I was on my little commuter bus, which was falling apart at the seams. They all are. This is an incredibly underground operation – and if I was ever injured on that bus, and wanted to sue – I would have no idea who to even CALL. Salsa music was BLARING (like always) and a Spanish talk show was playing on the television. There is a television on my bus. It’s not a video tape or a DVD either – it’s actual television, so when we go through the Lincoln Tunnel, the TV goes to snow. It’s ridiculous. Everyone on the rickety bus was watching the talk show with rapt bilingual attention, and swaying happily to the salsa music. My busride is always a cacophony of sound and it is totally annoying to tell you the truth – even more annoying when folks bring on their stinky McDonalds food – the aroma of which takes over the whole bus – but the ride is cheap, and so convenient that I can roll out my front door practically, hail the damn bus down, and be on my way. It’s distinctly third-world. The woman next to me was reading her Bible in Spanish. She was in the Book of Genesis. In case you care.
This is how I get into the city. It is always like this. It is completely absurd but I no longer find it odd. Like I said, it’s annoying sometimes – especially when my bus is pulled over by the cops for going through an EZ Pass lane into the Tunnel. Ya gotta love it when your bus is pulled over by the cops on a semi-regular basis. And when the driver speaks NOT ONE WORD, not ONE WORD of English. So the cop is saying, “You can’t go through the EZ Pass lane – how many times do I have to tell you that? If I catch you again …” And the bus driver is staring blankly at the cop, having no idea what is being said. Or – of course they know what is being said – and they probably DO speak English but pretending to NOT speak English works more to their advantage. Who knows. I don’t even care. All I know is is that now I will be late for whatever because this jagoff won’t follow simple rules.
New Jersey Transit also goes near my ‘hood – but it’s not as convenient. It just isn’t. You can’t FLAG DOWN New Jersey transit. Or – you CAN, but the driver will ignore you and shriek on by. But you can flag down these busses!
So this morning.
I put the ol’ iPod in the ol’ earlobes and blast my music and the whole world drifts away. The whole Salsa-music-ridden world. My commute is not long. Well, it’s VERY long if my bus is pulled over by the cops. But without any law enforcement interference, my commute is usually no longer than 15 minutes.
I am, at this moment, in a music-loop of Prince which shows no signs of abating. I feel like I’m in college again where I couldn’t listen to anything BUT Prince. And even more specific than that, I am kind of stuck on one song: “Cream”. Yup. Kinda can’t listen to anything else right now. The second it finishes I consider, “Uhm … move on to the next song?” 1.2 seconds go by. “Nope. Back to the beginning. Listen to it again.”
Anyhoo, I climbed up the battered steps into my bus, “Cream” blasting in my ears for the 20th time this morning, and sat down.
For whatever reason, I noticed a sign I had never seen before at the front of the bus, pasted above the driver’s head.
KEEP HEAD, HANDS, AND FEET INSIDE VEHICLE.
Okay.
Immediately, I got a picture of someone – one person – breaking all of those rules at the same moment. It was an unavoidable mental picture. I saw the head stcking out the window, hair blowing in the breeze, the manic grin. I saw the two waving hands. And I saw the contorted position the person would have to be in in order to get both FEET out of the window as well.
And then I started laughing – and once I started laughing, I could not stop.
I was out. of. control.
I turned off the Prince – and was immediately bombarded with manic Salsa music – which dug the hole of laughter even deeper.
The laughter was the kind of laughter you got as a kid in church, when your parents would be giving you deadly glares to “shut up” and you could not … for the life of you … shut up.
I tried to keep it under wraps, breathing in deep, saying to myself, “Please. Stop laughing. Now” … but it was to no avail. I kept seeing someone sticking their head, both their hands, and also both their feet out of the window as the bus careened towards the Lincoln Tunnel – and I was a goner.
Sheila, the best part of the whole thing is that the sign is in English!
I’ll try to make this short. I love the kind of laughter you are descibing. It is uncontrollable, inappropriate, and, usually, very embarrassing. About 15 years ago, my wife and I went down to visit some friends in Key West. They arranged for us to do a sunset cruise aboard a double decker boat some friends of theirs owned. They took people out every night, providing drinks and food for a fee. We got to go for free because our friends knew them–which is where the embarrassing part comes into play. There was a captain and a first mate. The first mate was about 120 years old(but he looked older), and kind of crazy–like someone who had spent way too many years in bars and in the tropical sun. Anyway, we set out, and everything is going great. It is a perfect late day, the cocktails are strong, my wife is reddish-tan and beautiful, and I am having a great time. After about an hour or so of heavy cocktailing, the first mate comes up top carrying a guitar. He starts to talk about “Key West’s native son, my good friend, Jimmy Buffett.” After telling a few anecdotes, he says, “Here’s one of my favorite tunes of Jimmy’s.” He then precedes to sing a play. To say that I found it amusing is quite the understatement. You have a grizzled old alcoholic, with skin like shoe leather, singing a peppy Buffett tune. The top deck of the boat was about 15 feet by 15 feet. We had no way to escape. I felt one of THOSE laughs coming on at light speed. I turned away from him, pretending to look out at the water. As I did, I picked up a can of Sprite, and bit down on the top of it as hard as I could. My wife was in the same state. She stood beside me, looking out to sea, with her whole body shaking in the effort to repress the laughter. I knew I couldn’t look at her. Unfortunately, I did. We both preceded to horselaugh in a convulsive fit for about 10 minutes. I’m talking bent over, very loud, tears in our eyes belly laughs. People were staring at us as if we had gone mad. It was very embarrassing, and we felt terrible about doing that to good friends of our good friends, but, by God, sometimes it happens.
“sing AND play”
I’m laughing just reading your description of it.
Safety signs are definitely unintentionally funny. I saw one in North Carolina that warned visitors at the park we were at that we shouldn’t climb over the railing because we’d meet a gruesome fate via waterfall. The cartoon body on the sign was flailing midair and it was WAY out of proportion with everything else. And the mouth was in a panicked “O” shape. It was ridiculous looking. The group I was with howled with laughter at the sight of it. It’s really hard to take these supposed dire warnings seriously.
Oh, and speaking of inappropriate laughter, I often found the driver’s ed snuff films to be HILAAARIOUS. It’s a wonder my teacher didn’t send me to the school shrink.
Sheila – my first generation immigrant wife calls the driver’s expression the “dumb foreigner smile”. When we do stupid things with Asian stuff (like getting kanji tattoos), she calls us “dumb Americans”, though – like most Chinese, she is an equal opportunity offender.
On the flip side, assuming that everyone I saw in Japan spoke at least some English kept me out of some embarassing situations that other Gaijin got into. Over here, I can’t count the number of Chinese, Japanese, and Russians that have been talking around us, not realizing that either she (she looks SE Asian, not Chinese)or I (or both of us) understand every word.
Well, I imagine that they know full well that they should not go thru the EZ Pass lane since we are pulled over all the time. This is a regular occurrence.
Cell phone calls made: “Yeah, sorry – I’m gonna be late for dinner with you … yeah, my bus got pulled over again … Yeah, this is the 3rd time this week …”
And the cops are openly annoyed every time we are pulled over which tells me they are repeat offenders.
Really, this is such a sketchy “organization” – and sometimes the busses are so dilapidated that I fear for my life getting on them – but they drop me off right at the end of my street, so I find them irresistible.
curly –
hahahahaha the flailing cartoon body!!!
I know – why is this so funny?
One of my favorites is the regular sign seen in Ireland of a car driving right into the bay. It’s so hilarious. There’s not even a line through it. They’re basically just saying: “At any moment you could just drive into a huge body of water. So be careful.”
Hahahaha! “Warning – road may flood.”
When I heard your description of the bus sign I couldn’t help but think of someone stuck out of the window like an old-time New Englander in the stocks in the public square. Maybe they should do that to the drivers next time they skip the tolls – no translation required!
Sheila- that was hilarious! I wish I’d been there!
Conor says that at the Y there is a caution sign at the pool warning not to dive, at the deep end. There is a picture of a man going into the water and his head smashing the bottom, but his legs are still way, way out of the water. So Con and his friend Ryan say that Shaquille O’Neill is clearly on their swim team.
Beth – hahahahahaha
Uhm … really tall men need to watch out in the deep end? Or …
Another favorite of mine was the sign Allison and I saw in Kinsale, Ireland.
The sign was: A drawing of a dog with his tail up. Beneath him on the ground was a STEAMING PILE OF SHIT. Yes – there was actually STEAM rising from it. And beneath all of that it said: No Fouling.
Absolutely best sign ever. Way better than “Curb your dog”.
A clever entrepreneur could probably make a mint with a handheld version of “No Fouling” for use at business meetings…
Oh, I remember those signs in Ireland!! My sisters and mother and I would just ROAR when we saw those and run over and pose in front of them for pictures!! They are great!! I wish I had stolen one of them!!
I was rather fond of the signs we saw outside THe Vatican, illustrating through simple line drawings the sort of innappropriate clothing that would not be allowed inside St. Peters. The faceless woman was wearing a cropped tank top (with a little line indicating cleavage) and a miniskirt, and the faceless man appeared to be wearing a singlet– like the strong man at the circus. The best part was that even though the man had no face, he did have a curly handlebar mustache.
Apparently the Vatican doesn’t allow handlebar mustaches. Who knew?
As for your salsa bus experience, I’ve been there myself many a time (unfortunately). I think manic laughter is always an appropriate response to riding the salsa bus.