As I’m sure I’ve mentioned many times before, I like riding on the bus. This is awfully lucky for me, since I tend to have to take four bus rides a day on way to and from Bath Spa University. This equals out to roughly 120 bus rides a year for me, so you can imagine I’ve had many crazy adventures relating to buses.
    The last three buses home to Corsham from Bath, are at 7:14 p.m., 8:30 p.m. and 11 p.m. As I’m sure you can imagine, I tend not to like missing my bus at this time, because then I’m left with quite a significant wait before I can get home. Not that I’m complaining about missing the bus, of course, I’m quite content to sit and play Tetris or wander the streets at night while I wait for the next!
    One day, at 7:14 p.m., I just arrived at the station to see the doors closing on my bus. I ran up to the doors and tapped on them. The driver let me in, but he said “You’re lucky; I’m not supposed to let people on board after the doors are closed, don’t do it again” and, of course, I won’t do it again. So I sat down in my usual seat on the bus, and thought happily about how I’d soon be home and that I wouldn’t be late. I had very nearly missed it. The bus started driving along and headed towards its first stop.
    However, when the bus arrived at the first stop, the driver turned the engine off and did not open the door for more people to get in.
    “I’m sorry,” he said as he turned around to look at all of the passengers, “but we’re going to have to stop here. The bus is no longer safe to drive because the speedometer is broken.”
    As such, we had to sit and wait for ten minutes or so, for the next bus to come along. Eventually, a, much smaller, bus arrived and everybody was moved from the main bus to the next. Ten minutes was no big delay, I’d still be happily home on time. The moving of everybody from one bus to the next, and then the letting on of people waiting at the stop, probably took around another ten minutes.
    The second bus drove Corsham-wards and everything seemed to be going swimmingly. However, once we were around 3/4 of the way home, the bus stopped again. The driver then told us that the bus was close to overheating and that it would be unsafe to drive. For another ten minutes or so, we waited for the bus to cool down. We were on a country road and, with everything of the bus turned off, we were just sat in darkness as we waited for this cooling to take place. Eventually, the driver decided to try the engine again, and it seemed that it was still dangerously close to overheating. With this latest revelation, the driver decided to call the bus HQ in order to find a solution.
    Luckily, First Buses had an excellent answer to this problem! The driver was told that he should just carry on driving, and so he did. For the last ten to twenty minutes or so, there was quite a strong smell of burning… And then eventually I was home, only ten minutes earlier than I would have been had I just caught the next bus.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve written any regular old anecdotes on here, which used to actually make up the majority of posts. As such, the next three entries will all be new anecdotes.
    Anyway, this summer I travelled to London to meet my internet friend Mairi Mac Arthur for the second time. It was all very fun and I was even able to buy myself a new pocket watch! But, while there, about half way through the day, we decided to stop for a toilet break, and this is when this anecdote takes place.
    When I popped into the men’s room, I realised that it seemed to be entirely empty, so I decided to myself that I may as well use one of the urinals in order to save time. However, as soon as I approached the urinal, a female cleaner mysteriously appeared and started cleaning the urinal directly beside it. Now, for city folk, a female cleaner in the men’s room during the middle of the day is perfectly natural, but for backwards country people like me, this seems very strange. Although, to be honest, I’d be quite equally uncomfortable if the cleaner were male.
    So, instead of using the urinal beside the cleaner, I made it look like I’d just decided to take an unusual route towards one of the cubicles. I prefer cubicles anyway, much more private and you can sit down, which is nice. While I was in there, I heard somebody else come into the room, he then went into the cubical beside me. Then I heard a knock on his door.
    “Hey!” it was the cleaner.
    The man didn’t reply.
    “Hey, you in there?” she asked.
    Again he didn’t reply.
    “Hey!” she shouted again, this time banging quite violently on the door.
    He still did not reply, I imagine he felt very uncomfortable.
    “Do you have toilet paper in there?” she asked him loudly.
    “Yes. I’m fine,” he said meekly.
    “Oh good,” she said, and then she left.
    Now, I may be wrong due to my rather limited experience in the field of public toilets, but it seems to me that this cleaner is a little lacking when it comes to the subtlety needed for her job. Perhaps this is the way forward for toilet maintenance, but it seemed to me that she was making people’s visits to the toilets rather unenjoyable.