I like most of J Browne up to Hold Out. He's always been a good background on a hot day in the yard.

Here's another mark for the "No Hope For Humanity" column of society:

On the streetcar to work this morning, I was standing behind an older lady who was seated. She kept nervously holding up a piece of paper in front of her face (Note: I am an unapologetic people watcher). On the paper, there were two short sentences in different handwriting surrounding what appeared to be an address printed out from an email. The first sentence read "Tell me where to stop." The second read "Get off at King and Bathurst." Since part of the pleasure of the people watching game is to fill in the back story, my read on this situation was that the woman was hearing impaired, and when she got on the streetcar that morning, she handed the note and a pen to the driver and indicated for him to write down her stop. Which he did - King and Bathurst.

As the ride went on, I flipped around the people-watching dial a bit, observing other folks on the streetcar and out on the street. When I came back to the lady with the note again, I saw that she had stood up and made her way toward the doors, her now well-worn note clutched in hand. Although we were still many stops away from Bathurst, she must have been concerned she was going to miss it. After the next stop was posted on the LED screen, I think she got her bearings and realized she still had some time, as she started to shuffle her way back over to a vacant seat in front of me. Getting around on a jerky streetcar in motion can be tricky for the most sure-footed of us, but she made her way across the aisle and was reaching out for the vertical bar at the back of the seat.

And that's when a young lady lunged in front of her, cut her off, and took the seat.

Now, not only was this girl obviously aware that she just stole this woman's seat, but I saw where she came from, and she already *had* a seat. She just wanted a better one. She plopped down, hugged her bag to her lap and turned her head brusquely ahead in an obnoxious, awkward manner that screamed "I know I just stole your seat, but i'm not going to acknowledge it. Time to turn up my headphones."

To the older woman's credit and class, she just smiled politely. She got her footing and stood in the aisle in front of the young seat stealer and held onto the bars, her note still dangling.

Obviously this young lady didn't know that the woman she denied seating to was hearing impaired. She could, of course, see that the woman was older and not as fleet of foot as her. But neither of those things should even matter. Short of a couple of school children playing a game, that sort of behavior is unfathomable to me. I could feel myself getting angry and staring daggers at the back of this girl's head.

Comfortable and cozy in her second seat of her morning ride, the girl nodded her head a little too intently to her music. I was weighing the pros and cons of calling her on her shit. It was obvious that this person needed a reminder that we're living in a society here and good manners are crucial to us all getting along, or at least not wanting to beat each other to a pulp. But at the same time, I couldn't see her face well enough to make a judgement as to how well she would take that sort of comment. The ante is upped exponentially in these situations when you are on public transit; I have seen enough people go from zero to psycho on these rides to know it's not worth taking that gamble. I was fairly confident that this girl was lucid and wasn't receiving and transmitting messages from Beezlebub. Her clothes were clean, new and stylish in an urban 'hood way, and she was certainly rocking a very slick phone and headphones. But again, that doesn't mean much. Not on the TTC. One wrong look or word and she could go Bobby Boucher, to quote Kanye.

My stop was coming up. The lady with the note seemed content enough. Instead of composing my missive to the seat stealer I found myself wishing that I was seated so that I could make a grandiose show of giving the lady my seat; "Here! Take MY seat, Ma'am!", my voice delivering the guilt trip subtext in a very non-subtle manner.

As the streetcar came to a halt at my stop, I saw that the older woman was jostled a bit and her hips and arms brushed the seat stealer. The seat stealer turned her head and looked up at the lady slighty with a clear look of annoyance in her eyes.

#peopleareshit

Livejournal.com
Modem, 14:12, yesterday
Catharsis of inaction.

This Dollar General is about a mile away from my office. As far as Western NY strippers go, she's surprisingly young. NSFW audio.

Here's her rebuttal



Classic Hits:

"I'm not racist, I have a black cousin"
"I'm bipolar...."
"If you look nigger up, it means an ignorant person".

https://twitter.com/JanelleAmbrosia

Classic takes all around.

you beat me to it, dov!

Biking my daughter home from school yesterday (she’s 4), she rides her little bike and I ride mine alongside her. Mostly it’s on secluded bike path, with just a few street crossings. We hit the button, wait for the ped signal, and cross with me standing way up on the pegs, making eye contact with the drivers, etc. Normally no big deal, actually really fun and relaxing.

Yesterday as we crossed the one big intersection, a car was inching forward into the crosswalk as we crossed. Daughter went through with plenty of room, and as I came through a few seconds later, the car began to actually roll forward at more than a crawl, now sticking about 2 feet into the crosswalk. I yelled “YO!” and looked at the driver, who was an older woman in her 70’s at least, possibly 80’s. She smiled nicely and kept rolling forward. I stopped my bike in front of her car and said “Hi – do you see this cross walk? Did you just see the 4-year-old who just rode in front of you?” She smiled, and held her hands up like “please”…? Meanwhile the car is still rolling forward, and has now bumped into my back tire, pushing the bike over at an angle. “STOP YOUR CAR, NOW.” Nothing. At this point I’m 90% certain she’s mentally not all there anymore. I looked at her passengers, who looked like younger family members, and said “if she hits and kills someone because you didn’t get her off the road, it’s on YOU. GET HER OFF THE ROAD.” … and then pulled my bike out from under her bumper and took off. Daughter was waiting calmly up on the curb just ahead of me, as we’ve trained her to do. Rode the rest of the way home, taking deep breaths and trying to get past it. Beer helped.

Damn.
I live just a couple of houses in from a major road, just off of an interstate and across from a forest preserve. They installed a crosswalk to get across this major road (US-34), with flashing yellow lights and everything. But many people -- about 60% or so-- just DON'T GET IT. They don't stop for the pedestrians and cyclists waiting to cross the street. And when I, or somebody else does, they come up on me and honk like an asshole.
So far, I don't believe that there has been an accident yet, but I dread the day that there is. Because I know that it's coming.

Conversely,

There are a lot of crossings for bike paths that have stop signs for the bikers to proceed when the traffic is clear to cross (no lights, no signs for drivers). A lot of people driving in the city think it's a nice gesture to stop for those bicyclists to cross...except the drivers usually do it without indication. I've seen more than one person get rear-ended because drivers arbitrarily make up their own traffic rules.

This is a great illustration of the greatest predictor (that I'm aware of, and I fucking bike a lot, but I'm no scientitian) of accidents: Unpredictable Behavior. When other people in traffic - be they cars, bikes, anyone moving more than 5mph - cannot tell what you're about to do, bad shit happens. When cars suddenly decide to stop in a place with no stop sign or signal, the odds go WAY up that people behind them were not mentally preparing for the possibility of a stop, and don't react in time.

I see that setup here sometimes, with crossings like you describe. Often, I will turn my body away from the cars and look down (at nothing) so that it's clear I'm not about to cross. That way the oncoming car won't try to be a bro and stop traffic for me. Because when they do, at best they get rear-ended. At worst, cars behind them swerve around them and keep going, blowing right through that crosswalk and what/whoever was in it. If I stand there looking like I might even want to cross, someone will usually be nice and stop. And that's when the bad shit happens.

In all fairness Todd, you do live in Chicago - Drivers are a special breed there

On the other Hand, I live in Seattle where we're famous for this:

A lot of the bike routes in Portland usually go down side streets. Most of them have stop signs at least at one part of each intersection but there's a few that have no stop signs at all. Makes me a little wary to just go flying down these streets.

Denver actually has really awesome bike paths, mostly along the river. Only things you had to worry about were other cyclists or pedestrians.

shiv, did you move to portland??? clearly, I have not been paying attention! and as infrequently as monty's been here of late, it's unlikely he's updated his files accordingly, either.

yep, back in march.

The fucking FILES

wow - cross-country!

And from all accounts, he's found a job as a professional bar hopper.

great success

Why does everyone equate what I post on fb is all that I'm doing with my time?

Yeah people should really try harder to just make stuff up to fill in the blanks.

Like, I dunno, shiv seems to do a lot of barhopping, but that can't be all he does. He probably spends the rest of his time running an underground cockfighting circuit and making his own cheese.

Local butcher's is selling World Cup sausages.

Portugal - Chicken Piri Piri
Spain - Pork Chorizo
Chile - Beef Chilli
USA - Pork Barbecue Hot Dog
Mexico - Pork Jalapeño
Italy - Pork and Italian Herbs
Switzerland - Pork and Swiss Cheese
Germany - Pork Bratwurst
Brazil - Pork Meat Feast
Australia - Pork XXXX Beer
Scotland - Pork, Shortbread & Irn Bru
France - Pork Toulouse
Japan - Chicken and Veg
Korea - BBQ Beef
England - Pork, Ham & Mustard
Netherlands - Pork, Syrup & Waffles
Cameroon - Pork and Hot Pepper
Ivory Coast - Chicken Casserole
Columbia - Beef and Coffee
Greece - Pork Moussaka
Costa Rica - Chicken, Chilli & Black Bean
Uruguay - Spicy Beef
Argentina - Beef and Red Wine
Ecuador - Pork and Potato
Honduras - Beef and Avocado
Bosnia - Pork and Onion
Ghana - Spicy Lamb
Belgium - Pork, chilli chocolate
Algeria - Lamb and Parsley
Iran - Lamb Curry
Nigeria - Pork, Coconut & Chillu
Croatia - Pork, Black Pepper, Paprika & Garlic
Russia - Pork and Vodka

This could tempt a dieter.

the boots were pretty thin on the ground today but I found some nice bits n bobs



UK to Denmark export issue






bootleg of 60's recordings, sleeve was a bit tatty but the vinyl is sweet



Xmas instrumentals, dunno what they were smoking at Charisma HQ but it must have been strong



features clips of jingles and DJ's prattling on, unfortunately it's all rather self indulgent
and not in the same league as Capitol's Kenny Everett but you can tell they wish they were



8 track Cornish radio jingles selection



JC's debut 7"



probably released in the wake of the great Bingo craze of 1973
it sounds suspiciously like My Old Man's A Dustman to me




sketches written by half the future Monty Python team as well as 2 of The Goodies + Barry Cryer







is there a weirder looking sleeve for an LP released on the budget World Record Club label?
dodgy looking DJ's dozen if you ask me






loving the pun on the sleeve, I nearly had a harp attack!




Oh Brother Where Art Thou? eat your heart out






most folks seemed to have not known what this great LP was as it had been sitting in a well thumbed box

Sweet bootleg.