Search ThisCrazyTrain.com

Wednesday, November 30, 2011


On Monday, I published a photo from a guy named Henry. Henry took a picture of his reflection in a GO train window and then emailed it to me. He claims to have his feet on the seat and it appears he's giving me the finger. Or he's telling me I'm Number One.

Below is the text exchange we had Friday night.
My replies are in green.


Henry: hey asshole just sent u a picm lemme no if u like LOL

The hell is that?

It's me sayin hi 2 u. Middle finger in the air and I'm a foot riding cowboy. The best season is winter when I rest my boots!

Where are you in the photo?

You don't see? Are u blind? LOL

I see what looks like a fat blob. Is that you? Are those tree trunks you're holding?

I'm sitting and I've taken a pic of myself inthe reflection. Do u see it?

Nope.

Make it larger.

Make what larger?

The photo asswipe.

How do I do that?

Are u kidding?

Well maybe if you weren't such a crappy photographer...

It's the phone.

Yeah, I bet. Ansel Adams managed to take art gallery quality photos with a box and a pinhole of light. You're just crappy with a camera.

Maybe if I have a $2000 nikon instead of this camera phone but I don't so who carers.

See my point above. The camera is merely a tool.

Anyway, there's nothing to see here so I'm moving on. Thanks for the chat.

Do you want me to highlight what you need to see?! LOL

Nope.

What's your issue with people who put feet on the seats anyway? Who cares. Does it hurt you!?

Actually yes it does.

Every time I see feet on a seat, a piece of my heart withers away and dies.

LOL whatver. Who cares. When u look at my. Pic you'll get it.

Wow, you're not letting this go are you?

You should put it on yourwebsite!!

Put what?

My picture.

All I see is a mess.
I never heard anything further from Henry. Eventually I did get around to looking at the photo he sent in Photoshop and posted it for you all on Monday. lswgirl13 confirmed what I initially thought, it wasn't obvious at first what the photo was about.

Hells yeah she was gettin' a great deal. No wonder GO has increased the fare inspections

from: D.F.
to: cj@thiscrazytrain.com
date: Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 2:20 PM
subject: Presto

I was on the LSE train home the other day and we got checked yet again for tickets. I swear they check twice a week lately.

Anyhoo, this woman sitting across from me, busy using her Blackberry has a Presto card and when the GO Transit officer tapped it, it didnt beep. Long story short, this woman since she purchased her Presto card over two months ago has only been tapping on in the mornings. She told the officer that he was wrong, that when she purchased the Presto card she was told it automatically knew where she was going and she only had to tap once a day.

So the guy explains to her how it really works and then asks her if after initially putting $150 on her card over two months ago, has she since refilled her card? She said no and he said, "Didn't you think you were getting a really good deal?"

After that, I literally LOL'd at her. Anyway, he wrote her a ticket. I wonder which is cheaper, the ticket or the fact that she's only been paying half price for the past 2 months?! I am also shocked that she has never been checked before now since, as I mentioned, GO is checking tickets much more frequently than ever before.

Ain't no shame in this game

from: David S.
to: cj@thiscrazytrain.com
date: Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 8:06 AM
subject: It's raining so...

Literally watched this one park - even though I stood there staring in amazement over how they carried on with no shame at parking in what is the "driveway" and right under a NO PARKING sign. There was still space at the back of the Oshawa GO Station lot, but heck, it was a rainy day so why not, right?

Sounds like someone set sail on the S.S. Minnow


from: Doug R.
to: cj@thiscrazytrain.com
date: Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 11:37 AM
subject: Car parked for at least a year

This car has been parked in the Pickering GO Station lot since at least January and has never moved. If this was a pay lot I wonder what the bill would total? I walk by this car every day and wonder what happen to its owner. At least now I know to tell out-of-towners to leave cars here and get a ride to the airport. Save on the "park n fly" charge.

Dirty skateboard is tired

What a GO foot rider does on weekends in coffee shops.

A grinch among us

This may be a free country, but people aren't "free" to do this. Sorry. Vandalism has no place on trains.

Thanks to Pete L. for the pic.

The amazing Olympic Sprint that will never be again

Those of you who have me on the tweets know I was up at an ungodly hour yesterday morning to catch the 1st LSE train (507 am) out of Oshawa.

My day really was trains, planes, buses and automobiles for a whirlwind trip to Montreal for business. A trip that almost didn't happen.

Oh it was close. It was so so so close.

Monday was a long day and my mother sweetened the crap by asking me to venture into the Eaton Centre - a place I HATE - "to run to Old Navy to fetch a sweater she put on hold". First of all, there is no 'running' to Old Navy. I work across from the Eaton Centre, where it starts. Old Navy is located where it ends.

I had a million things to do before leaving for this trip, some items that were delayed because I wasn't in on Friday. I was already working well past 'time to go home' and had to be up at 4am the following day. There is no saying no to my mother.

Those with an Eastern European mother know they are the first to throw out the guilt card. Screw the King of Hearts. Nothing beats the "next time you ask me to do something for you, I'm going to be too busy to do it, too" card. Her house wins. Every time.

By 730 pm, I'd done as much as I could on a presentation I had to provide graphics for. Knowing I had to call it a night, I left work and walked up Yonge from Queen to Old Navy (Dundas).

I buy the goddamn sweater and take the subway to Union. I miss the 813 pm train by 2 minutes.
This sets the mood for the rest of the night.

I sit around Union waiting for the 913 pm train, pissed off that I'm wasting time and all this over a stupid $17.25 sweater. Granted, that was the 75% off sale price, but still.

I roll out on the 913. I have the sweater, my purse, and a leather attache folder with printouts relevant to Montreal, notes from the company president about the presentation I had been working on, my boarding passes, the address of where I was going and reference guides for training all neatly bound and printed in colour.

On the train, I put the Old Navy bag and my purse under my seat and I slide the folder into the crevice of the seat between the cushion and armrest - this location is key to the story so pay attention.

As we leave Whitby, I'm so tired and unhappy that I will get less than 4 hours sleep that I'm no longer clued in to what I had with me when I boarded.

I remembered the sweater. I remembered my purse. (Oh yes, you know what's coming...)

I walked to my car all the way at the end of the lot - the same distance to walk from Queen to Dundas. As I get in my car I suddenly realize that I don't have the leather attache folder. Yes, those of you who are swift already knew this.

The train was still sitting at the station.

I threw my purse and the goddamned sweater into my car and took off running.

Here's what I didn't clue into: the train wasn't going anywhere but when I got off the train, it was "out of service" but only temporarily.

I'd like to point out a few things about me and running.
1. I suffer from chronic heel pain.
2. I'm overweight.
3. I have asthma.
4. I run like I'm treading mud.

As I reach the platform, my lungs are screaming, my feet are numb, I can't feel my thighs and I'm coughing. In fact, by the time I reach the accessibility coach, I am so out of breath I can't talk.

The engineer was on the platform and he took one look at me and asked me if I left something on the train.

I nodded. I coughed and gasped and felt like vomiting. He told me the doors would be opening soon once the train was back in service and that's when I clued in to a few people milling about the platform.

I didn't know! The hell! And I did that Olympic Sprint for nothing. Nothing!

I got on the train and could not recall which coach I was on, so I raced through the four locomotives east of the CSA and on the second run-through, found my folder.

I walked like a turtle back to my car and was coughing so hard, I was gagging. In hindsight, I should have just slept at the office.

I honestly don't know where the hell I was going with this. Other than to say when the CSA says to look around for your shit so you don't forget it, heed the advice.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Just another day on the TTC

Amazerballs. So much for staying well back behind the yellow platform line, huh?
Thanks to Dan D. for the pic.

Train 1 - Ferrari 0


I can't confirm if these pictures are indeed what happened after a Ferrari driver attempted to outrun a GO train five years ago according to an email. Some sharp-eyed railhead will probably smell a rat but they're neat and show why you'll never win in a contest against a train.

Monday, November 28, 2011

A quick note about anonymous commenting - Redux

I've turned off moderation. This means comments will appear instantaneously.

I think I've tightened up the spam filters and suspect our 12 year old troll will have to be more imaginative with his flaming if he wants to be heard.

I don't like putting up a barrier. I like giving people the opportunity to speak without censorship but some people just need to surf away and get their own soapbox.

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Foot rider tells us we're number one

Henry disagrees with this site's anti-foot riding mandate and sent in this lovely photo for all of us to enjoy.

I salute you too, Henry.

My chainsaw loves men of girth and it's hungry.

Bag riding and foot riding. Doing' it right

Girlie here has it down. Bag next to her. Feet on the bag. Awesomesauce.

The Future

Apparently, two coaches were enough in "the future".

Unfortunately, I don't know the backstory of this photo emailed to me. The sign says "GO Urban"??? in what is the GO Transit stylized font. Perhaps GO Transit was to be one big monorail along the lake? Close enough.

Photographer Terry Doner captures 'exit the GO parking lot' crazy. Richmond Hill, but it's like this pretty much at all of them


Source

Bluhd!

from J. McDonnell
to cj@thiscrazytrain.com
Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 12:58 AM
subject nose gushers

I'm susceptible to nosebleeds at this time of year. I just found your website so I figured I would send you a story that happened to me last week.

I was headed home to Milton and was in a quad with three other women. My nose was really dry. So I kept pinching it hoping this would stimulate some mucus. After about 12 minutes of this, I began to think of things that would make me cry such as my dog dying, my mom burning all my Pac Man personal arcade systems. You know those really small versions of the larger kind you would play in an arcade? I have seven of them. All original. Mint. Already the tears are forming. What I was hoping for was a runny nose as it would help with the lube. Earlier in the day I had moistened my nostrils with dabs of Vaseline. Hey, anyone who deals with this dry nose shit is nodding their head. Anyone grossed out should just count their lucky stars you don't have to start your day stuffing grease up your snot tunnels.
About 30 minutes into the ride, I'm now considering giving up my seat to snort the water that isn't safe for consumption in the GO train bathroom when all of a sudden, I feel a gathering wetness in my left nostril. Shit. Blood.

Of course I have no fucking tissues and the only thing I can use to stench the flow is the sleeve of my jacket, which I carefully use to dab after every sniff of blood. I throw my head back which only pushes the blood down my throat causing me to gag. Then horror of horrors, I irritated my gag reflex and coughed, spewing a spray of blood into my hands.

Only one of the women in my quad was awake and she was staring at me like I was Regan in the Exorcist movie.

I mumbled an apology and scrambled to get up to go to the bathroom. I realized I had the attention of quite a few people who had no qualms about shrinking back into their seats as I passed them.

In the bathroom I looked like I had just bitten the toe off of someone. I had blood crusted on top of my upper lip. My nose was leaking like a faucet. I stayed in the bathroom for most of the ride.

My wife was waiting for me at the station. She was pissed I had ruined my jacket. Like I had intended for all this to go down.

I guess what surprised me most was that no one offered to get me paper towels or provide Kleenexes. I guess that's to be expected in this day and age with all the diseases on hand.
A crappy train ride home.

-J

Reminds me of this video:



J, you're the boy screaming, "Not funnnnnnnnnnnneeeeeeeeeee!"

An almost 'win' for all your space are belong to us on the TTC

Surprisingly, This Crazy Train has developed a rather large TTC following. Are there no satirical TTC blogs out there with roving citizen-eye riders on the look-out for the rudest of rude? Or is it because I'm just so awesome? Well... I am.

Sean writes:
I was on the TTC this morning, and these two yahoos decided to take the comfort of a three-seater subway car and turn it into a two-seater. The way they did this is by sharing a newspaper (sorry, the "Metro"; not a real newspaper) between them and effectively hiding the middle seat. Alas, their clever scheme only lasted one stop, before an elderly woman snuck in between them.
Go Granny go Granny go.

Guy on the right: "The key to 'all your space' is to look super engrossed in the conversation."
Guy on the left: "Got it. Look super engrossed."

Guy on the right: "Be sure to smile occasionally so people don't think you're that much of a douche for hogging a seat."
Guy on the left: "Got it. Look friendly."
Guy on the right: "Right. This way, little old ladies aren't scared to ask for a seat."
Guy on the left: "Got it. No stealing seats from nana."

It was all kinds of purple

A few of you will recall an earlier post involving the purchase of a ticket for the "Purple One" by my father.

Dad got me a great seat as one can see from the photo.

I last saw His Royal Purple Highness in 2004. The man is a tireless performer. He rocked for almost four hours and gave encore after encore. The best was when he busted out Purple Rain. It was amazing to see so many people just so happy to be singing a song they truly love.

I went alone to the concert but made friends with the people around me. I wore purple but not to the extremes that others did. Prince fans be crazy y'all.

For those who missed him, here's the performance of all performances:

Friday, November 25, 2011

Off Topic: First in line for Santa at Fairview Mall!

Lemme tell you. This Santa? He was all kinds of awesome. He spent well over five minutes chatting with my kid. She was so ecstatic afterwards that it really made me feel grateful that she's the kid that she is. Funny. Sweet. Sensitive. Her excitement makes me want to enjoy Christmas.

It's been a very stressful two weeks for me. Been tryin' to bring the funny but not really feelin' it these days. What this girlie needs is sleep. Alcohol. Sleep. Alcohol. And not necessarily in that order. I suspect next week will be better.

I have in my possession probably one of the best text exchanges yet with someone who confuses me with GO Transit Lost & Found. I just have to clean it up. It's amazerballs.

Thursday, November 24, 2011

What a gong show that was ...

I have to admit, it's been over 18 years since I've taken a TTC ride north of Queen on the Yonge line.

The hell?

One word. Sardines.

I had a conference today. I journeyed up from Union to North York Centre and left at around 5pm, so just at the start of the clusterf*ck rush hour. By the time the train left York Mills, the train, one of those new, motorhome-wide Bombardier models, was P-A-C-K-E-D.

I was seated in one of the 3-seater jump seats. The ones with a sign that says small babies will be catapulted off of. A woman is standing right beside me and almost over top of me. Like this:

Am I setting the scene now? Good. I had snapped the photo so I could show how tight it was on the train and how people were almost on top of me. But then things took a different turn.

She's chewing gum. She's snapping it. She's chomping it. She's blowing bubbles.

Well girlie blew a little too hard because this is what happened next:

This is my chest and me taking a photo of my chest where her orange-coloured gum landed on my scarf. Because I know, if I didn't, few would believe me that this woman launched her gum clear out of her mouth and onto me.

What happened next? Settle down. I didn't go for a bag beatdown although it did cross my mind but how could I? Oh, how soon y'all forget. The nail incident?

She saw me take the photo which I know totally threw her for a loop. Yeah, Imma submit this to CityNews Viewer News. Top story.

She made no effort to retrieve her gum. I had to ask her. She reached down quickly, snagged it and held it between her fingers.

Look, I felt for her but really? No apology? When the train pulled into Bloor, she bolted.

Train delayed? Cancelled? Go ahead, make yourself comfortable

What a shit show that was

I lost all battery power on my BlackBerry shortly after climbing aboard the 5:53pm LSE, so I had no idea or fore-warnings of the dog and pony show that was sadly, a pedestrian fatality at Guildwood.

However, I did connect with the people around me to commandeer another BlackBerry and send a text to my husband so at least he knew, if we were going to be idle for hours, that I was stuck. Said networking led to a student sitting in my quad getting a lead at a law firm. See? Delays aren't all that bad.

This also meant I missed all the texts sent to me as people vented. I do have a messaging feature enabled on my phone that emails all texts to me, so I had some great reading material when I got home.

Yes, it was a suck-fest and yes, I agree that pedestrian fatalities are an annoyance and an inconvenience and yes, I do wonder why these people don't wait until 2am, but the reality is there are people who do decide to end their lives in this manner. It's unfortunate that the ones who are affected are those left to deal with the decision: the VIA engineer, the first responders, witnesses, the family left behind, etc. Our 35-minute to 1.5 hour delay (depending on what train you were on) pales in comparison to what these people just had to go through.

Or, there are people who choose to try to beat an oncoming train at a level crossing. I never understood people who do that. Maybe someone can explain it to me?

Every bag tells a story

Wednesday night's 5:53pm express from Union to Oshawa.

When I get on, the train is 75% full. I take the first seat available in a quad opposite a dude and a chick with her very large bag on the seat across from her. She's on her iPhone, yapping with a lot of likes and um, and uh, and you know, like?

The train continues to fill. She makes no motion to remove the bag even though I'm eyeballing it and waiting for someone to ask her to move it so they can sit. No dice. Holy crap, people are way too polite.

This girl doesn't even take a breath. And she's crowded herself against the window and facing out that way so as it to indicate through her body language that if no one can see her face, no one will ask her to move her bag.

She talks. And she talks. Finally, the train is standing room only and we begin to pull out of Union. She's still talking and I've gotten busy tweeting about her.

This is all kinds of rude.

Amazingly at no point, even through the Rouge Valley dead zone, did she lose any cell signal. I contemplated a few times slapping her on the arm to get her attention but then figured, why the hell should I do all the work to free up a seat for someone who doesn't have the balls to tell her to move her crap?

After Pickering, she decides she needs to get more comfortable and throws her dirty, caked-on-muddy boots onto the seat. I had enough at this point. After Ajax, there was enough room for me to move to change seats so I didn't have to listen to her stupid pirate hooker conversation with her friend. As I was leaving, I did say very loudly, I sure hope you bought a second ticket for your bag and walked up the stairs to sit somewhere else.

Entitlement? Absolutely.

These are the clowns some have raised.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Beware: I will shut down your game of BBM ping pong

5:10 pm LSE Tuesday

The lady beside me has the volume on her BlackBerry set to L-O-U-D. There are several of us around her who are fiddling with our own BlackBerries, which are quiet.

She's in full BBM-mode (*BBM = BlackBerry Messenger), sending messages back and forth between herself and a colleague. The pinging is so loud that I want to punch her in the va-jay-jay after every ping.

After the 11th ping or so, the guy across from me drops his head into his hands. Let me tell you something about "dramatics" and "grandstanding". The people annoying the shit outta you? They don't notice your gestures, your eye rolls, your death stares, your sighs, or your throats clearing.

Queue me.

"Would you like me to show you how to turn your volume down?" I ask the woman.

"Oh, is it bothering you?" She asks, throwing a quick glance at everyone around her. Thanks for shaking all your heads "yes", you donkeys.

"It's a little loud," I say with a polite smile. I take her Blackberry and show her on the Home Screen how to change her alerts. We settle on "Normal" although I would have preferred "Silent".

She doesn't thank me which irks me. I imagine she thought I was in the wrong. That I was rude. Or bold.

No, what I am is smart. There was no way in hell I was listening to anyone play a game of BBM ping-pong for 45 minutes. Not on my watch. Imma shut you down.

Meme butchered by Yours Truly

Off Topic: As seen at the grocey store. No wonder life tastes a little "off" at times


Somewhere there's a produce manager who thinks he's pretty clever.

Photo courtesy of Sean P.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

It's like a Choose Your Own Adventure book

UPDATE
Holy moses. Loads of people are googling the link shown in the email below. Either these people don't realize they willingly set themselves up for GO news alerts, they don't trust "the man", they just refuse to believe the "reward" is real, or they think it's a virus.


"GO Transit" (alerts@enews-gotransit.com)
GO Transit wants to learn more about how you use our train service. We are conducting a survey to better understand your transit needs. Please take a few minutes to complete this survey. Completing the survey by December 21 will enter you in a contest for a chance to win one of ten $250 GO Transit fare vouchers! Please visit www.enews.gorailsurvey.com to take the survey
What? Me? Turn down free fare? Never.

I must warn you, the questions almost make you want to lie.


This one below, is specifically dangerous. If this survey were paper-based, there'd be a big arrow with the words "Turn over for more" scrawled underneath.

When a text message takes a wrong turn

I present to you, what happens when a person with good intentions, goes down in a blaze of glory.

I've stripped the remaining text headers out for y'all. My replies are in green.

Text message from 1416730XXXX
to 19054427423
Mon Nov 21 2011 06:55 PM

r u the go person?

Text message from 19054427423
to 1416730XXXX
Mon Nov 21 2011 06:59 PM

Hi! I am definitely a go-to person. What's up?

is this the go train site?

No.

so this isn't the crazy go site???

Yes and no.

wtf? are u the person who writes about go trains???

Yes, sometimes.

oh my f*cking god. just answer the question!!!

I did.

no u didn't.

is this ur website www.thiscrazytrain.com

Yes.

why didn't u just say yes!!!??????

Then I would be lying.

what?

You asked if I was the "go person"? I'm not.

jesus christ. r u really this slow??? obviously u new what i meant.

Au contraire, my friend. I get people who mistake me for a GO Transit employee so I like to be real upfront about who I am not.

whatever, k. i have a story 4 u.

Are there keys missing on your end? What are you using?

wtf?

Why are you typing like I'm charging by the letter?

who cares who i type. r u interested in my story or not????!

Sure. Shoot. Just don't type me as a class-A personality.

i don't feel lke tellin it 2 u NE more cuz ur being so rude

Your typing is giving me a headache. What's better for pain? Tylenol or Advil?

etf?

Are you trying to give me stock advice?

WTF?! r u on crack?

r u high?

I think you need some anger management courses.

i think u need a kick in the azz

Okay, why don't you name the place and time and I'll come by and show you some buns?

w/e. i'm out.

Have a good night. Don't forget to water your plants. Mark Cullen told me once that plants die if you just put them on the fireplace. Stupid guy. Knowing so much about plants. Please.

Because I haven't broken out the cheerleaders yet

This heartwarming story comes from one of the regulars - lswgirl13.
With all the bitching and complaining (on the site) I actually have a warm and fuzzy story. Last nite, I'm almost at my stop, all comfy as I have the quad to myself.

I'm getting organized, get my keys out of my purse, put my PRESTO card back in my wallet, put my gloves on, etc. I get into my car (totally unrelated but just to piss Whitby and Oshawa people off, less than 5 minutes from off the train to out of the parking lot!!) and head to the grocery store for a few things.

I get to the cashier, open my purse and yep, NO WALLET. I immediately knew I had left it on the train. My gas tank is nearly empty. I have no cash, no debit card, no credit cards (including my work one!), no driver's licence, no health cards PRESTO card... NOTHING.

I whip home, get on the computer and start looking for GO phone numbers thinking all the while I have a poop-load of stuff to cancel and then my home phone rings. It's a girl named Lisa, who is also my new BFF, and she has my wallet. She boarded when I got off and she was heading home to Hamilton.

She found my business card and was going leave a message for me at the office, but figured I'd be in a panic, so she used the info from my licence and Canada 411'ed me when she got home to get my home number.

I borrowed money from my son for gas and whipped into Hamilton to get my wallet.

Everything, including the money was still there. I gave her a bit of cash for saving my ass and for being such a decent human being AND even more important, I made it home in time for Dancing with the Stars!

It makes me feel good to know there are still honest people out there.
Lisa, this is for you (girl better have told you about this website):

*\o/* *\o/* *\o/* *\o/*

This story is worthy of four cheerleaders.
Oh, and one more, a sexy pirate cheerleader just for Fred:

*\o/¿

Girl with a suitcase hasn't got a clue

Lots of room under the seat! Funny, she has no issues having her laptop bag on the floor.

721 OSH - UNST

I'm in the bi-level part of the last coach. There's a woman in the quad beside me, who for some reason, feels her suitcase belongs on a seat and not on the floor. She has it on the seat opposite her. There is plenty of room near us for her rolling bag.

Fast-forward to Ajax, I ask her, before the train pulls in, if she'd like to put her suitcase on the floor. She says, "No thanks".
The hell? Bitch, that wasn't a question.

People get on and I already know by looking at some of the answers to the recent poll on this site that ain't no one gonna ask her to move her shit.

Wait, I spoke too soon, a man asks her if the seat is taken and she makes this big production (something tells me she doesn't ride the train much during rush hour) of moving her suitcase from the seat opposite of her to the seat beside her, which results in several people coming up and waiting on the stairs to shoot her death stares and of course, roll some eyeballs.
I mumble, "Told ya to move it" and she ignores me.

Look, still lots of room!

She's put all her hair in front of her face like a shield as she studies some documents from Goodlife Fitness about how to answer sales calls.

I have a good view of her side boob. It's just begging for a punch but I won't. Because I don't like jail.

Monday, November 21, 2011

New poll. Those who read this blog faithfully already know which answer is mine


I got some flack about how I handled the Blackberry Trackballah from last week, so I'm curious, let's hear how you superstars would have handled it.

Top right. Vote.

And just as an FYI:

How to turn off trackball sounds
  1. In the device options, click Screen/Keyboard.
  2. Set the Audible Roll field to Mute.
  3. Press the Menu key.
  4. Click Save.

217 voted (thank you) and the winner is ... Presto

But not by much.

People still love their paper passes.

HOW DO YOU PAY YOUR GO TRANSIT FARE?

Presto
94 (43%)

Monthly Pass
92 (42%)

10-Ride
26 (11%)

Two-Ride
5 (2%)

Votes so far: 217

Off Topic: You may want to change the sign


Parking FAIL at Lawrence & Elinor in Scarborough.

Photo courtesy of my friend and news photographer, Tom Stefanac

GO-GO Gong Show

What a crap weekend I had. Fever, chills and a cough. I'm sure standing in a cold wind for three hours on Saturday during the Bomanville Santa Claus parade didn't help my situation. But the kid loved it.

Here I was, all snuggled in bed, with my 40 pillows and two cats, and the mistake of keeping my BB next to me after I made the rounds of texting and calling those who needed to know that I would be keeping my germs to myself today, when the phone lit up like a Christmas tree.

The 6:27 am milk run from Oshawa became express from Pickering which I'm sure, delighted the folks on that run and the 6:47 am Oshawa, which is the express from Pickering, became the milk run, annoying the hell out of, I'd say, 15 of you based on the texts, BBMs and tweets. I love it. You come and bitch to me. Imma take it. At this point, I turned up the dial on my electric blanket.

My GO patriot, Doug, sent me a text that read, "With trains late this morning a lady is handing out cards asking us to complete a survey. I think, "Are they that dumb?". Then everyone I have been standing with for 45 minutes all said yes and took a card. I am sure the responses will be negative -- just my gut feel. What a crazy morning starting at 645 am."

That's one way to ensure participation.

But don't be jealous of me. I'm still going to try to get some work done from home. Just be glad I'm not on the train spreading the sick around. You don't want this.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Freeloaders on a GO Bus

Someone's been sipping too much of the juice


Angela says this woman did the entire hokey pokey in her seat (I shake my hands back and forth!) during the entire morning rush hour ride to Union Friday. It was all kinds of exercises!

That's not water in that keg of hers.

And get your crap off the seats, you dirty bag rider!

Presented without comment

Friday, November 18, 2011

I need to start carrying one of these to beat the feet of foot riders with

Scott Herkes
No one told me it was "Bring Your Giant Pool Noodle On The Day" today...

Guess who's back? Back again. Douche is back. Tell a friend

from mjxxxxxx@telus.blackberry.net
to cj@thiscrazytrain.com
date Thu, Nov 17, 2011 at 2:19 PM
re: (no subject)

I guess you just can't take people seriously when they tell you whenyou've fucked up can you? That was cute puuting up my email 2u on your silly little website. I was told by a friend of mine who works in law that even though you x out the email addresses you're still infrining on my privacy. As much as you thik all this is anonymous is not. I didn't authorize for you to put even a fraction of my email up or even put my email which if somsone had the time on their hands, they could eventually figure it out. Idon't plan to do anything further about this because I am sure one day you'll pis off the wrong person who will take you down. I'm a nice guy and i'm going to let this go but a few things before I leave. 1. there's no such thing as free speech. 2. you're ugly.
Peace out.

from cj@thiscrazytrain.com
to mjxxxxxx@telus.blackberry.net
date Thu, Nov 17, 2011 at 9:56 PM
re: (no subject)

I have my lawyer's permission to correspond with you. He just looked at me pointedly from his chair and then lifted a leg and starting cleaning his inner thigh. I don't know why I pay him. But he must be doing something right because I still have this website, all my assets and investments and my key to the front door still works!

You got time? I have the most hilarious story to tell you.

All in all, it hadn't been a good day. Bad traffic, a malfunctioning computer, incompetent coworkers and a sore back all made me a seething cauldron of rage. But more importantly for this story, it had been over 48 hours since I'd last taken a dump. I'd tried to jumpstart the process, beginning my day with a bowl of colon cleansing fiber cereal, following it with six cups of coffee at work, and adding a bean-laden lunch at Taco Bell.

As I was returning home from work, my insides let me know with subtle rumbles and the emission of the occasional tiny fart that Big Things would be happening soon. Alas, I had to stop at the mall to pick up an order for the wife. I completed this task, and as I was walking past the stores on my way back to the car, I noticed a large sale sign proclaiming, "Everything Must Go!" This was prophetic, for my colon informed me with a sudden violent cramp and a wet, squeaky fart that everything was indeed about to go. I hurried to the mall bathrooms. I surveyed the five stalls, which I have numbered 1 through 5 for your convenience:

1. Occupied.

2. Clean, but Bathroom Protocol forbids its use, as it's next to the occupied one.

3. **** smeared on seat.

4. **** and toilet paper in bowl, unidentifiable liquid splattered on seat.

5. No toilet paper, no stall door, something growing near base of toilet.

Clearly, it had to be Stall #2. I trudged back, entered, dropped the trousers and sat down. I'm normally a fairly Shameful ****ter. I wasn't happy about being next to the occupied stall, but Big Things were afoot.

I was just getting ready to bear down when all of a sudden the sweet sounds of Beethoven came from next door, followed by a fumbling, and then the sound of a voice answering the ringing phone. As usual for a cell phone conversation, the voice was exactly 8 dB louder than it needed to be. Out of shameful habit, my sphincter slammed shut. The inane conversation went on and on. Mr. ****ter was blathering to Mrs. ****ter about the ****ty day he had. I sat there, cramping and miserable, waiting for him to finish. As the loud conversation dragged on, I became angrier and angrier, thinking that I, too, had a crappy day, but I was too polite to yak about in public. My *** let me know in no uncertain terms that if I didn't get crapping soon, my day would be getting even crappier.

Finally my anger reached a point that overcame Shamefulness. I no longer cared. I gripped the toilet paper holder with one hand, braced my other hand against the side of the stall, and pushed with all my might. I was rewarded with a fart of colossal magnitude -- a cross between the sound of someone ripping a very wet bed sheet in half and of plywood being torn off a wall. The sound gradually transitioned into a heavily modulated low-RPM tone, not unlike someone firing up a Harley. I managed to hit the resonance frequency of the stall, and it shook gently.

Once my butt cheeks stopped flapping in the breeze, three things became apparent:

(1) The next-door conversation had ceased; (2) my colon's continued seizing indicated that there was more to come; and (3) the bathroom was now beset by a horrible, eldritch stench.

It was as if a gateway to Hell had been opened. The foul miasma quickly made its way under the stall and began choking my poop-mate. This initial "herald" fart had ended his conversation in mid-sentence.

"Oh my God," I heard him utter, following it with suppressed sounds of choking, and then, "No, baby, that wasn't me (cough, gag), you could hear that (gag)??"

Now there was no stopping me. I pushed for all I was worth. I could swear that in the resulting cacophony of rips, squirts, splashes, poots, and blasts, I was actually lifted slightly off the pot. The amount of stuff in me was incredible. It sprayed against the bowl with tremendous force. Later, in surveying the damage, I'd see that liquid poop had actually managed to ricochet out of the bowl and run down the side on to the floor. But for now, all I could do was hang on for the ride.

Next door I could hear him fumbling with the paper dispenser as he desperately tried to finish his task. Little snatches of conversation made themselves heard over my anal symphony: "Gotta go... horrible... throw up...in my mouth... not... make it... tell the kids...love them... oh God..." followed by more sounds of suppressed gagging and retching.

Alas, it is evidently difficult to hold one's phone and wipe one's bum at the same time. Just as my high-pressure abuse of the toilet was winding down, I heard a plop and splash from next door, followed by string of swear words and gags. My ****-mate had dropped his phone into the toilet.

There was a lull in my production, and the restroom became deathly quiet. I could envision him standing there, wondering what to do. A final anal announcement came trumpeting from my behind, small chunks plopping noisily into the water. That must have been the last straw. I heard a flush, a fumbling with the lock, and then the stall door was thrown open. I heard him running out of the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.

After a considerable amount of paperwork, I got up and surveyed the damage. I felt bad for the janitor who'd be forced to deal with this, but I knew that flushing was not an option. No toilet in the world could handle that unholy mess. Flushing would only lead to a floor flooded with filth.

As I left, I glanced into the next-door stall. Nothing remained in the bowl. Had he flushed his phone, or had he plucked it out and left the bathroom with nasty unwashed hands? The world will never know.

I exited the bathroom, momentarily proud and shameless, looking around for a face glaring at me. But I saw no one. I suspect that somehow my supernatural elimination has managed to transfer my shamefulness to my anonymous ****-mate. I think it'll be a long time before he can bring himself to **** in public -- and I doubt he'll ever again answer his cell phone in a bathroom. And this, my friends, is why you should never talk on your phone in the bathroom.

And the scum of the earth shall inherit hell

There's a special place right next to Satan for people who aggressively push past a seeing impaired man carefully making his way down a broken escalator to a subway platform. All that shoving so they can catch a train on a line that runs trains every minute.

You're not more important than this man who is also just trying to get to work. You can wait.

This is why I love that the TTC subway door attendant saw what these people did and prematurely closed the doors sooner than he should have, so they shut in these idiots' faces.

For. The. Win.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

There's a reason why I'm not a GO bus operator

Can you imagine?

Two words: Coroner's Inquest.

I've been hanging onto this post for a while, just feeling out the audience here, because we've got a merry band of anonymous idiots who really don't know when it's time to pick their balls up off the floor and head back to the village.

As many of you know and some of you don't know, on occasion I will haul my ass onto a GO bus as part of my daily GO Transit journey. A few weeks ago, I took a late bus home from Oshawa station.

There's only about eight of us on the bus. The operator, a middle aged dude, somewhat pleasant, excellent situational awareness skills (I love to study people when they drive, you can learn a lot about their personality) who kept his two-way radio at a reasonable volume.

As the bus rolled along King Street through Oshawa's downtown, the silence among us passengers and the hum of the bus was broken by a loud shout of "Yo!" from the back. It startled the crap out of me and equally rattled the operator who slowed the bus significantly because like me, he suspected the shouter had missed a stop.

Nope.

The shouter had decided to phone a friend and not realizing that mobile phones aren't soup cans tied to a string, spoke at a volume one would hear a person use when shouting over the roar of a crowd at a baseball game.

This pissed off the bus operator.

This made me want to nutpunch the guy because I, and my seat mates, were now being subjected to his evening plans of "bluntin' bowls and watchin' ho's" and who the best "brah" would be to score "some shit" complete with repeating back an address of where said "shit" would be. (Queue eye roll).

Dude was L-O-U-D. And stupid.

This was disrespectful in many ways. First, one-way mobile conversations are distracting for the people being forced to listen. Two, the operator of a vehicle is also distracted because his brain, as much as he doesn't want it to, can't zone out the boisterous chatter of Mr. Marijuana Man.

Eventually, Marijuana Man proceeds to get off the bus. No longer on his cell, he makes his way to the front of the bus after pushing the call button. I could hardly contain myself. I was hoping the operator would say something to this jerk for scaring the crap out of everyone.

Nope.

Some of y'all just too polite. I know the public is the first to go after all y'all throats if you dare stand your ground with a-holes like this punk, so Imma pick up the ball for ya. Heard?

Politely, but in my best school teacher "Imma take you down" voice, I tell this young man that his loud, ridiculous grandstanding of a drug phone call was rude and disruptive. That he needs to be mindful of his surroundings and understand that many of us don't care what his plans are for the night, especially off-duty police officers heading home from work.

Not that there were any on the bus, but you never know.

I saw the operator catch my eye. "You go girl." He mouthed.

Oh... I can go.

Marijuana Man mumbled something that sounded like "Bitch, please" which I guess is how he says he's sorry, and scrambled off the bus. So I made this big production of pulling out my BlackBerry and gesturing and pointing and pretending like I was reading out street names, while staring right at him while the bus was stopped at the light and he was waiting to cross. The driver hadn't closed the door yet and the interior was illuminated, so I know he saw me.

Why?

Because Marijuana Man began to run.

Bad boy, bad boys, whatcha gonna do. Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

The rest of us laughed our asses off. For. The. Win.

Go ahead, make yourself at home


So I'm rolling into Oshawa on the 5:10 UNST.
Never mind that this woman had no socks on with those flats (c-c-c-cold) but her left foot that she swung over into the aisle was swinging with so much force, she nearly took my glasses off.

Something pissed this girl off something righteous because it was almost like she was daring me and my seat mate to say something to her about her feet on the seat.

I was scurred. She was also throwing a mean-looking side eye, too.

Wonder what had her so angry? Maybe her feet were cold. That would explain a lot.

Yo' mamma


I don't read the shoutouts regularly but let me know if there's a hollah back to this one. Someone sure reads this site religiously.

A quick note about anonymous commenting

Blogger, or GOOGLE (to quote the raging, anti-legal assistant, Oshawa-hater) in its infinite wisdom does not offer the ability to turn off anonymous commenting but allow for 'Name' and 'Blogger or other ID' options. In other words, if I turn off anonymous commenting, I force you all to sign in.

I do have the option to integrate comments using Facebook accounts, but why? I hate blogs that do that. I want to comment with some protection of privacy. I'm sure you feel the same.

I also don't want to force people to sign in. I feel it's a deterrent. This isn't a newspaper. I don't need people to "own" their comments.

All I can suggest is that we don't feed the trolls. I know it's hard and I sit on my hands too, but if we leave them alone, they eventually get bored and surf away.

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas


Someone's rear window. Oshawa GO lot.
Judging by the blown-up and enlarged photo booth images, I suspect this is their first Christmas together as a couple.

Your driving might be okay, but you parking illegally is not

How the non-confrontational get confrontational


They write notes, fast and furious.

But you gotta give the guy credit - this took nerve (and a lot of rage). Fight for your right to trackball, I guess.

Twitter tells the story:

CJ Smith
The note from annoyed BB trackball dude upset I poked fun at him on the
Vanessa Charlebois
by ThisCrazyTrain
@
: I hope that went it gets posted there are tear stains and blood drippings. Too much?
CJ Smith
": : Fight or flight? Fight! Fight! Fight!" I'm so taking this note. Awesome for the site. Love the drama!
CJ Smith
I am pretty sure this dude on the has written me a note because he's folded it & is tapping it on his book. Wonder if I should run?
Angela Weller
by ThisCrazyTrain
@
His imaginary 'note': to do -- Make appointment with therapist to discuss train-rage issues over request to halt BB noises
CJ Smith
BB jerk on the maybe upset with me coz he just pulled out a pen&paper & is frantically scrawling a novel as he shoots daggers
CJ Smith
": pics! (of the bitten BB) or it didn't happen :)" I said real loud, 'is some1 winding a watch?' And he stopped
CJ Smith
Someone's BO on this#gotrain smells like baked lasagna & if this jerk doesnt turn off his BB trackball, Imma bite it off with my teef