Tuesday, October 07, 2008

Adventure!

I got to push a bus last week. I was on the way home, when our bus stopped for a very long time at the intersection. I looked up and saw that the driver was getting out to help the driver of another bus that had stalled in the middle of the intersection blocking all traffic. Apparently she had hit a "dead spot" a part of the electrical power cable that holds no charge (the Seattle buses use electric power within city limits). Our driver came in and let us know it would be a while til a truck could be sent out to tow the other bus out of the way. It was about 11pm by that time, and I knew that if we were delayed that long, I wouldn't get home til about 3am. So I asked the bus driver if I could push it out of the way. He brightened up and said, "you know, it doesn't actually take that much to push one of these things, we could probably do it." I replied, "lets do It!" and jumped up out of my seat. The driver patted a heftyish mexicano guy who was occupying a seat towards the door of the bus and said "come on, you too!" and so the three of us hopped off, rolled up our sleeves, and pushed the bus a good five feet til it passed the dead zone and kept on going on it's own power, the driver waving at us as she left. So we hopped back on our bus, I made it for my transfer, and got home at about midnight.

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