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Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Trolling the Quiet Zone

I've been told I'm very good at dialing up the crazy. I've never been one to shy away from attention. I don't mind being in the spotlight and I enjoy getting on people's nerves should the opportunity result in comedy gold.

Last night on the LSE 4:53 pm (16:53 for you rail nerds who keep calling me out in email for not using military time) I sat in the upper level of the first coach heading east. I found a spot that had decent a/c blowing because I needed a nice breeze across the puppies and settled into my seat to watch Grave Encounters. A lady took a seat in the next quad over and began browsing through her contacts looking for someone to help her verbally chew through her commute home. She started her conversation and of course, grew annoyed every time the CSA made announcements because they were interrupting her phone call.

The train rolled out of Union and she was off, full of "I-know-right-anyways-whatever-like-so-jelly-like-shut-up" spewing out of her pie hole. I have no beefs with people making phone calls but I gots beefs with people who project and feel the whole train gives a shit about their lives. Girlfriend was loud. She was obnoxious. I was ready.

Guess what? I can be obnoxious, too!

Wrapping myself up in my own bubble and with my eyes never leaving my movie, I said, "Shh!" real loud.

Then I waited a minute and said it again. Then I began to sing Shh to the tune of You are My Sunshine. I did look up at one point and told the guy across from me he could join in, anytime. He shook his head with a smile and went back to fiddling with his phone.

The woman on the phone was staring right at me. I could feel her anger. Good. But she was still talking.

Then I started to sing Shh to the tune of Another One Bites The Dust.

Just after Danforth, I heard the lady tell her friend on the line that she had to go. The very second she said goodbye, I ceased my shh-singing.

She didn't try to phone anyone else for the rest of the ride.

Once again, no one threw me up onto their shoulders, like footballers do when the quarterback wins a game, but you're all welcome.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

First you are a superb writer. Second I wish I'd been there. I woulda joined in!!! Virtual shoulder carry for CJ!!!!

C.J. Smith said...

Yay team!!!

TomW said...

I don't why GO uses the 24-hour clock in schedules but CSAs use 12-hour clock. I wish they'd pick one and stick to it.

(I was going to say it's not "military time", but apparently that's a synonym for the 24-hour clock in North America. You learn seomthing new every day :-) )

Peter said...

@CJ: You’re too funny! Have you uploaded any training videos (NPI) to YouTube, so we can learn to be just like you in situations like that? Wouldn’t that ease the heavy burden you carry, knowing your disciples are executing your work for the good of society?

Anonymous said...

I would have had your back and cheered you on! Your hilarious way of dealing with these jerks is inspiring and helps me cope with the daily commute with these tools. Keep it up, maybe it will give some other commuters the guts to speak up, albeit probably not with as much creativity and style as you.

C.J. Smith said...

My only regret is that instead of watching a movie, I should have been recording my lovely renditions of shh'ing my way through Another One Bites the Dust, on the train, and filming her as well.

MATT said...

While we share the same train line, we're never on the same train. My train (seemingly regardless of when I leave work) never goes past Pickering. If I ever personally saw someone do this or something like it, I'd get out of my seat, walk right up to them, and give them an epic triple-low-five.

CanuckGirl said...

I would have high fived you! :D

Anonymous said...

Hilarious!! I'm on the same car but down below where all the yappers are now. There's one girl who used to get on the phone giving out relationship advice. OMG it was annoying. We used to call her the relationship Guru! I love those phone yappers when we hit Rouge Hill and they're smacking their phones and saying "hello - hello - hello" all the way through the dead zone. You go girl - wish I'd been there!! BGirl

Anonymous said...

Needed you yesterday on the LSW line in the quiet zone. I had my headphones on listening to my music and I can hear Taylor Swift's "Love Song" playing so loud I can sing along. A young woman two quads away was the culprit and her headphones were in her ears!. I am surprised that blood wasn't flowing from her ears. A guy in the same quad kept taking his headphones off and making an odd WTF face while looking at his headphones trying to figure out where the music was coming from. My stop was next so I headed for the door without confrontation.

C.J. Smith said...

Sounds like she thought her headphones were plugged in all the way. Guess not!

Anonymous said...

Last winter there was a woman on the LSE 5:03 train and she was chatting with her friend quite loudly on her phone, almost for the benefit of everyone else on the train, I don't know how she didn't get it with all the glares she was getting. I feel bad that I took pleasure in the fact that she was so obnoxious that she completely missed all the announcements from Union to Ajax saying that the car she was on didn't open at Ajax and even funnier as she freaked out to her friend on the phone when the doors didn't open.

calvinhc said...

Outstanding!

Another good technique is to "join" in on the conversation by adding responsive comments to the one side you can hear. Simple little things like, "that's for sure" and "you tell 'im" are good to annoy the phone slave enough to say something like, "excuse me, but can I get some privacy?"

The natural answer is, "Ah, can I get some public?!? This is not a private place and your volume does not make for a private conversation!"