On The Buses

Glasgow buses are so bad it’s not funny anymore. Anyone who has ever set foot on a bus in this city more than once probably knows what I mean. All of the usual complaints apply… they’re always late, the fares keep going up, sometimes they crash… yet somehow the buses in Glasgow manage to bring something new to the table.

The drivers all seem to suffer from post-lobotomy mental defects with personalities ranging from absent to psychotic. The actual buses themselves often smell of puke and/or piss. And you always get a strange feeling like you’re taking a slightly wild gamble when you go up the stairs on a double decker. And that’s because you are. Which is what I do on a daily basis.

There’s about an eighty per cent chance there’s going to be someone pretty obnoxious up there waiting for you. After that it’s about fifty/fifty whether or not they might be openly offensive in some way, with about a thirty per cent chance of aggression or hostility and I’d say about a ten per cent chance of them apparently being dangerous. That is, having the countenance of a lunatic. An actual real lunatic. Those are pretty bad odds.

Then sometimes the bus will get to a certain stop and without any warning not go any further. The driver will just stand up and say that’s it, end of the line. And so you have to get off and wait for another bus. But the thing is, sometimes the drivers don’t even bother telling you. They just go away and leave everyone sitting there like idiots until it becomes obvious that they’re not coming back.

Here are three unusual things that (I swear to you) have happened to me on buses:

1. A driver actually jumped out of his cab, stood nose to nose with me on the pavement and threatened me with violence. I had suggested that he might be on drugs which it seems he probably was.

2. The bus stopped and I heard the driver shouting from downstairs. I went downstairs and realised that I was the only person on the bus. I assumed that the bus was doing the thing where you suddenly get chucked off but the driver said no and asked me to wait where I was. He then disappeared for about ten minutes, leaving me on the bus on my own with the door open and the engine running. Then he reappeared and told me that he was going on holiday first thing the next day and that was his only chance to change some money.

3. I jumped off at my stop and the door closed on me. As in, it shut exactly half of me- one arm, one leg, one ear, one bollock- on the bus, and the other half on the pavement (which incidentally and inconveniently enough, is a good two feet lower than the bus). It didn’t hurt or anything but let’s just say that I wouldn’t do it to show off in front of a girl. So I stood there like a dick for a full twenty seconds or so (which I found out is a long time when trapped in a bus door) before it finally opened very very slowly and the driver said (and I swear that these were his exact words) -It’s just started doing that. (It still pisses me off, even now, that I was so shocked I just stood there and watched the bus drive away and couldn’t even say anything).