Adventures from the Bus

The sunshine has returned! I am so pleased to see the sun streaming in through our blinds in the lab. We have fabulous full-length windows to take advantage of the lovely southern California sunshine, that all of Los Angeles has been missing lately.

This also seemed to stimulate the crazies, particularly those that ride the bus. I will have to do a longer post sometime on some of my earlier adventures that include such notable characters as "please-part-my-hair" man and the spitting girl. Today's adventure involved Mr. "I'm on something really scary right now" Man. I got on the very crowded Culver City 6 bus, hoping to make it in time for the Monday 9am meeting. I noticed that this guy was staring at me, which caught my attention because most people don't even seem to notice my existence. Lo and behold, as the bus empties, the only available seat is next to him. I sit down. He says, "Hi. I'm starting my first day at my new job today. It's running servers. Linux servers. For a .com. I don't have a degree or anything, I've just been doing this for a few years. I'm not into the whole, you know, classroom scene." Or a close approximation thereof. He asks if I am going to work, (I am), where do I work (UCLA), are you a teacher (no, a scientist), what kind of scientist (biochemist). Now, here's where things went down the road to psychodelicdom. He asks if I invent drugs, like psychodelics, cause he likes them, but they FREAK him out. They are really scary. But he likes them. He has never once met my eyes, and now he's starting to get really animated. I freaked and got off at the next stop, wishing him luck on his first day...