On the Bus

The good news: my bus has internet access, so I brought my computer to get some work done. The bad news: the internet is not working properly. Oh, well. Technology is a fickle mistress indeed.

I’ve spent about 80% of my waking hours being shuttled from one place or another today – I don’t even want to get into the shenanigans that I faced this morning on the subway. I don’t think that all this waiting is making me more patient, either. On the contrary; I’m always in a hurry to get to the subway so I can go wait some more.

I keep refreshing my browser window with some tiny hope that the internet will magically connect. No luck so far.

We had a St. John’s Service Day today at Queens Library, and it was shorter than I was expecting. We were back in this weird art gallery space and nowhere near the children’s section, so I’m not sure that our fun times were adequately taken advantage of. Each of us had to pick a station and at first I gravitated towards one in the back that looked like it would be face-painting (there’s something inheriently funny about being a bad artist and painting on a kid’s face, because he will have no idea of how terrible the blob looks until much later). However, the librarian revealed that this craft table “was the hardest of them all”, which was enough to stop me from listening further and back away from my spot. Apparently, they were constructing some kind of kite that kind of looked like a fish and required glue.

The next table was more to my liking – snack time! We had ‘healthy snacks’ with a liberal dose of the air quotes. Nature’s Valley honey oat granola bars, pretzel stix, and Kellog’s mixed berry fruit snacks do not a healthy snack make. However, the gummy fruit snacks were pleasing and I took two of the pretzel stix containers with me for the bus ride. I had to jet out at 1:00 so I missed the breakdown pizza lunch. I was so late this morning I missed the breakfast. Lame lame lame.

Ooh, I wonder what time we will get there. This would be a truly fair guessing game, unlike Thanksgiving car rides home where the family picks arrival times and Dad adjusts his speed like some corrupt blackjack dealer.

I just saw a sign for Baltimore, so that’s good news. I wish the ride from New York to DC was prettier.

Speaking of Thanksgiving, it looks like I’ll definitely be spending it in the city this year. It’s not bad, though, because Meredith is being kind and taking in an extra bedraggled family member. In four year’s worth of Thanksgivings, I will have only been home once. Christmas, however, I think I’m going to try to take off the entire week. They say that new employees don’t get any time off until after their first year, to which I say phooey. I’m coming home. My job is entirely online, anyway.

It is nasty out! Yesterday I had to take off my shoes and socks once I got to work and put them next to the fan on the floor because they were soaked right through. It was misting/raining before and it looks like there may be some blue skies ahead, but also dark clouds.

I was browsing the Youth Services collection and I don’t know when I became such a pursed-lipped fogey but for some of the titles I was like, “this seems a bit inappropriate for young readers!” Then I stopped being so old and went back to my snack table.

The apartment has been good lately – Daniel is the ideal roommate, because he leaves an hour before I wake up and gets home before I do so he can let me in the building. It’s too bad that the demon second graders are getting him down. We’re both very concerned about our sleep schedules, too.

I need to finish 10 ‘genre novels’ for children soon, so that’s what I will do. Adios.