Drums and Tongues

So far this week, I've been treated to a couple of really great blasts from transit past.

First off, I ran into an old friend of mine, not that we've ever spoken or than she would know who I am at all; I'm just a really big admirer of hers.

I don't know her name, so I've given her one, just for the sake of reference: I call her The Lady Who Can't Control Her Tongue. The first time I ever saw her, I didn't really take much notice. She appeared to be an ordinary lady sitting among other ordinary people on an ordinary bus in an ordinary city. First impressions, as we all know, however, can be very deceiving. A few minutes later, she caught my eye again. This time, she let me have a little glimpse of what would eventually make her one of my favourite Winnipeg Transit characters of all time. She would periodically and without warning let her extraordinarily long tongue out of her mouth, for what looked to me like some sort of an exploratory mission. It would snake around from left to right, and then up and down as if it were searching around in a new land or something. It almost looked as if it was looking for something in particular. All the while, the lady just sat there with an almost impossibly neutral expression on her face; like nothing about having her tongue snaking around through the air and hanging half way out of her face was out of the ordinary in the slightest. I hadn't seen her for a few years, so when I saw her earlier this week, I was overjoyed. I almost began to doubt myself when, after a few minutes her tongue had not emerged from it's den, but finally, out it came waving around frantically as if to say: "It's me! It's me!"

The other old favourite I saw this week (actually this morning to be more precise) was the Air Drummer. The Air Drummer is a man of about 30 or 35 who always sit

s on a sideways facing seat, either at the front or near the back, listens to his walkman, and plays air drums with a pair of drumsticks that he's always got with him for some reason. He's a lot of fun to watch. I've even joined him on air guitar a couple of times before. He didn't seem to care that much when I did, but at least he didn't mind.

My favourite thing about the Air Drummer isn't necessarily watching him drum (let's face it, if you've seen one air drummer, you've seen them all) but rather the reactions of the people around him.

One time, an old snooty lady sitting across from him, tapped him on the arm angrily, waited for him to press stop on his walkman and said "Do you mind?!" I was floored that she could be so annoyed by something so obviously and inherently awesome, that I interjected and said, "Actually I do. I was really enjoying his air drumming, and the only thing on this bus that is annoying me is your negativity and lack of imagination." Surprisingly, this did not win her over. At least while s

he and I were glaring at one another, the Air Drummer was able to get back to what he does best.

Last Friday night, I took a bus to the exchange district. I went because I was on a mission. Part 1 of my mission was to go see a play in the Rachel Brown Theatre; part 2 was to come home and write a witty and poignant review of the play on this blog, as part of an assignment for a creative writing class.

Given that the forum for my review happens to be this blog, I’m going to do my review in two parts. Firstly, I’ll do a review of the play itself, and then (in keeping with the theme of this blog), I’ll do a review of the bus ride that got me there.

The play I saw was one in a series presented by Theatre Projects Manitoba called In the Chamber 2010. Entitled, The Last Men, the play was essentially composed of two hour-long monologues by actors, Gordon Tanner and Steven Ratzlaff, in that order.

In the first segment of the play, Tanner played a man videotaping himself in a hotel room. The tape was obviously intended for the eyes of the owner of the company the man worked for, and dealt with the hog barn fire of July 31, 2008, during which around 15,000 hogs burned to death at Cluny Colony in Cluny Alberta.

Though a little long, the monologue, which was masterfully acted by Tanner, went into great detail about the fire and the conditions in which the hogs were forced to live in the barn. At the same time, however, it had another element of disillusionment and ethical awakening, which I found very reminiscent of the 1976 film Network, or the more recent Michael Clayton.

At one point in the film, Tanner’s character began discussing things that “seemed like a good idea at the time”. To illustrate his point, he showed a photo (on a projector he had set up in his hotel room) of a person leaping to his death, out of the World Trade Center, to escape from the flames in the building. Not only did I think that this was an ineffective example of the concept the character was getting at, but also I found the reference extremely offensive in a way that didn’t fit the mood of the play, and couldn’t help but let it colour my reaction to the rest of the play in a negative way.

The second half of the play came in the form of another monologue, this time delivered by actor Steven Ratzlaff. Ratzlaff’s character was a man who, along with his estranged wife, had lost a baby during the Health Sciences Centre’s infant care scandal. The character had a very unique take on the situation; he wasn’t angry with the program or doctor that led (due to neglect or improper care) to the death of his son, but rather at the inquest which determined that his son shouldn’t have died. He argued that it was this finding that made it impossible to go on living in any real way.

Over all, both monologues were well written and very well acted, though, each ran a little long, causing the entire evening to seem to drag on a little.

The real highlight of the night for me, however, was the bus ride, which brought my friend Chris and I to the theatre before the show.

The driver was a middle-aged man with a well-groomed mustache, and who was wearing the familiar navy blue uniform of Winnipeg Transit.

He was friendly and efficient and drove the number 18 bus very confidently, with very few jerky stops and starts.

The bus itself was relatively clean, and surprisingly free of any sort of stale urine smell, which was a huge bonus.

Another bonus was that neither Chris Nor I was stabbed during our ride to the play.

Church Lady...

So, one of my favourite characters I've met on the bus in Winnipeg is a lady I've recently begun called "The Church Lady". I've seen her a number of times and, for some reason, she always picks on me when she sees me--which I absolutely love.

I saw her on the bus this morning.

The bus was pretty packed and was well into standing room only by the time I got on in Osborne Village. The Church Lady was Seated near the front, wearing a large green parka, which made me not realize immediately that it was her. While I walked slowly down the aisle towards where she was sitting, she looked at me and asked if I wanted to sit in her spot. I chuckled and thanked her, but declined, saying that I would be just fine standing. About 30 seconds later, in a completely changed tone, she looked up at me and said in a loud voice "Excuse me, can you not stand right here beside me? You're giving off energy rays! You're giving off No-Church rays!"

This absolutely intrigued me, so I probed her a little, so as to determine the nature of these so called "No-Church Rays".

She replied, matter-of-factly: "No-Church Rays! Do you go to church?"

I had to admit honestly that I didn't.

"Well there you go! No-Church Rays!"

While searching for a respond I came to the realization that this made perfect sense, so I told her so.

Then I moved towards the back, giving someone else a chance to have their morning brightened by the Church Lady...

Misguided Chivalry

Today on the bus, I experienced one of the many events that over the years have made me very glad to be too poor to buy a car.

While I was already seated on the sideways seat by the rear door, two young men got on the bus and moved to the back and stood in front of the door. The men were swearing loudly and profusely, however, this is hardly a rarity, so I barely even looked up from my book when I heard them. A few stops later, an elderly lady got on the bus and walked to the back of the bus. Though the men may not have seen this, she walked by about three or four perfectly good seats in which she could easily have chosen to sit.

Upon seeing the lady walk past them, one of the men exclaimed loudly (presumably to the other, though everyone on the bus could easily hear): "I hate when people do that! No one got up to let that fucking old lady sit down!"

Now, admittedly the sentiment behind the man's statement was, for lack of a better word, touching, there were at least two things that he either didn't realize, or else chose to completely ignore.

Thing #1: As I mentioned earlier, there were about three or four open seats that the lady could easily have chosen to occupy, but which, for some reason she ignored on her way to the back of the bus. One of them was next to me! (Though, due to the fact that I have a very intimidating mustache, I can understand why she may have chosen to pass that one up.)

Thing #2: The old lady could hear the man very clearly, and immediately after hearing him call her a "fucking old lady" she looked as if she were about to cry. I was able to make momentary eye contact with the lady and made a dismissive eye rolling gesture at the loud man, which made her smile, but the whole thing really got me wondering: Is it possible that chivalry is really nothing more than another way for men to say to women: "you are not good enough to do things for yourself--that's why men should do stuff for you!"?

Maybe it is, and maybe that's just my lame excuse for not throwing my jacket into a puddle any time a woman walks by...

Hey Gang,

As you may have noticed, I've decided to change the theme of my blog from the topic of unicorns (a subject which, as it turns out, is painfully exhaustible) to the subject of crazy crap that happens to me (and around me) on the bus (a subject with limitless potential, as I'm pretty sure we will never run out of crazies as long as there are city buses to drive them around all day long).

I hope you'll all join me in the coming months as I relate to you all, the stories that keep me entertained during my commute. Who knows; maybe some of you will even be tempted to leave your cars at home and join me on the bus as well as here on the internet.

Dennis Rodman, Gone but Not Forgotten

In 1996, basketball bad-boy Dennis Rodman announced that he would be getting married. This news came as a shock to most of his fans and to people in general, because he had never announced that he had even been dating anyone. Rodman told the media where the wedding would take place, so when the day arrived, the press was all ears.
As it turned out, Rodman was not in fact getting married at all. He greeted the press wearing a full wedding gown, and announced that he was actually marrying himself. This pseudo event was organized by Rodman himself (or maybe his publicist) and was designed to promote his new autobiography.
Though, many people scoffed at the ruse and still others were unimpressed with the spectacle of the tattooed athelete in a wedding dress, it was certainly a great way for Rodman to raise awareness of his autobiography among people who are into that kind of thing.

Presumably after the event, Rodman went straight home to consecrate his wedding vows.