Bus 79 Ride Report

Saturday was beautiful with just the right amount of sun and the right amount of breeze. So my girlfriend and I decided to head on out to Pasadena, however, instead of taking the easily accessible Gold Line I convinced her to take the bus with me instead. I told her I was in the mood to write up a new ride report and that as far as I knew the 79 had not been done yet. Plus I wait at a bus stop that shares with the 79 and the majority of people at the stop seem to get on that bus and I had always been curious where it went. Thrilled, she said ok.

The bus arrived at the corner of Olive and 8th around the time I expected it, 10:25 AM, maybe a couple minutes late, but nothing to really complain about. The first thing I was happy to see was that it was one of the busses with the seating that I like the most, that is to say the curved high backs instead of the low square backs. We boarded alone and joined just a few others already on, however this would soon change.

At Pershing Square the amount doubled and 1st and main doubled again so that by the time we were on Cesar Chavez the bus was almost entirely packed without any “stop requests” being sounded off. As for the bum situation, a common occurrence on the downtown lines, I was happy to see (smell) that only one terrible smelling bum boarded at Pershing Square and it was noted audibly by a black man wearing a Shepard’s style hat. It was all going on behind me so I couldn’t see the face of the smelly culprit as he was being berated, but after a several stops he was forgotten about. Instead the Shepard’s hat man began yelling about his future at the track. I wasn’t sure. but I assume he meant Santa Anita and though he was adamant about rallying the troops to not make anymore stops so he could get to track faster the bus driver just kept on stopping. The selfish jerk. Many others seemed to agree as calls to drive on sounded off. Looking around I could see newspapers open to the race book page and I could feel the energy in the air that only the hope of ponies can create.

Along the drive there was also some fun signery. One such was for an out of business place for golden pigs or California pigs of gold. Something or other. But there was nothing there except a couple of broken trailers. I dreamed back to a day where Mission Road was famous for its golden pigs, if there ever was such a day, my history of that particular area is not very thorough.

As I was lost in my daydream I seemed to have missed the catalyst that turned the crowds excitement to anger, but the packed suffocation of the bus might have had something to do with it. With each stop that couldn’t fit, the group grew testier because of the pushing and pressing of the passengers to fit more. There were cries “to move back”, and if by clairvoyance to rally up some positive support, the bus driver yelled out something about how many people were going to the racetrack and the mood changed back to excitement. However, that excitement turned to confusion when out of nowhere our bus pulled over and the bus driver told all the people going to the track to get on the bus behind us. Confused but blinded by the group mentality ten to fifteen people jumped off the bus and we were off again. I never saw a bus pass us so it could very well have been a sly ploy to unload the rowdy pony boys, but who can say. Not to mention it didn’t really matter all that much because just a minute or so later the bus was packed again, many carrying their tell-tale newspapers open to the track page.

Among all this was a preacher in a Jamaican colored hemp hat that was casually trying to save people by asking them if they were “transferring or transforming.” One man whom he approached in the seat behind me somehow turned the subject onto an author he liked that used to write for the LA Times. The preacher who I later learned didn’t believe in God, just karma in general, said he didn’t read the LA Times because they were cheats and that when he used to work there someone came in and murdered his supervisor. This somehow led to the 2nd guy trying to convince the preacher that it was impossible not to know who Robin Williams was, but the preacher refused to acknowledge it until the 2nd man brought up Tootsie, which I’m not sure Robin Williams is even in. I think he had meant to say Mrs. Doubtfire, but my getting involved would probably hinder more than help. You see, the 2nd guy, who we’ll call Robin from now on, had actually met Robin Williams the year before and to not know him was unthinkable. This led Robin to talk about Billy Crystal, which the preacher again denied having any knowledge of so he decided to abruptly change the subject to his most recent purchase of a 13 inch VCR combo TV on eBay. Turns out no one else was bidding and he got it at a steal, but it also turned out that Robin was very anti eBay, convinced of a conspiracy that the company had going. The preacher than talked about Amazon.com and funny Jews whose names neither could figure out. Robin then dropped an “I was homeless for 3 years,” which somehow led to early LA architecture convo and the amount of deaths that have occurred in his current apartment building. In fact, one such body had been decaying 3 weeks before it was reported. I guess the landlord was a former child molester and was hiding under a false name while selling drugs to his tenants. AND they just recently shot an episode of Desperate Housewives there!

Sadly our stop at Huntington and Sierra Madre came and we couldn’t continue to listen to tales of corporate conspiracy and molester management. The last thing I heard before we had to get off was the preacher mentioning he was a raiders fan. Even if you’re not down for listening to such entertaining stories of strangers one has to appreciate the fact that if nothing else the convo at least blocked out having to listen to the damn “hand” talking in Transit TV’s wonderful Delsym ad.

All in all the trip was one of the most entertaining I’ve been on. Though if you had to stand and deal with the pushing and pawing for more room I’m sure it would have been much less enjoyable. And no surprise to me, the minutes late at the beginning was more than doubled and tripled by the time we got to San Marino, but when we got off, the weather was still perfect and now I had a story to tell.