you couldn't see or hear the ambulance until you were in front of it. The ambulance sat there for a good minute.
What the hell is wrong with people these days? For all they know, the ambulance could be rushing to save their best friend dying of hypothermia because he slipped on ice and broke his leg, but NOOOO they've just GOT to get wherever they're going because by God that ambulance is just a nuisance anyways, all flashy lights and loud noises and it ran that red light anyways. Go ahead, man. We all know who's in the right here. And we also know karma is a fucking bitch.
=edit: The respects in which the day did not suck were that my dad is taking my car for a tune-up and paying for it, that I got my drink for free at Denny's because Angela comped it, that Colin and I actually talked for the whole time I was at Denny's, and that I had a really great idea for a group blog- an essay blog, where we'd write and post old-fashioned essays, the "On ____" kind. I had a lot of good ideas for essays today. More on this later, it's bedtime.=
It had been a fairly uneventful day up until I got out of class at 2:45 (save for nearly passing out and puking this morning, but that was because I hadn't eaten in maybe twelve hours and was quickly rectified.). I waited at the bus stop for the 125, which is usually late. I'd been there for about five minutes when a lady already there said she'd been there for nearly twenty, which wasn't really surprising considering the route doesn't start until 2:50. So I waited. And waited. And that stupid peddler went by, hauling his snow-covered wares. Some guy on a bike rode by, and rather flatly said "Bitch!" No inflection, no emotion, it sounded kind of like a car horn. Twenty feet later, he did it again. The other women and I just all kind of stared at each other, said "Did he just say 'bitch?'" and shrugged it off and kept waiting. And waiting.
One by one the women hailed cabs, and soon I was alone. By now I had lost all hope of catching the 3:18 train or even the 3:20 which makes every damn stop along the way and takes about half an hour longer because of it. I said fuck it, and hailed a cab. I got to the south concourse of Union Station at 3:24. The next train out didn't leave till 3:58.
So I grabbed something to eat and hopped on the train (since I got on it so early I got one of the one-seaters in the top). Sitting behind me were a bunch of 20-ish guys who talked nonstop about drugs and sex and drugs and sex and bitches and money and drugs and sex. And I waited. Eventually we left, and eventually I got home.
It had been snowing most of the day, not an uncommon occurrance in Chicago in January, but damn it when you're home 45 minutes later than you planned to be already and can't find your car because the space number signs are covered in snow and they're too high to wipe it off, and you find your car covered in a HALF INCH THICK LAYER OF ICE, boy howdy son, it makes your whole damn day doesn't it. So I got in my car, put my sweater on and got all good and bundled up as best I can in a new coat that's already lost a button, and chiseled. Chiseled. Chiseled. And finally I was done, and it was dark and damn cold.
I got home fine, just in time to catch Extreme Makeover- the only reality show I watch besides the Home Edition of said show. The lucky winner was the bird-dog-ugliest woman I'd ever seen, on the show or anywhere else. She looked like a cross between Jay Leno and a horse, was 5'4" and 100lbs, and was missing approximately half her teeth. I am dead serious. They gave her a kind of flesh implant to fill out her cheeks, and told her that if she took up smoking again (she'd recently quit), the tissue would die. The dentist who was going to work on her toothless piehole said he couldn't work on her if she took up smoking again because her gums were too damaged.
She started smoking again THREE DAYS LATER.
She got chewed the hell out by the doctors, and in the end got her shit fixed up so she looked like a white RuPaul. There's only so much you can do with some people.
The lucky guy winner was a guy who was actually pretty decent looking, if a bit skinny. Until he opened his mouth, that is.... HOLY BROWN GOOKY STUFF BATMAN. He said he drank up to 12 sodas a day and brushed his teeth maybe once a week. He had fairly advanced decay in every tooth in his head.
BUT THAT'S NOT ALL!
On the way to Denny's after seeing the fugly queen win the fugly prize, I hit a red light at 59 and Aurora and saw an ambulance coming, horn blaring, lights flashing, siren wailing. Only the cross-traffic to my left had the green, so the ambulance got halfway into the intersection.
About fifteen cars proceeded to go on through, as if you couldn't see or hear the ambulance until you were in front of it. The ambulance sat there for a good minute.
What the hell is wrong with people these days? For all they know, the ambulance could be rushing to save their best friend dying of hypothermia because he slipped on ice and broke his leg, but NOOOO they've just GOT to get wherever they're going because by God that ambulance is just a nuisance anyways, all flashy lights and loud noises and it ran that red light anyways. Go ahead, man. We all know who's in the right here. And we also know karma is a fucking bitch.
=edit: The respects in which the day did not suck were that my dad is taking my car for a tune-up and paying for it, that I got my drink for free at Denny's because Angela comped it, that Colin and I actually talked for the whole time I was at Denny's, and that I had a really great idea for a group blog- an essay blog, where we'd write and post old-fashioned essays, the "On ____" kind. I had a lot of good ideas for essays today. More on this later, it's bedtime.=
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home