Note: The title is supposed to emphasize “Unfortunate,” not riding on the Owl being fortunate.

Happy 1906 anniversary people, as you all know, people gathered at 3rd and Market remembering those who died. Eventually the crowd went onto Church and 20th to spraypaint the gold hydrant. But, I’m pretty sure most of you guys got lucky — the Owl was working for you and you guys got on a fake cable car and headed there with ease — mine was different.

So, anyway, I started out at Van Ness and Jackson, heading on the 90-Owl hoping to time-transfer with the 91-Owl at Van Ness and Chestnut. Unfortunately, as I got to Van Ness and Chestnut I saw the NextMuni display and it said “91-Owl: 22 minutes & 37 minutes.” So I ran as fast as I could to catch the 90-Owl, hoping to catch the 38. Unfortunately, some guys got on at Union and tried to get a free ride. “I gave you a free ride yesterday,” the driver said, but he still got on and asked people around for a dollar. Nobody gave him one, so he began this long talk with the driver which lasted three minutes or so, and the bus was heading slowly up Van Ness. The bus let the guys off at Pine, and continued slowly.

Around Geary Street, that’s where I saw the 38 go by. By then I thought I was going to be late, but seeing that I missed the 38, I had no other choice, as I was desperate, to get off, and run through the Tenderloin on O’Farrell. Not fun.

I finally made it around 5 minutes before the bagpipe went off, playing “Amazing Grace.” I’ll have video of that later. After that, the sirens started going off, symbolizing the quick and efficient response the firefighters were heading to rescue people affected by the earthquake.

Around 5:20-ish, we were told to head to Dolores Park. I asked around, figuring out whether we would be riding the fake cable car instead of getting there ourselves. And the worst part is, the Metro wasn’t really open yet.

So I waited for any bus that went up around there, and here came a K-Owl. We all got on, except for this lady who asked how to get to 20th and Church. The operator then replied, “You need to…get on the 9-San Bruno.” The lady tried to reason, then the operator said, “9-SAN BRUNO,” and closed the doors on her. I think the door almost got her head.

There was another thing, on the K-Owl, when someone was trying to get on at 9th and Market, this guy asked the driver how to get to Mission Dolores. She said, “I don’t go on Dolores. I go straight up to Castro.” He replied,”So how do I get up there?” She said, “I told you three times already, and I’m not going to tell you again because you are holding me up, I said I don’t go to Dolores, I go straight up to Castro.” The passenger then told her whether she stopped at Dolores, then she realized, “Oh, yeah, yeah.”

But, instead of letting him off at Dolores, she let him off at Church.

I don’t have her driver number because she ripped it off, and as I tried to get a picture of her, she covered herself. After that ordeal, she told me, “I ain’t rude, I’ll be the nicest person you’ll ever meet.” Yeah, right. Then how come you were all like “9-SAN BRUNO!” and shut the door on her? “That’s what you wanted to hear, you see, there’s a war going on, you don’t understand that.” Well…yeah…kinda…at least she wasn’t like…Cynthia Thompson?

Anyway, since I heard there was a parade of firetrucks coming, I decided to hang around Church and 14th for a little while, until I saw a bunch of firetrucks heading down Dolores. I started running again, hoping to catch up with the firefighters, until I realized I couldn’t catch up. I ran anyway.

I’ll have photos and multimedia up later.

Share this Muni Diaries post

• 

No related posts.