aristophanes

Walked out to the Firth of Forth today, which according to Google Maps was about 4.5 miles' walk by the route I used. I finally got there, and as invigorating as I find the ocean air (it's my native air, afterall -- I was born and raised in Los Angeles) it was super boring over there and after about 10 minutes I'd seen all I needed to see. I wasn't too tired, but thought I might use the bus to go back home since it was a long and unfamiliar walk out there. But, the next bus was going to be 20 or 30 minutes off (since it's Sunday), and so I decided hell with it, I'll relax at a cafe and rest a little, then go ahead and walk back. I bought a weird drink I'd never heard of and don't remember what it was, but it was a spritz of some kind using an Italian apertif. When I stepped out of the restaurant -- which happened to be right next to the bus stop -- there happened to be a bus waiting. And so I took it as a sign to use the bus.

I suppose I'm glad that I did, in that it was an entertainingly eventful bus ride. I sat down across the aisle from a guy who was loudly screaming to himself. Everyone was kind of ignoring him, as he'd blabber, approximately, "Get this fucking bullet out of me, fuck them all, fuck them all!"

After a few stops, a young couple got onto the bus. The girl walked on and sat down, holding an open bottle of flavored vodka which was about three-quarters empty, waiting for the guy to pay for the tickets. The guy was about 70p short on exact change -- he was very nervous and seemed either much less drunk than the girl, or maybe even quite sober and just worriedly trying to keep his eye on the drunk girl. He began asking if anyone would be able to make change? Unfortunately, the first person it happened that he asked was the crazy screaming guy (being the person sitting nearest the door), who reacted even more crazy and screamingly at the question.

"I DON'T KNOW YOU, FUCKER!!!" screaming-guy bellowed.

Nervous-guy, realizing suddenly that the man was cray-cray, apologized and tried to ask elsewhere if anyone would be able to make change, but screaming-guy kept interrupting with screamed protests and insults. Meanwhile, the driver had stopped the bus and was coming to chase down drunk girl and tell her to get rid of her bottle of vodka.

Nervous guy was then stuck trying (pretty admirably) to calm down screaming-guy, convince his drunken girl to abandon her bottle of vodka, and still hoping to get change for the bus. Tensions rose. I ended up being the one who gave him 70p, though a little late, as the driver kicked both nervous-guy and drunk-girl from the bus right after I did that. (Oh well, I figure they used it for the next bus, after settling the vodka problem.)

Screaming-guy remained on the bus screaming for about 3 more stops, till the driver shut off the bus again. The driver didn't even have to say anything, screaming-guy has probably been through this before -- soon as the driver approached him, screaming-guy screamed, "Yeah, I'll get off!!!" and angrily left the bus, then began screaming and kicking the doors as the driver restarted and tried to drive away. It appeared that the screamer kept kicking the bus even as it moved, and fell over as a result of kicking a moving bus.

And then I rode back up to Princes Street and walked home, and bought bread and discount crumpets from Sainsbury's.