Saturday, January 29, 2011

The dreaded 213

I realized I haven't blogged about Salt Lake City's public transportation in a while. After Andy and I moved to Sugar House, I abandoned TRAX and began riding the bus (which is actually really nice--way better than TRAX). I began riding the 220 which picked me across the street from my house and delivered me to the hospital at which I work. Easy. Wonderful.

UTA decided to revamp the bus schedules mid-December which cause the 220 to no longer go to the hospital! In fact, no busses near me went to the hospital. Boo. I would have to transfer. After studying the new schedule I decided to switch to the 213 simply because it got me closer to the hospital than 220's new route.

So, the 213 picks up one block west of the 220 and let me tell you what a difference one block makes! The 220 uses beautiful, new, clean busses whereas the 213 uses super crappy, dirty, old busses. The people who ride the 220 are all commuters to the hospital. The people who ride the 213 are rude and stinky. Unfortunately, both busses cater to two high schools which isn't ideal for the morning commute.

I rode the 213 for about two weeks before I gave up and returned to the less convenient 220. Here are the reasons I chose the longer commute:

1. The 213 would NEVER arrive on time. It was either 10 minutes early or 10 minutes late (when it decided to show up at all)

2. The drivers are grumpy (The first day I rode I tapped my pass on the scanner and the driver mumbled something to me, "Excuse me?" I said, since he mumbled and I didn't hear what he had said. "USE--THE--ONE--IN--BACK" he yelled in an exaggerated way.)

3. The people who wait at my stop are weird (I struck up a conversation with a nice blind man who told me he really hoped I was LDS because the only nice people in the world were Mormon and he sincerely hoped I was one of the nice people. Then he invited me to a Sarah McLachlan concert for Valentine's Day.)

4. The people who ride the bus are rude (I gave up my seat for an elderly man with back problems and he called me a "bitch" very loudly because he was offended that I moved and didn't sit next to him. He called me a "stuck up bitch" loudly for 10 minutes until I exited the bus.)

5. High School students- though this one goes for 213 AND 220, (I listened to a Junior telling a sophomore about the really old movie that his teacher showed him called "A Beautiful Mind". He talked about how it was made when Russell Crowe was really young and how it was about some guy who was good at math, was "schizophrenia", and tried to kill his son . He thought it might have been based on a true story.)

6. College Freshman ( taking religion 101 talking about how lucky they are to be part of church that doesn't have any negative historical events to cover up unlike the Catholic Church.)

7. General Weirdoes (A guy interrupted me from reading to say, "I notice you are reading with your sunglasses on. Does reading with your sunglasses on give you a different perspective on what you're reading?")

Due to the above instances, I have switched back to the 220. Thank God.

3 comments:

Emilia said...

And to think I was considering taking the bus a couple times a week! Although, concerning the college freshmen in #6, I think you should have enlightened them on some of the "darker" historical moments of their church...would have totally wigged them out...and could have been fun to mess with their minds. ;)
Glad you're back to the good bus!

April said...

Sometimes I read with my sunglasses on too, it doesn't definitely give me a different perspective. wtf?

Mandee Shaffer said...

WTF!? I'm PART of their church and I would have told them every dark piece of history I could have found to prove my point. Every church has them. What fuckwits.

And this is why I hate utah public transportation. I miss the subway. or the train in Germany. Where NO ONE even LOOKS at you.