Good Evening;
Well....Friday was a both a pissy-ass waste of time dealing with the MTA and Walmart. I think the bus system schedulers should be called the "Monkey Transit Asshats"....
As in the old saw--
"Put 50,000 Monkeys in a room with 50,000 typewriters and eventually they will type out Hamlet".....
(although I favor the idea that it will be "King Lear", or maybe the works of Edward Lear.... 'cause y'all know my feelings of identification with madness, insanity, and "Nonsense"...Or possibly Norman Lear?.....but I digress.
I think that the above method is how the MTA develops it's schedules, and probably hires some of their drivers, because some of them act as if they are but one step away from tearing off their uniforms, climbing on top of the bus and throwing feces at their passengers!
So after standing for 40 minutes on 2 overcrowded buses with 2 drivers who both were total jerks who purposely drove with jackrabbit starts and stops while overloaded with standees, many of whom were elementary school age kids, throwing them (and yours truly) from side to side and back and forth and almost falling over.....I got to the Walmart at Port Covington.
I had spent a good hour on the laptop tracking down the jeans in my size and style(s), that were both cheapest and in stock, multiples of pairs according to the website....and then I got to the disgusting sewer of a store. No 'Big & Tall' section at all, or any sizes larger than the XL-46 that tops out the normal size runs. After finally tracking down an "ass"ociate who wasn't talking on their cellphone or another "ass"ociate.....(and don't let me get started about the content of the cel and live conversations, with the vulgarity and limited vocabulary, and total absence of any type of grammar that passes for appropriate public discourse among the 'proletariat'......(male/female/white/black/brown/yellow)--[yeahhhhhh, ..when a middle-aged Asian woman greets a racially confused white teenage hip-hop wannabe, and a perky preppy Ivy League collegiate styled black 20-something female and a stereotypical pointy toed cowboy booted bolo-tied Tex-Mex latino .... with:
"What's up my niggas, you bitches is late again, yo,
you gotta stop hittin' them blunts yo, kna'meen!"And this was a supervisor!Professionalism, Courtesy, Civility, Manners, Common Freakin' Sense??!!??
Leaving the store shaking my head I waited about 20 minutes for a bus that was only 5 minutes late, running in tandem with Another bus on the same route, which pulled out 2 minutes after the bus I was on, as yet Another of the same bus was pulling in to the loop. They were supposed to be 25 minutes apart.....At Least!
I transferred to the #10 instead of the #7 and got off on Broadway and Pratt in Upper Fells Point, which as one of the loci of the vibrant, varied, and multi-cultural Hispanic population in town has begun to get much more upscale than when I was living down there. Restaurants that were then only catering to the (legal & illegal) immigrant population, with no frills homestyle/'peasant' food from Central and South America in tiny storefronts often with no printed menus and mostly segregated by country/region, are now larger & fancier and competing for the tourist dollar too. The 'gentrification/yuppification',
(..... ruination....but I'm a purist and a snob who knew and loved the area as a working seaport (and there was even a family connection through the movie theatre that bore my surname up until the mid-'70s, (it's now a Hispanic church); through the first influx of the artist/musician/hippie era, seedy, blowzy, raw, rude, & rebellious...and a little bit dangerous; into the rebirth and rescue from demolition and destruction by Barbara Mikulski et. al., throughout the dilapidation and deterioration before the dawning of the second renaissance; and the wild and exciting unfocused energies that spurred growth and rehabilitation, to the slow strangulation and control of planned development and skyrocketing property values that forced out the bohemian renters that were the draw that brought the county folks and tourists in the first place, and which made it damn near impossible for old timers to ignore the outrageous profits to be had on their free and clear real estate; and the inflow of new young money which fixed up and lived in their newly renovated, exposed brick, rooftop decked, stainless steel kitchened, Architectural Digested creations...and who brought in the young, bold, and culinarily innovative restaurateurs and boutique owners, which inspired the B & B innkeepers, whose success caused the $$ signs to begin to glow in the eyes of the high rent hoteliers...........which has made Fells Point a beautiful, and palate pleasing destination and tourist hotspot, and a prime drinking ground for all the 'sorostitutes' and trustafarians' from T/L/JH Universities but the bane of those of us who revere and remember Funks, Miss Irene's, the "old", "real" Daily Grind, and similar haunts and dives.......},
process has become bilingual. But I've digressed again....lol.
I remembered a place on Broadway across from the Broadway Market, a discount store landmark in Fells and a place to pick up jeans real cheap, "Dollars And Denims". So I walked down Broadway towards the water marveling at the change and the rapidity of it, and the sudden infusion of BIG money. On both sides of Broadway large iron frameworks had been erected. They were supporting the historic facades of buildings, commercial and old residences too. There are actually damn near complete blocks that are nothing more than an older, more fragile Fells Point version of the Hollywood 'back lot'! The work it takes to shore up and preserve as opposed to raze completely....... BIG MONEY! is here again.
Of course 'Dollars And Denims' is one of the businesses that did NOT relocate, (to my knowledge). I did stop in the Goodwill Retail Store, and nearly had an anxiety attack trying to sort through the unorganized by size and unmarked other than the mfgs. tag inside somewhere, jeans hanging on the racks.
I left and finished walking through Fells Point and on into Canton along Aliceanna St., which becomes Boston St., all the way to "The Can Co." shopping center and the Safeway....with a short layover and libation, at "The Gin Mill" to surprise Michelle, who is tending bar there. (I had a Gin and Tonic....what else would I get there...lol!). I met her boyfriend and coworker Dave, chatted a few minutes and hit the Safeway.
As I was walking in I saw my former sponsor John P. and his wife Denise P. on their way out. It had been about 8 or 9 years since I'd seen him, (I used to run into Denise on the bus by the Courthouse fairly regularly). We chatted a few minutes and then they had to run because they had a full cart of groceries, weekly shopping, and had to get home. I figured I'd run into him at some point as their home is 2 blocks over and one block closer to the waterfront from the apartment here.
The Safeway here is really a pretty crappy store for such a showcase location, dingy, dirty, dull. And on top of that they are expensive as hell. Plus....when I finally did get what I was going to buy and got to the registers, the lines were ridiculously long, and there were half a dozen cashiers just standing around chattering like magpies, not helping the active cashiers bag groceries, or helping at the 'self checkouts', (which are always screwing up through either machine malfunction or GIGO by customers), which had a line of 40 people stretching down the cereal aisle.
I just put my intended purchases in the cooler and said screw it! I stopped back here and grabbed a bite to eat and then had to hurry to catch the bus to Monkee's. I was able to reduce my debt by another significant factor and grab another 2 weeks worth of meds. Then it was back on the bus and I decided I HAD to go to the Safeway for some necessities. I puttered around in the now almost empty store for an hour or so and got some needed food items. After walking back here it was almost Midnight and I cooked dinner, ($1.00 Banquet Microwave Chicken Fried Steak in Sausage Gravy w/ Mashed Potatoes & Corn), {put the CFS pattie and gravy on 2 slices of toast with shredded cheddar and.....what else? -- MAYO!!! LOL!!, mix the rest of the shredded cheddar with the MP & C and a big spoonful of the gravy, grated Parmesan and garlic salt}
A little extra work turns 'ehhhh' into 'pretty damn good'.
That's it for now, I'm tired....I'll tell you about Today's, (Sat.), runaround later on Sunday....er....today......lol! Didn't know it was so late.....lol!
I should have guessed by the near constant migration of tipsy white 20-30 somethings up the street under the windows, they've been in full vocalization of their alcohol enhanced mating dances.
Later...............................Dave
