Buses

I think I'm getting fat again. I dropped two pants sizes in Katimavik, and now the smaller sizes are getting uncomfortable. Oh well.

I think I'm getting stupider, too. I think that guy in the last post rubbed off on me. When I came home, at one point I actually said this,

"Wouldn't it be cool if Santa came down and totally just messed shit up? Just like, ripping people's heads off and shit."

I actually thought I was leading up to something witty when I was saying that. Oh well.

On the buses around here, every one of them has a different seating arrangement. I can see why you'd want to mix it up from the standard rows a bit. There are ones laid flat against the wall at the front and point to the centre of the bus. These are good for elderly people and people with a physical disability. They fold up or down to make room for wheelchairs or baby strollers. Then you've got your standard seats. These are good because it allows a greater quantity of total seats in the bus. Then some buses have a part at the back which is at an elevated height. Seems pointless, but it's kind of cool. Back there, there are seats that face toward each other. These are good for if you want to have a conversation with someone. Gets a little awkward if the bus fills up and those are the only seats left, so you wind up facing a stranger. It's less personal to squash in next to someone than it is to look at them. Looking is more invasive than touching, I guess. That's weird.

But then there's sometimes this little setup, where there's two chairs, one facing to the inside of the bus, and one facing forward. That means someone is staring at someone who is turned to the side. I don't see what situation this would be useful in. It's like, if you're at a restaurant, and someone at the table next to you is staring at you, and you can see them out of your peripheral, but you don't want to look back. I think that's the situation the bus is trying to recreate.

Guelph bus drivers are pretty friendly. They will sometimes try to draw the attention of the bus. Usually they have a circle of friends who travel this way regularly.

But for some reason, they can never draw the attention of the entire bus. In another situation where a lot of people find themselves lumped together for some random reason, it's not difficult for one person to draw attention to themselves. On a bus, though, people seem to just want to keep to themselves.

I've been using a bus pass this month. It's the first time I ever have, but it's not worth mentioning. You just flash your pass, wait for the driver to give you a nod, and go to your seat. I don't have any... bus pass anecdotes.

Yo... I'm doing pretty awesome financially. Mom's Disability gives something like $500 a month more than Welfare did, and with me working, they do something like, they cut out half the pay from my weekly 40 hours out from the Disability cheque, but nothing is deducted for overtime pay. Then, I pay $500 month to household expenses.

End result is, the only thing that comes out of me is that $500. That's only about one quarter of my monthly wage. I'll definitely take that.

We're not rich, but you don't need to be rich to be happy. If you've got a solid financial footing, that's a beautiful thing. I don't even know what I'd buy if I had more money than this. Okay, well, maybe a car, a Kindle, a cell phone, an iPod, a new chromatic harmonica....

...Yeah, okay. Whatever.

I think I know why the agencies liked my resume so much after coming back... I worked two jobs for the duration of what would be the length of a temp contract. I also was working, like, 16 hours a day, for $3 a day. That tells them you're willing to work long hours, get paid little, and you can complete contracts.

Although, when I was working, a guy was explaining something business-related to someone else, and he said,

"That's because last year was recession. Everyone was poor. This year, everyone have money."

That would explain why all my friends are working. So it didn't have anything to do with my credentials, the world just turned in my favour outside of my control. Great.

Well, I guess I'll be happy for my country, but a bad part of me would rather think I just got really cool.