Good hard thwacks
I ride early enough in the morning that most of the time I get a seat to myself. Some mornings are packed for some reason, and for some reason the same lady used to always seems to sit next to me. I get on before she does so I end up with a window seat and I get off before she does. I’ll say “excuse me,” stand up, and wait. She kind of barely turns her legs out toward the aisle so I have to squish my butt past her. I carry a laptop backpack. It’s not one of those ginormous monster backpacks, but pretty much any backpack hangs off me awkwardly because I’m pretty small.
The first few times I took great care to squeeeeeze past her without thwapping my bag into her face or knocking her headcovering off. After about a week of this madness (and almost tripping and smashing my face into the seat across the aisle) I gave up and resigned to just letting whatever happen, happen. I got a couple of good hard thwacks in with my bag.
She hasn’t sat next to me since.
Aug 22nd, 2007 at 12:34 pm
I hate it when people just turn to the side like that! Much like you, I don’t want to hit them with my backpack, but sometimes it is unavoidable. It can be quite frustrating though.
Aug 22nd, 2007 at 7:17 pm
Years ago, while driving a school bus, those “bead lizards” hanging off the zippers of back packs were all the rage. One day, the kids were piling on the bus, and as one of them swung to go down the asle to the seats, the tail of the bead lizard on that kid’s BP was so long, it wrapped its self around my neck! Shortly after that incident, and many other drivers being smacked in the face by those things, the school district banned all “haning” items from the back packs.
Sep 12th, 2007 at 8:46 pm
I recently moved from Minneapolis to Honolulu, Hawaii. I remember being appalled the first few times I rode the bus because EVERYONE just moves their legs into the aisle instead of standing up to allow someone to pass. And, to compound the problem, there is an epidemic of little old ladies who sit on the outer seat when the window seat is empty. So most polite people (this included myself…for a while) will just stand next to them and hope they’ll let you in. But now I just point and slide right in. It’s amazing how quickly you lose your manners when you’re surrounded by poor bus etiquette.