Those of you who follow this site (all 7 of you!) might be wondering why I haven't updated it in awhile. Though frankly, I think all of you know the reason why. Basically, I've taken an extended vacation from cooking anything interesting because Caitlin is pregnant (8 weeks!) and going through the morning (haha, we wish it was just the morning) sickness phase, and well, cooking for one and eating it hastily in the corner lest the smells cause her to vomit is not the best environment for creating good recipes. Plus cooking for one is a good way to make you want to hang yourself.
Hopefully the nausea will go away soon and I can get back to cooking some great recipes (and there's probably going to be some weird ones with a pregnant wife as my customer)! In the meantime, I probably need to throw some updates up here, regardless of actual recipe content.
Okay, so based on the number of funny stories I have from my daily commute of driving to the MARC Commuter train and then taking a bus to work 3 times a week, I've decided to start regaling my readers with these tales in a recurring series I will call Tales from Public Transport. Most of them involve me noticing someone else doing something really weird, or some kind of confrontation with an annoying entitled jerk whilst riding the train or bus.
Our first tale comes from last summer. I have a nice timbuk2 messenger bag that I carry with me so I can take an umbrella or jacket (if needed), and a book or my PSP for some enjoyment and distraction while on the train. When it's hot out, I also have a water bottle with a clip that I hook onto my bag so I can have some ice water on my trip. MARC is pretty lax about food and drink, to the point that a good portion of the passengers heading home on Thursdays and Fridays are toting 6-packs and/or 40oz bottles of beer. Hell, I've even seen a nice little clique of passengers bring beer, wine, pizza, wings, and fried chicken and have a nice little MARC train happy hour.
On the other hand, Metro Bus is significantly less flexible about food or drinks in theory, but pretty much just as lax in practice. They have big signs everywhere (also in Spanish!) about no food or drink on the bus. Now, I generally take that to mean "don't be a dick and eat your breakfast/lunch/dinner on the bus", but sipping from a drink is pretty low on the public-shame-meter.
That day, I get on the bus and I sit in one of the side facing seats towards the front of the bus. There's a guy about 5 or 6 feet away in one of the front facing seats with a leather briefcase on his lap and a giant cup of Starbucks in his hand. I'm only usually on the bus for about 15 minutes, but it's amazing how bored you get during that time, so I opened up my book and was blissfully/ignorantly reading away.
This is on my way to work, and at 8:15 in the morning it was already 90 plus degrees outside, and this particular bus had no air conditioning (at least not running anyway) and frankly, opening the window would've only made it worse. After 5 minutes on the bus, I'm getting pretty hot. Then I remember I have a nice water bottle full of ice water, so I unclipped my bottle from my bag, folded out the straw and took a sip. Before I can close the straw and clip it back to my bag, the guy with the coffee (coffee douche from here on out) looks at me with disgust on his face and loudly says "You're not allowed to have food or drink on the bus!" Surprised, I look over at him, notice his coffee and reply "Okay, are you the pot or the kettle, because you've got a cup of coffee in your hand, and at least my bottle wouldn't spill if I dropped it, unlike your crappy Starbucks cup".
Now, I really wanted to follow up that statement by knocking his coffee cup out of his hands to prove my point, but I didn't want to be the dick who made a mess or start something any more than I'm already into. In response, coffee douche says "Well, I'm not DRINKING it, just holding it. . . " as if that somehow made him better than me. The sign doesn't say "no eating or drinking on the bus", it says "no food or drink on the bus". Subtle I know, but I guess not everyone can grasp the minutiae of the printed word. Point being, we were BOTH breaking the rules. Anyway, I casually clipped my water bottle back to my bag, chuckled derisively at his comment and continued ignoring him and reading my book until I got to my stop. Reading is Fun. . damental!
What a way to start the day. . .
