Assume

In 2010 I spent much of the year working in Africa.


From this statement, what assumption did you make, if you didn’t know that about me already?

That I worked for an aid agency doing good works for the poor, hungry and homeless? Maybe you thought I volunteered my time working in a field hospital. You almost certainly asked yourself, ‘Ohh, I wonder which agency?’ Thinking Doctors without Borders, Unicef, Oxfam etc.

Alas, it was nothing so noble. I work for a bank, doing office stuff, and I was paid, well. Few people find that out.

My point is that people make assumptions about everything you say and unless they ask for specifics, which they rarely do, that’s the impression they keep about you. It can lead to all sorts of problems, in the workforce and in person. I’m as guilty as anyone.

I do do good works. I volunteer my time, mostly with animal charities. I figure enough people focus on people (an assumption). Animals can’t speak for themselves, so need twice as many voices raised for them.

Currently I’m crocheting blankets. Basically, massive granny squares, but blankets none the less. I was asked on the train this morning what I was doing. The fact the 20 something had no idea what crochet is, is a topic for a whole other blog entry. Having established the lack of knowledge regarding the gentle arts, I said ‘it’s going to be a blanket for charity’.

I’ve been here before, so when asked what charity I simply said, ‘the homeless’.

Last time I specified and said, ‘for animal shelters’, I was treated to a tirade of words and spit that went along the lines of ‘people are far more important’. I didn’t wish to risk going to work and sitting in someone else’s sputum all day, so decided to be vague, based on the prior experience.

She surprised me. ‘Ahhh…the doggies and pussy cats with love that. They’ll be able to make a nest to snuggle into’.

I did my best impression of a guppie, and when recovered I confirmed her assumption.

We proceeded to chat about animals in shelters and how her three dogs had all been adopted for shelters. I’d made assumptions about her, based on the station she got on at, her style of dress, even her immensely coiffed hair. I was wrong. She was remarkably normal and without the pictures stick.

She voiced her assumption. As we were departing the train she said, ‘Thank you for talking to me. I’m new in Sydney and I was afraid you’d ignore or be rude to me, people on public transport here can be so strange.’

I left her with this and, ultimately, a smile on her face, ‘Yeah, but that because I’m weird’.

Remember, to assume, you make an Ass of U and Me.

Daydreaming

From my desk I can see the planes flying over the Star Casino, and I often think to myself, which far flung place are you going to?


Then I think where would I be if I could be anywhere but here? The first, quick answer is usually, anywhere but here.

This morning was no exception, after a hideous Monday morning trip to work. I had a twelve minute walk to the station because the parking situation is so bad at my local station, but I had to go there this morning because I needed to buy a ticket. The walk and queue for ticket caused to me miss my train by about 30 seconds. A fifteen minute wait for the next one stretched in 30 when the 9:01 was cancelled.

If I'd known that the train was cancelled sooner I could have walked back to my car to to get my phone from the front seat, which I noticed was missing from my bag when I got my purse out to pay for my ticket.

Once on the train, it was packed. That's what happens when a train gets cancelled. A big bottomed Indian man sat next to and his friend across the aisle. Not having my phone I was unable to block them out with noise cancelling headphones, so had to focus on the sprayed artwork of hyena, soup and wayward. They are very naughty boys with a passion for purple, yellow and silver, but they do help the time pass as you figure out what's new on the canvas' of walls, signal boxes and fine wire mesh.

I got to work at 10.

Some days it's better if you don't have to get out of bed.

Will

There are days when the will to live is dealt a severe blow. When you are consistently shadowed by a big black dog, the blow may be something small to ordinary man, but as far as you’re concerned you may as well have had a house fall on you.

I had every intention of being to work for nine this morning. I even managed an early night by being in bed and light out before 11pm. I was up, showered and all animals fed and watered by 8pm, I was parking the car outside number 16 by ten past eight.

First blow. Number 16 is nearly three-quarters of kilometre away from the station. It’s pretty much as close as you can get. At that time I should have been down around number 6 or 8, but these big houses have wide street frontage and I was basically twice as far away as I should have been.
I had to run down the hill for the train.

Second blow. There were men in uniform checking tickets. Stopping everyone. I had to dig in my bag for my weekly, usually done on the train between stations and just before I get off the train. Today, I missed the train I was aiming for by a couple of seconds.

It was OK…the next train would get me into the office just after 9am.

If only the train hadn’t been significantly delayed due a mechanical failure.

I stepped on the train at 8.44.

I got into the office at 9.38. And the desk I was supposed to be sitting at was occupied. At least the computer was. So I had to hunt for a spare desk.

My will to live on a scale of 1 – 10 is currently sitting at about 4.

And yes, I'm aware on the grander scale of world problems it ranks roughly as a nothing. It's my world I concerned with right this minute. I'll deal with bigger issues later, when I'm feeling up to it.

I really hate days like this. It can only get better.

Crack in the Facade

Yesterday I had an odd day.

I woke feeling rested for the first time in a couple of weeks. I showered, dressed, sorted out the fur and feathers and even caught the train I was aiming for. The sun was shining.

Not long after the train had pulled away from the platform I felt the sting of a tear in my eye. I willed it away becasue I couldn't figure out why it felt like it was needed. There were no sad movies to be seen, no songs of regret pumping through my headphones. I was listening to Sander van Doorn to continue the positive mood I was in.

The tears pricked until they spilled over and started to run down my cheeks. I descreetly wiped them away.

I looked in my bag for a tissue. Sniffing season hasn't yet started so I don't have any. Damn.

I used my sleeve. Very twelve year old.

Then the nose started to go.

The train was packed and I was sat in the fixed seat that faces another. The lady sat in the seat opposite was watching me with interest but she made no move to offer a tissue or even an encouraging smile. Our knees where touching, maybe she felt that was comfort enough.

I could feel choking coming on as we sat at a station with the door open. I jumped for my seat, over the person between me and the aisle and out onto the platform. A large suck of air, pushed the lump in my throat back down.

I walked along the platform, expecting the doors to close, but they didn't. I found a seat a couple of carriages away from where I'd started and resumed my trip into work, feeling slightly confused but more composed.

The tears started again. That reprieve had been short.

What was going on to cause this...breakdown?

I thought about Cara. I thought about my job situation, my home life, my loneliness, sickness, the things I do because I'm on my own, things I don't do because I'm on my own. The last few years in general and how I've been breathing through the stress, the pain and worry for nearly four years, with little or no physical support.

Yes, I acknowledge there have been good times in there, but I can tell you that rough and tough times FAR outweighed good.

Whilst I have regular contact with many folks online (both here and aboard), no amount of wishful thoughts, air hugs and kisses and kindly, supportive words in a message will ever make up for an actual hug and a jolly good chat over a glass of wine.

I know there are some that ask how I fit everything I do into my life. I make it fit to prevent myself doing myself harm. Yes I mean that. Given too much time to think I eventually come back to 'why bother?'

Yesterday when I broke, the doctor wanted me to go to the hospital for evalution and assitance for my nervous or mental breakdown. I managed to convince her that I wouldn't self harm and I mean it. I think it, I know there are people out there that would, but not I. When thinking about how, I come around to who'd find me, who'd have to deal with my lack of will, who have to tell what family I have left that still speaks to me (family weirdness) and ultimately who'd have to do the washing up. So it always come back to thinking of others.

I acknowledge that I need help, professional help. I also need to make lifestyle changes and I need to have someone in my life that can call me when they want too and vice versa. Someone that I can exchange hugs with. Someone that isn't going to tell me to 'get over it' and most of all I need a human in my life that isn't surprised when they see me cry and even better if they can say, 'You're beautiful', when I do.

This won't solve the problem, but it with sure as hell will make putting together IKEA shelves easier.

Name Calling

I was appalled this morning when I heard a man call a woman a 'retard'.

On my way to the platform after I'd purchased my train ticket from the ticket office I was walking passed the automated machines. There are two, side by side. Man had just completed his transaction when Woman, who'd just started hers, dropped some coins. There wasn't a queue behind either of them. As he walked passed her, he spat out 'retard' at her. She flinched. Pick up the coin and put it in the machine.

This exchange took part in the blink of an eye. If I'd been closer to the ticket office or platform stair I would have missed the schoolboy comment. But I didn't. I was in a perfect position to witness the entire thing.

A 40+ year old man bullying a woman in her 30s.

As you'll see from the photo below he's less than a perfect specimen of manhood. You can't see the top of his head, but it is somewhat devoid of shagpile. And yet he felt the need to call someone, a stranger, an inappropriate name. What effect would that one word from a stranger have on her day? Did she already have fragile self esteem; did that word shatter what was left of hers? How would he like it if someone called him baldy or Kojack?

The charming specimen of manhood

I'd rather be called a 'f*cker' than a 'retard'. It true for starters, but it isn't an insult to all those that do have learning difficulties.

I find the whole idea of name calling so unnecessary and cruel. Why did he have to say anything to her, let alone call her names? Clearly they did not know each other. Wouldn't it have been a nicer, more humane gesture to assist with the coin collection? No, he called her names and then sat on the platform for 10 minutes; he was clearly in a hurry to catch his train.

This brings me to my next point about name calling. Said with love name calling, is there really such a thing? I have a group of friends that call each other names. A couple of them call one guy a retard all the time, he doesn't seem to mind, but have they ever asked how it makes him feel? I know that when one was called a 'bogan', she got most upset and pouted for a week. in this case it's deemed to be 'affectionate' name calling, but really, when is name calling ever affectionate? Clearly bogan didn't think it was all that affectionate and yet she continues to call others names.

I was called names when I was at school. Specy, four eyes, teacher's pet, swot, banger (I was into metal music), dumbo (I was in remedial Maths class) and boarder. I went to a school that had day and boarding students. Muv, after my parents separated was the cook, then house mistress in the school. Day/Boarder rivalry was rampant and it was considered a massive stinger to get in a boarder shot, even though I didn't board. Kids hah!?

Having been on the receiving end in my time I'm very reluctant to engage in such behaviour now and this morning I found myself holding back from the man. I imagined the scenario would have gone something like this:

'Morning fat so'

'Excuse me?'

'Oh, I'm sorry, I thought we were greeting people by insulting them now'

At that point I see myself lying on the ground with a black eye; after all, bullies will invariably lash out when challenged or confused.

People are strange

The weather is somewhat inclement at the moment for the time of year. This is having a negative effect on the population of Sydney and surrounds. The storm drains are flowing like winterbournes and the temperature gage is barely touching 20 degrees Celsius. With only two weeks to Christmas everyone expects to be sweating in light chiffons, not snuggling into overcoats.

Last night I was woken by heavy rainfall on the roof and three cats and a dog trying to hide under the covers when the thunder rocked the house at 3am. I woke this morning in no mood to play the commuter game. But a meeting in the city at 10am meant I to, and win.

I find myself hyper observant when I'm tired and testy. I notice small thing that wouldn't normally confuse or annoy, today, I'm in uber form. I'd win the gold if observance of human oddity was an Olympic sport.

Why did the woman squeeze herself into the second of two seats when a three seater remained unoccupied?

Why did the three seater remain unoccupied until every other seat in the carriage was taken?

When two people did sit in the unoccupied seats, why did the guy who was clearly not travelling with the girl sit so close to her?

Why did the guy stand next to the spare seat looking at it like it had the lurgy?

This seat was just in front of me. When I had boarded the train the seat I was sat on and lurgy seat had formed a sixer until I flipped the back. There was nothing wrong with the seat, it was clean, there were nothing nasty on the floor and there wasn't even any marker pen graffiti tags on the seat back. It was an inoffensive seat, just waiting to be squished by damp bottoms (from the rain, wow you're disgusting!).

Being of a curious and questioning nature this behaviour led me to hypothesise why people would behave in such a way. I would have liked to have put together a brief survey called 'why are you avoiding that seat', but I don't think it would have been well received. For forty minutes to tossed over various reasons in my head and I finally came up with this theory.

Here's my theory.

People are weird and we'll never be able to guess at what makes them tick because most of the time they don't know why they do things.

End of theory. Damn, another PhD idea blown out the water.


A storm drain in full flood

Bus Vs Train

I have a well known loathing of public transport. It is of course a necessary evil that gets me to work and saves me from paying astronomical sums of cash for car parking.

I usually travel by train, which at my new abode it not as simple as it used to be. Once I had a three minute walk to the station and a train straight through to my destination. Now my trip to work looks something like this;
1. Drive to the vicinity of the station and park as close as possible. 10-15 minutes.
2. Walk from car to station. About 10 minutes, depending if I parked outside number 8 or 15 and anywhere in between.
3. Wait for train, could be up to 15minutes if I have just missed one.
4. Travel to Epping. 5 minutes.
5. Change trains at Epping, can be up to 14 minutes and involves going down two very long escalators and waiting.
6. Ride train through the Tunnel from Epping to Chatswood. 25 minutes of blackness outside and usually a flickering fluorescent inside.
7. Walk from station to office, 5 minutes.

This is of course done in reverse order on the way home. So I travel for up to an hour and a half each way, with a number of changes and loads of waiting. I find it very hard to do anything on my trip, such as reading, because I’m not really settled for very long in any particular place. I find it hard to read on the stations, because frankly, I just try to stay warm, which is not always possible when the platforms seem to be a wind funnel.

Today I tried another option to see if it was a better way to travel. I took the bus:
1. Walk to bus stop. 6minutes. Today I stepped straight onto the bus, but there could be up to a 5 minute wait.
2. Sit on bus for an hour and watch the world go by.
3. Get off bus and walk to office. 3 minutes.

This is a 70 minute option. It knocks 20 minutes off the trip, plus I don’t have to fight for a seat or do the escalator shuffle. I’m going to give this a go for the rest of the week to see how it goes. I arrived at work feeling marginally more relaxed than when I travel by train despite the constant stop start to let passengers on and off and the driver locking us all in while he nipped to the loo at Macquarie Uni.

What I like about the bus is that you get to look around. The world passes you by just a little slower and you get to see things you would normally miss. You travel down roads you always wondered where they led. This morning I saw the side of Eastwood I have never seen before and discovered there is Rice Cake shop there. Love rice cake :-) Also, no travelling backwards on a bus...backs of heads only, sometime an ear if you're near the sideways seats in the disabled bit.

You still get inconsiderate passengers of course. No feet on seats, but some woman did get on with a pull along suitcase and proceed to put it on the seat. It had muddy wheels.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

It's not our policy

Yesterday I misplaced my fortnightly train ticket. I searched all my bags including Cara's and to no avail. Gone. I have no idea how, it's a total mystery.

I did however have the receipt in my wallet. $62 (that converts to US$65.86, 40UKPounds, 5,716 Kenyan Shillings, 10,267 Nigerian Naira and 187.66 Turkmenistan New Manats)

After being sent to the Station Master by the ticket seller I was told my ticket was considered lost as if it where cash.

'If you lost a fifty dollar note you wouldn't expect it to be replaced' he told me.

I immediately came back with, ‘If I lost $50 I wouldn’t have a receipt’.

‘It’s not our policy to replace tickets based on a receipt’.

After a little sweet talk from me, he very kindly gave me a blue replacement ticket until the 23rd (same as the lost ticket). But I still walked out of the office thinking how ridiculous it is to give receipts but them to mean nothing. Every other business in the world has to honour the receipt, why not Rail Corp?

Far from Home

There really is nothing that can be compared to the feeling of waking up when the train stops and realising that you’re several stops past where you wanted to get off.

Been there done that.

I’ve often been tempted to give the sleeping beauty next to me a nudge when I alight and tell them where we are, but then I don’t want to disturb them because they look so peaceful. But the thought is there, and isn’t that what really counts? :-)

picture borrowed from here

Manners

I think I've written about this before, but I think I need to again because it's something that continues to vex me.

Manners seem to be dying and to the detriment of society.

I know it may be an old fashioned point of view and suddenly I've turned into my grandmother with her 'youth of today' attitude, but it's not just the youth of today that this is decay is affecting. It's everyone.

Train travel: as a frequent user I see how the lack of simple please, thank you and excuse me affects the blood pressure of many travellers. When you wish to exit a packed afternoon commuter tube, 'excuse me' would be extremely effective at getting people out of the way instead at staring at the back of their head in the hope that their latent ESP is going to kick in. It rarely kicks in before they pushed out of the way from behind. Everyone in this scenario loses. The pusher gets annoyed and the pushee gets pushed and annoyed. Not good for anyone.

Queuing: being of English decent I am well versed with the art of queuing. I think I even formed my own queue to get out of my mother’s womb. So what happened to an orderly line of like minded souls all after a ticket for something or other? I had a bloke shout, 'oh come on!' at me this morning. Really, I wasn't even at the front being served; some Indian lady had that pleasure, and I'm pretty sure she was going as fast as the credit card machine would allow. Again, queuing is not a hard thing to master: join the end of a line, stay there and shuffle along until you reach the ticket seller, food dispatcher, or check out chick. It really is very simple; it shouldn’t require a six week learning annex.

Seating on public transport: there are seats that seat three or two people, on occasion there is the odd single seater or multi seater. If your bottom is wide or you are just grossly obese, please don't try and squish between two people in a three seater or peg someone to the window in a two seater. It's rude. If you need a seat and a half or even two, consider asking the sitter to vacate. It's entirely possible that you'll be told to 'bugger off' but at least you warned them before sitting on them and breaking their thigh bone.

On a similar note, when people are getting off the chosen mode of transport, don't make them climb over you to get out (or in for that matter). Please stand and let them slide into the window seat with dignity instead of nearly falling head first through said window. Ladies often have skirts and stocking on, it's not nice to have to spread your legs over a stranger just so you can sit down. It's even worse it you snag a new pair of stockings just because the sitter can't be arsed to stand.

A simple rule of physics next. If you don't let some out, you can't fit more in. Same goes for public transport. Letting folks off usually makes it much easier to get on.

I feel I have said enough for now on this subject. It’s possible I shall revisit it next time either I or some unfortunate stranger has steam pouring from their ears in the AM or PM trip, but I shall leave you with this final thought;

Wouldn’t being out in public be a much nicer and less stressful experience if everyone just gave a little thought to what other people may like in life?

What comes next?

Why is it that a really supremely crap Monday always follows a nice weekend?

My weekend consisted of a relaxing ride out to the Blue Mountains and Mount Tomah Gardens, a BBQ at a friend’s place with extremely pleasant company, a short stint laying on the grass in my back garden surrounded by my family (read Puss, O-Ren and Max) and a little bit of tidying. It was all rather nice and relaxing.

When the alarm went off this morning I was a little high on expectation.

It all went tits up when I got to the station, a mere 35 minutes after rising. I washed my fortnightly ticket in the back pocket of my jeans, by accident you understand. I only brought it on Wednesday last week so it still had nine day left. It had cost me $80. I was told by the station staff after my production of the receipt that a rail ticket is the same as cash, if you lose it you have to buy a new one and washing it is the same as losing it. ‘After all, if you washed cash or if you lost you purse, it would be gone’, I was told. It didn’t go down well when I told him that Australian cash is plastic and survives the washing machine quite well.

- I had to buy another ticket.
- I had to stand on the train.

A girlfriend suggested that I should have said 'Like cash ehh, I'd like to see you try and buy lunch with a train ticket.' Very valid I think. Thanks Nicole.

I got to work and took to my seat to play course administrator all day and deal with people complaining about the lack of spaces left even though they’d known about the course for weeks.
- I had to collate 160 six page documents manually.
- The meeting I prepared for was cancelled.
- And other general, I’m too important to talk to you moments.

I got on the train at the end of the day and it was 36degrees inside the metal tube. By the time I got off the train at my destination, after nearly an hour of rivulets of sweat running down my back, my trousers when soaking wet. For that pleasure, I'd paid twice.

I arrived home in what can be only described as a less than jovial mood. I needed something to take me out of that headspace.

Don’t judge me for getting some semblance of enjoyment from harvesting virtual sunflowers and milking cartoon cows that give strawberry milk.

Scrabble

I’m a big fan of Scrabble, but being a lady of the single persuasion I rarely have anyone who wants to play with me. So I have Scrabble on my mobile, which I used to while away the many hours I spend sitting on public transport.

The other day I was having a quick game where you are shown four sent of tiles and you have to make the best words you can, you play against the game.

I can’t remember what words I made, but I do recall the final set of tiles being all vowels. I tried a few words with only vowels and was told I couldn’t have any of them, including AI, IOU and eu. It was worth a try. I passed on the final round and the game won.

The words it won with were;

CITO
TERCELS
SPODDY
EUOI

Now, I didn’t know any of these words so I wrote them down. According to Dictionary.Com, only tercels is a real word. It’s a small male hawk, and a plural at that. The other words where not found. And, Yes, I know it was a bit sad that I wrote the words down, but I had to know if I had finally cracked.

This is the first time I’ve wondered if the machine isn’t just making stuff up, often I put in words and it says ‘Not in the Dictionary’ then proceeds to put something down that I have no choice but accept or cancel the game.

I don’t know if I should consider deleting the game from my phone or just carry on playing and learn some made up words I can use to score good points. I’ll most likely do the later, I’ll just have to remember that I can’t use them when playing a human.

Observation and Writing

On Thursday I had to stand for part of my train trip. I picked an interesting spot to stand, purely by accident and the people I saw inspired me to get out my notebook and write. It’s been a while since I wrote anything apart from blog entries and change management plans.

I had my iPod plugged with Rufus Wainwright mumbling his lyrics to his beautiful music when I noticed the man sitting the middle of the three person seat directly in front of me.

He had grey hair and black wire rimmed glasses resting on his nose. In his late 50s he was wearing a white shirt with the long sleeves, rolled/folded up his arms. His nylon tie blared its pattern to the whole train with it yellow background and William Morris dove pattern. The breast pocket held a black pen, a red pen and a frayed edge blue and white hankie. Across his knees he rested his brown briefcase with the scuffed edges hard against the seat back in front of him. Resting on top of the briefcase was a large book, white pages and small text in two columns. The writing on the pages was highlighted in yellow, pink and green. It was notated in the margins inn black, blue and green and he was making more notes with a second red pen he held in his right liver spotted hand. I looked at the header on the top of the page closest to me.

Jeremiah 9.11

How many times had he read this bible? Did he find something new in each reading? Did he have to read it? Was he studying theology? Was he a priest in plain clothes?

Then I noticed the brown marbled rubber band on his wrist. In green it was embossed with 1 Rifle Afghanistan.

It was out of context for me. It raised more questions.

I got out my notebook.

Friday 13th

My Friday 13th started out bit sh*t.

First the 0804 train I was getting arrived and left early. I can see the train station from the front gate and I KNOW I was on time. So I did a little run to try and catch it, ended up on the 0818 which was running four minutes late.

Now I work in North Sydney, I have to change train to get over the water, so I get off at Granville and change onto a North Shore train. Because of the early running of my usual train I wasn’t guaranteed a seat, on the 0826 out of Granville and in fact, because all the trains were running late, the train was packed to the gunnels.

After being thrown around a bit I asked if I could swap places with a young girl who was just standing with no assistance from any handholds, and sat on the downward step.

At Central, a shuffle of people resulted in several people leaving, but more people wedging themselves in. Then an announcement said, ‘This train will be a City Circle train due to problems on the Bridge. This will NOT be going over the bridge.’

Arghh!

I got off.

I found a RailCorp guy and asked, ‘Are any trains going over the bridge?’

‘Not at the moment love.’

So I set off to find a bus. The next bus didn’t leave until 0928. I was already late for work, so jumped in a cab.

The one system in Sydney can result in some rather interesting rides, but this morning I was grinding my teeth as the taxi drive about four kilometres in the wrong direction before finally getting on track. As we were driving across the Harbour Bridge, a train appeared to my left and over took us.

A few minutes later I climbed out of the passenger seat having paid $28.00 including the $4.00 bridge toll (it’s $3.00 after 0930) and walked into work at 0929.

Feeling much better now…looking forward to playing sideshow freak at a girlfriends dinner party tonight.

Poker Face

Trains seem to give me the best material. I can’t say if it funny or terrible material, but it’s fodder that just keeps giving gas.

This morning I rode to work listening to my iPod (The All–American Rejects) and trying to avoid looking at this view (I’d forgotten reading matter).



In the end I just gave up trying and took a picture of the sleeping man for you lot. I knew you’d find it amusing. I was just glad he didn't smell.

Well, Excuse Me! Part two

While waiting for the 1910 to Glenfield at Central I saw this guy, drinking this drink before he dropped the cup at his feet. A gentle,'I think you dropped something' a few minutes later resulted in him saying he would pick it up, but he left it laying were it fell. Nice guy, don't you think? Jodie, Merrylands



I sent this to MX commuter freesheet tonight. Maybe this litterbug gets his 15 minutes of fame for being a complete git.

Well, Excuse Me!

I’m pretty sure I’ve asked this before, but I’m going to ask it again, anyway. Why are people so rude of the train?

For starters, it’s the people just stand and glare at the back of your head when they want to get off the train and you are between them and the exit. Rather than say something, such as, ‘Excuse me’ or even ‘Excuse me, please.’ They just push past you and huff, as if your psychic abilities should have let you know they wanted to get off the train.

Today however, I lost it. I had a very long day yesterday and am exhausted today even after a reason eight hours of sleep. I drove over 400kms to move four alpacas. Left home at 10am, drove to Ourimbah on the central coast, chased the animals into a van, had my bones rattled while I drove to Windsor pulling into a Maccas drive through for lunch. Dropped the small herd off at their new home, then got back into the van and drove back to the Central Coast to pick up the car. I had a friend with me, but it’s still a hard trip. On the way back into to town we stopped for dinner at Taxim in Hornsby. It was at this point that I realised it would have been my 12th wedding anniversary and Hubby and I had our last anniversary dinner at the very same place. I got home at 8pm, had a bath, checked my email then went to bed. Puss curled up with me.

Anyway…back to train rudeness. I was running a tad late this morning, but got to the station with a few minutes to spare, so I was feeling alright. I hadn’t had to run. Got on and stood until the next station where I have to change trains. When the next train pulled into the station I was stood in just the right place for the doors. The train came to a stop and I stood to the side so passengers could get off. Then I went to move forward, a small man pushed between me and the side of the train. He pushed so hard I bumped into the person standing to my right, starting a domino effect. He rushed onto the train, bumping into people getting off and down the stairs. He jumped into the last seat. I wasn’t too far behind him and found myself, really pis8ed off, much more so than normal, because he had been so supremely rude and his actions had affected more than just me. I looked at him as I took up position leaning on the back of a seat, with hand hold digging into my spine, and the following went through my head;

‘You rude fu8ker!’

Apparently, I also said it, quite loudly. A couple of the people who had followed me on, and seen his display smiled and nodded. One said, ‘I couldn’t agree more.’ and glowered at him. He must have had a dozen or so, sets of upset eyes looking at him. But he steadfastly refused to move and got his book out.

I got a seat at Strathfield.


- The herd says goodbye to Wispa, Arabella, Bertie and Eric.

Morning Giggle

I seem to spend a lot of time on trains. Last night, on my way home a derailment caused my 45 minutes trip to be 70mins of unair-conditioned boredom (I forgot my book and my iPod) in 40 degree heat. I was glad to be home at twenty past seven so I could remove my sweat soaked trousers and jump a cool shower.

This morning, random stops outside Lidcombe and Newtown meant I had an extra ten minutes on the train, but a dramatic over night drop in temperature meant I got to work with a dry seat.

I had my iPod this morning (not making that mistake again) and I was happily listening to Cat Stevens and looking outside the window, watching the world whoosh by at 30kph. Our trains don’t move very fast.

I had noticed earlier in the ride that the Christmas reprieve was coming to an end and few people were having to stand. The people that did have seats had their noses buried in books, school work and newspapers, or just like me, had music soothing them towards another day at the office.

The three men sitting in the seat in front of me were a combination of newspaper, school-work and book. None of them had music. The guy next to me though, he pulled out an old Sony Discman that I remember having when I was 16, but I digress…

Back to the guys in front. The school-work guy was sat in the middle. Wedged in between the two larger guys like a party popper about to be pulled, he was looking at accountancy sheets. The print was large and bold, and very easy to read from my position. He was flipping the pages, reading about credit and debits and P&L before moving onto end of year. It was all so riveting just outside Stanmore he started to get the head bob.

You know the one, the I’m falling asleep and I have no control, one. I want to stay awake, but, I. Just. Can’t.

His black haired head was slowly swinging to the left, then jerking upward. Then back down again until his chin hit his chest, then back up again with a start. This went on for a few minutes and then his head came to a stop. Nestled against the shoulder of the man to his left.

I watched as Cat sang ‘The Boy with the Moons and Stars’ as the man slowly put his newspaper on his lap and with his index finger pushed the sleeping mans head into the upright position. The continued support meant he didn’t wake up. The finger was bent rapidly, taking it away from the man head, then the whole hand was slowly moved across its owners chest so as not to wake the sleeping neighbour. The sleeping man stayed like that for a moment, then despite his head already being upright, his head snapped back with such force his whole body spasmed, he stood up then sat back down again.

After resuming his set he looked around to make sure no one had seem him, then continued to read his school-work.

On the 18th November I purchased a train pass to cover me for the full month until my next pay day. It cost me one hundred and forty five dollars. I thought I was being most efficent, then I got sick. I took my sick notes to the railway station and filled in a form. I'd worked out that I should get about $60 back by the time they had deducted the $11 handling fee. How wrong I was. Despite having proof that I had not travelled on the trains for 14 of the 30 days on my ticket, I was eligible for nothing.

So, to today. The train police, also known as Transit Officers (TO) were checking tickets on the way into work this morning. A girl went to her bag and couldn't find her ticket. She was in a panic, the TO stood over her and watched. He huffed and puffed before saying to her, 'Give me your ID!'

She looked up at him ashen, Ireally think she had lost her ticket. Her lack of compossure and colour would be very hard to fake.

She looked down at her bag, then back at him before saying, 'If I had my ID, I'd have my train pass. My wallet isn't in my bag, I think it's been stolen.' there was a distinst glisten in her eyes. I have that feeling before, my heart went out to her. ' I don't have any money.'

The TO then took his notepad from his utility belt and flipped it open.

'Name?'

I didn't hear her response, but I could feel the heat from her blush three rows back.

'Address?'

Again, a quiet response.

'You will be recieving a $60 fine in the mail, you will have two weeks to pay it. Have a good day.' he walked away.

So in short, they are quite happy to slug you for more cash, but make it impossible to get any sort of refund. To top this off, train fares are going up. Let's hope a raise in fares mean I don't have to stand on every trip.

Train Trip

I was standing on the platform at Merrylands station this morning, waiting for the 7:31 to the City Circle listening to the melodic tones of Camille Saints-Saens, readying myself for the week ahead when the train rounded the corner.

I could see the driver that would take several hundred commuters including myself to destinations from West to East.

He was laughing merrily while talking on a hand-held mobile phone.

Suddenly I was feeling less calm.