Tag Archives: MUNI

It’s not CalTrain

After dropping my kid off at camp for the day, I got on the 22 Fillmore and walked to the back of the bus and sat down.

Back of the 22 Fillmore bus

Back of the 22 Fillmore bus

A few stops later a guy gets on and sits next to me and starts taptapping on an iPhone with a shattered and cracked glass screen. He’s wearing a buttondown shirt and carrying a laptop bag.

Behind me 3 people are talking about where and what Ottawa is. They’re wearing tshirts and baggy shorts. Then they notice the guy next to me taptapping on cracked shattered iPhone screen. They ask him how it happened.

“I put it in my shirt pocket and leaned over. I’ve dropped it a lot before and it’s never cracked. Now I have to call Apple. At least it still works.”

I jump into the conversation with the story about the skydiver who jumped out of a plane with his iPhone in his pocket and it fell out of his pocket (while he was falling from the sky) and landed on the roof of a building and broke, but the GPS still worked and he was able to find his phone.

Now there are a few more people joining in the conversation, contributing stories of cracked iPhone screens and where/how to get them fixed and why not to bother asking Apple to fix it and how the screen gets suction-cupped off and replaced.

“Oh, man, I know where you can get that fixed, don’t call or send it to Apple. Go to Cupertino,” says one of the baggy shorts tshirt guys.

People around me laugh and chuckle. “No, seriously,” says baggy shorts tshirt guy, “Cupertino is a shop downtown on Battery St and they can fix any iPhone fast and cheap. Just Yelp it. They have good reviews on Yelp. Yelp knows everything.”

As people start to get off at various stops, they all wish each other a good day and good luck with the cracked screen, and thanks. Kindness and good wishes are everywhere.

When I got off the bus I wondered why the baggy shorts tshirt guys didn’t just use their smartphones to look up the answer to where/what Ottawa is.

MUNI has the best stories and entertainment along with smells and obscenities.

Defining Adrenaline

MUNI from lucy's perspective in 2007

MUNI underground photo taken from Lucy's perspective in 2007

On this morning’s MUNI adventure to take Lucy to her summer day camp, we took the underground and then a bus.  She’s been carrying her very precious prized small tooth fairy pillow with her because she has a loose tooth and wants to have the pillow with her at camp in case the tooth falls out at camp.

While we were stepping off the underground, she accidentally dropped the small pillow and I watched it fall towards the gap between the train and the platform.  I held my breath and wondered how we’d ever replace it. Just as it almost fell into the gap and under the train, a small threshhold popped out, at floor level, between the train and the platform, and caught the pillow.

I picked up the pillow and we walked towards the stairs to leave the station.  While we were walking towards the stairs, Lucy said, “I was so scared my body and head were shaky inside and then I was so glad I didn’t lose my pillow but my insides were still shaky.”  I said, “That’s adrenaline, it’s something your body creates when you’re scared or excited, and then you might be relieved and let out a big breath and said, Whew! and still feel the adrenaline.”  Lucy said, “I felt my body feel the Whew! but I didn’t say it, my body said Whew to itself and it still feels it.”

Can’t make this stuff up.

The Preschooler Remembered

This morning we took the F market without any complaint from Lucy about wanting to take the underground. She remembered. She’ll never be President.