Coffee High City
After months without a coffee option, [one of downtown's fashionable moneyed neighborhood] food hall[s] has a new resident coffee shop. [It] previously operated as a cart [and] opened in the space formerly occupied by [some such other coffee shop.] It joins five new food stalls [in] a recent revamp of the global food hall. ...strong coffee community. "...somewhere that shared our values...and a better city for coffee." ...jumped right into Denver coffee culture...managing the coffee program at...the Readers' Choice winner for Best New Coffeehouse...in 2022. They started doing pop-ups[, or short-term mini businesses, at one of the neighborhood's] men's clothing store[s. Coffee is] "a craft, not a commodity." ...showcasing coffee roasters... "...future guest roasters... I don't know if it's because it's such a transplant city, but we've been very welcomed." ...encouraging people to get its logo tattooed on their bodies. ...(on an arm or leg - no butts). - Westword, 12/1-7/2022
[Colorado's soccer team], headed up by their world class communications director...host[s] an annual [event] where members of the media, along with...alumni, get to play a real game...with a full kit... ...I was invited to attend...by...Amazon Prime. ...Prime rolled out the red carpet for...fans. ...to bring awareness to all the great stuff Amazon Prime offers its viewers...with a room at [a famous downtown hotel and] a bag full of schwag...pregame sideline passes...a prepaid card for concessions... - Mile High Sports, 12/2022
None...are doing anything...for which they are qualified by their education... The bureaucracy is...immobilized... ...most of the...younger talent is being wasted. "The generation gap is very bad. We are the transitional ones. The younger don't care or aren't ready for anything. Most of them feel abandoned...disillusioned, they pretend to be full of bravado... The older intellectuals are laying low or have given up. We have nowhere to turn except politics, which remains corrupt." The [powers that be] created their privileged...class...but...left the peasants and the middle class untouched. And they've used the civil servants...as just that - servants." There were many paintings or drawings of cemeteries and skulls, of bare bones in fields, of people on the run. ..."Hate calls for hate, blood for blood, skull for skull." ...a display of the "weapons of the weak." ...this...country...needs...engineers and scientifically trained graduates... ...sons and daughters...go abroad to study, and stay away. ...the dean of...a private Buddhist institution [remarks,] "Who wants to come back to a huge prison and get killed?" All [city] residents...except foreigners have to go through an elaborate identification procedure when they move into a new dwelling, and they are subject to constant checks and rechecks by the police. Each family must have a census certificate approved by the chief of...a group of families. The paper must then be certified by...something like [a ward captain.] Then the...sub district boss, has to give his approval. A middle-class [street] has fewer...pimps...petty gangsters, and other troublemakers... There has been a complete breakdown... Civil servants now live...close...to...taxi-drivers who make three or four times what they make. "...there will be a flattening out of classes... ...the taller houses will overshadow the huts and shacks. There may emerge a whole new middle class, or there may be no middle class... No such thing as social mobility, in the traditional sense, any longer remains." - R. Shaplen, "The New York Times", 4/15/1972, reprinted in Reporting Vietnam, 1998
In 1776, Matthew Boulton...said...of his famous Soho iron works..."I sell here, Sir, what all the world desires to have - POWER." ...the English Midlands...were the forefront of the world's manufacturing life. As well as industry, literary and scientific societies prospered. ...two centuries on...where the Industrial Revolution grew up, now lies...ruins. - Aldiss
Wednesday. I will be late to an appointment with my investment broker if I don't make the same bus I did on Monday. I make it, and along the way we stop at the same train station where I caught the train last night. We pull up to the gate and a guy steps on. He asks the driver where this bus goes before stepping back off. After a brief layover, we head back toward the avenue. We stop at a light when the driver opens the front door and shouts, "Come here" to a guy on a bench at a stop. One passenger has just stepped onboard and turns as if the driver is speaking to him. A second passenger gets up and comes up to the driver. The driver says to the guy outside, "You want the (bus number) 12." When I get home from work, I have the voicemail that my cards have arrived at the camera shop. The shop is a ridiculously close crosstown ride. With cards in hand, I head for the train. I catch a train headed the wrong direction, transfer to the right one, and catch a bus down to work's doorstep with minutes to spare. All this for some Christmas cards. Christ! I disembark across the street from my shopping center and, for the 4th time this week, go into the breakfast place before work. This morning, I'm sitting next to a table with four women. two are from Argentina. One is studying for her US citizenship. Friday. Today I'm working open to close. I continue to be amazed how fast an entire day can fly past at work. I'm up long before my alarm goes off. Lately, I have things to do which preclude my riding all the way to work. And I make use of the time on bus rides getting them done. The bus to the doorstep of my shopping center doesn't run as early as another, which will drop me a short ride away. I grab the latter, and along the way I have Christmas photo cards and stamps, and for most I have personal notes to include. I also have an old address book. It's a low-tech morning before sunrise. I have an old friend who refers to cards as an "anachronism." I take the half hour ride collating notes and cards, and putting stamps upon envelopes. I have no pen with me and must wait until I get to work to fill out addresses. This bus route on the pre-dawn run has its apparent regulars, as well as homeless. A couple of guys come onboard, one of whom thanks the other for giving him his transfer. The guy who gifts it is someone who doesn't strike me as homeless, regardless of his yellow construction vest. he's in new warm weather gear, and it appears coordinated as opposed to handed down or from the thrift store. I notice that he carries a folding camp chair with him. At another stop, a woman comes aboard who exchanges waves with him. She's dressed as if she may manage a small office. The chair guy and I get out at the same stop. It's a stop where another passenger waits with his own bike. The bike rack on this bus is full, including with my own bike, and the driver tells me, "You just made this guy's day." When I get out, I notice that the guy who got out with me is already sitting in his camp chair on the median between the two lanes of this busy avenue...panhandling. But I wonder if in fact he's retired, has his own place, and does this for extra money. What I don't realize until I do get to work is that I mistakenly include one note along with another in one of the cards. And I must write it over. And as I don't realize this until I've already filled out addresses and put a sign on the door at work and run over to the contract post office in the hardware store at the shopping center and come back and taken the sign down, I must repeat the process. But I do find a gift for the brother-in-law.
Saturday. I take some trash out to the bus stop shelter across the street on my way to work. In the shelter is a guy standing up. The rest of the inside of the shelter is taken up with a blue camping tarp, covering both benches and part of the trash can, which has apparently been moved inside the shelter to support the tarp. I have no reason to believe anyone else is in here. I deposit my trash...in the trash, which jiggles the tarp. From beneath the tarp, I hear someone say, "What the...what the...?" After work, I decide to do grocery shop at a supermarket at the very stop where I disembarked this morning. Afterword, I cross the street for an early dinner. I hear a cyclist, is he homeless? He's at the same spot on the median where the chair guy was this morning. He's curing someone, in a car? The following morning, I'm off to the sister's place. I grab a bus just down the street. Just before I get out, a middle-aged short guy gets on. He's in sunglasses. He curses "people" and punches a seat before he sits down. Before I step out, I glance at him. His head is tilted back as if he's passed out. After I leave the sister's, I ride to the train, which takes me to a stop near a supermarket. It has a product I can't find at my own supermarket. The parking lot includes a lot of space for a shopping center, half of which has now been developed into new condos. The huge lot remains. A year or so ago, I was here for the first of what I refer to as a kind of flash mob car show. It's all street racers. After the first one of these I've seen, I later noticed sigs up all around this lot, claiming that it's in fact "private property." This afternoon is the third gathering I've now seen here. Street racers are milling about, hanging out at the supermarket. The signs are still up.
...cycling would be much easier on his knees than running. And like many who have knee issues but want to keep active, he turned to cycling. ...his family moved to Denver... The incredible Colorado cycling community, as well as the seemingly endless routes around the state... ...still hosts a bike ride every Saturday. Unless the weather is extreme... And during the week, he will be pedaling somewhere by himself. - Mile High Sports, 12/2022
A fundraiser in support of [a health care center in Boulder committed to] each individual's physical, emotional, social and spiritual needs [includes a bike ride with] three fully-supported route choices for cyclists - 68, 38, and 24 miles - plus an outstanding post-ride party with music, food and craft beer...[The organization's director finds his work] both grounding and perspective-building. - Community News, Second Edition - 2022
Wednesday. I'm out the door, and for the first time in some days, I'm riding all the way to work for a change. The overnights are frosty well into the last month of the year, down to 19 or 20 degrees F., but the days warm up. I'm all the way down the trail to a big golf course along the way, behind a tall chain link fence. On the opposite side of the trail are some tall trees, a recently popular spot for homeless. There's a tent visible from the trail. Just a few yards away from the tent, on the trail, is what appears to be a kind of flatbed dolly you can push. It looks just like ones available at Home Depot. Shopping carts are nothing unusual out here. Just this week I had to dodge two of them coming home in the dark. Both were parked right out on the trail, underneath separate overpasses. And this one has the usual collection of incomprehensible items. On the bottom is a huge fire log. But the thing which catches my eye is the orange ladder on top of the dolly. A few days ago, last Sunday, I had just entered the trail from the sister's place. Less than a mile from here, on the grass off the trail, was a bicycle and a bike trailer. They were both laying on the grass underneath an orange ladder. The following day I am working open to close. I'm up early enough with plenty of time to ride the entire way. Instead I ride to a bus which will drop me a short ride to work. Had I not elected to ride to the station, I would have missed the guy sitting in the dark, under an orange sleeping bag, beneath the overpass for the train. As I pass him sitting absolutely motionless, he exclaims, "Fuck you!" At the station, those of us waiting for this southbound bus are at the correct gate. It pulls up along the curb behind the gate, on the opposite end of a drive. When the driver gets going, I'm standing next to him after I put a ride coupon into the fare box. He doesn't appear to see me standing there. I must ask him for a transfer before I get one. On the bus, I'm sitting behind a guy who smells. When he gets up to disembarks at the next train station, I see that his right leg is missing below the knee. In his left hand is a cane. Through the front window of the bus, I see a homeless camper in the big parking lot for the station. We pull out of the station and onto the avenue. We stop and pick up the chair guy. Again, he gets out at my stop, and by the time I have my bag secured to the back rack of my bike, he's already sitting on his chair, out on the median.
I grab breakfast at my usual place before work. I'm sitting not far from a couple of grey-haired guys. One is making a pitch to the other about investing in nursing homes for baby boomers, and also for the generation following them. I missed the first one, but I'm definitely in the next generation. He's peppering the guy with details, about residents who lock in a fixed rent "for as long as they live." I heard death described as the final stage of life. I've never heard of it pitched to a client in terms of something to make money from. The following morning, I've caught up on my sleep for the week. Working all day yesterday, I didn't get a chance to deposit my Christmas bonus at the bank. I hit the bank on the way to work this morning. I do the ride all the way, and I end up at the bakery next to where I work. I'm in line for a soda, between a guy with white hair and a long beard, and a guy with shaggy grey hair and sandals. It was 22 degrees F. this morning. The first guy comments on the rearview mirror I secure around my wrist. He then mentions to the guy behind me that he noticed his sandals. The two appear not to know each other. The second guy says, "I have to race back to my car. Frostbite can happen in 10 to 20 seconds in 10-degree (F.) weather." Or did he say minutes? The guy in front of me came in with a couple of canvas bags. He fills them with loaves of bread. I tell the girl behind the counter, the manager, that I feel as though I am in an apocalyptic future, where money has been replaced by loaves of bread. It's a short walk to my store. Between here and there, a guy exits his car in a T-shirt and shorts. He's complaining about how cold it is outside. After work, i decide that I want to have dinner on the way home at the Black Eyed Pea. I'm sitting behind an elderly couple. The husband is going on and on about his life, as if he's reading from some kind of script. He's considering some kind of exterior repair to his home. "But I'm not doing it now. It's too cold. I'll wait until it warms up." He's right about that. The overnights have been in the mid-teens F. The following morning, I will head out in my ski pants and long underwear, and my hoodie between my long-sleeved shirt and winter coat. When I leave here, it already feels as though it's down into the teens. The wife mentions something about an errant daughter, and the mother getting involved. "She's getting involved?" he inquires. "What for?" He later makes reference to I know not who, perhaps the daughter, when he says, "Well, then they're insane. They need to be put into an institution." I'm facing the opposite direction from this couple as I watch another, middle-aged couple come in and take a seat. The guy has a Black Sox hat on. It's popular with particular gang members. I take a closer look as he is facing me. He has tattoos on his face.
Monday. I wake up too early. But does this stop me from going to the gym? Of course not. Anything to get the gym out of the way. I'm working out on my last machine next to a couple of grey-haired guys conversing. One is telling the other about an old truck he parked at a train station in the metro area. His catalytic converter was stolen. Someone broke in and stole his prescription sunglasses. Another time, he was walking to his truck when a "thug followed me. I told him I had bear spray in my truck." When he got to his truck, said thug left, because his truck had been broken into again. I didn't hear him say if his bear spray was stolen. Otherwise, he enjoys riding the transit system. Though he mentions one particular train line, referring to it as dangerous. It's a line which traverses a slate of wealthy neighborhoods. I stay a half hour late at work and finish just in time to run out and catch a bus. I get home about an hour before bedtime. I grab dinner at the Chinese place. Coming back across the street, I see a neighbor in the parking lot of my townhome complex. I also see a couple who appear homeless. The guy is walking a bicycle. My neighbor says hi to them. They go up and onto the porch of one of the units, and they stand outside without going in. I ask my neighbor in Spanish if they live here. She does not know. Tuesday. It's perhaps fifteen minutes until close at work. I expect to ride home this evening. Four customer come in. Forty-five minutes later, it's time for the bus to come along. I'm riding the bus instead. To the train. I've been riding home from the station where I get out. I bungee everything to the back rack and get the lights on...just when the bus shows up. I think that I un-bungee everything. As I'm onboard, my bike on the front rack, I don't have my bike lock. I see it through the front window, beginning to bounce on the back rack, from which I have removed the bungee cord. I negotiate the white trash bags in the aisle, which belong to the homeless passenger, and point at it as I ask the driver if I can run out and grab it. Though his express tells me he has no idea what I mean by "lock", he obliges. I lost my last bike lock just this way.
Thanks to a deficit in the week's budget, I've already blown my $400 Christmas bonus. But I also got a new bag for my handlebars, for under $30. And as it came from Walmart and not the sporting goods supercenter, it didn't cost ten times that amount. It isn't square, it's flat and called a "tote bag." But it's bigger. This week before Christmas, I got a notice in the mail about renewing my Medicare. I'm not good with websites where I need a password. But it goes smoothly. I have all the requested digits. I need to finally open an "account" with my company's payroll service, to access another digit. With another password. This goes smoothly as well. Wednesday. I'm coming home from work, again by bus and train. This time I do ride the rest of the way. The forecast has proven correct. Shortly after 6 PM, it's 5 degrees F. I know this from a time and temperature sign I pass along the way home. Right after the sign tells me how cold it is, the very next message is, "MERRY CHRISTMAS". The following day is the same. I take the transit system to and from work. Back yet again at the same train station, waiting for the last bus home, I spot this evening's crazy person. A bus for one westbound route arrives. It's headed back downtown as it's off duty...right on schedule. The crazy asks the driver, "When's the next one?" She replies that it's directly behind her. If in fact he is westbound...and not crazy, he has a choice of this route or another one also westbound. The one he wants will be here in less than an hour. The other will be here in half the time. I know it's below freezing out here, but it could be worse. But I'm convinced he knows none of this. I'm in a $300 down coat with a hood, long underwear, and ski pants. His skinny jeans appear slung low, and he's in a jacket and a knit cap. But he doesn't stay at this gate. He walks across to a bus gate where no bus is scheduled to arrive. Tean I watch him walk the opposite way to a southbound bus which has just pulled up. It takes off, and next I hear him from the train platform. He's yelling "Fuck you!" at the automated voice from a train which just arrived. A middle-aged passenger shows up at the gate for my bus. He asks if it's been here yet. He tells me he ran from his work to the train, to make this bus. The crazy comes back and asks him something before vanishing from sound or sight. My bus arrives and I step on with the other passenger. He mentions his trek to the driver before calling his mom. He tells her that he's on his way home, what the temperature is, when he will be there, and about the frozen pizza he's bringing home with him.
A Tale of 2 Trash Bags
From the nuts who are passengers to the ones who drive the bus. On Friday, I'm again called into work. I quick fry a couple of eggs and bag 'em. I again elect to take the bus as snow and ice and cold p[revail. I hop on the same bus as yesterday morning. It's only once in a blue moon that I'm on this route. I wait until I'm onboard to eat, as I can then take off the cold weather face mask. I'm done shortly before we reach the train, and I get up to toss my empty bag into the trash at the front of the bus. I've previously had compliments for doing so. Upon this frosty morning however, this driver first asks me, "What are you doing?" before telling me to stay behind the white line of the floor when the bus is in motion. He says nothing about my eating on the bus, which passengers are not supposed to do either. I'm on the same bus at the same time, which gets me to the same train. Only this time, I miss the connecting bus at the same station by three minutes. I walk to a cafe across from another bus stop outside the station. I've noticed this place before, but I've never been in. At twilight, when we close these days, I'm out of work on time. And I'm back at the same station as last night. This evening's daily crazy comes walking across the median of another bus gate. His winter coat is unzipped and the temps are single digits. He stands at the gate for another bus before moseying his way over to me to ask if I have a cigarette. I still don't smoke. My bus arrives a bit late. The guy from last night is back, the one on the phone to his mom. We get on and the bus changes drivers. Both front and back doors are open, and I'm cold inside with my hood and mittens off. The cigarette guy comes aboard, along with another crazy. Cigarette guy sits and laughs to himself. The other one asks the driver for one of the plastic trash bags. This driver has no problem handing him one, in which he puts a small box. I do a little reading before the new driver tells us to disembark and get onto the bus behind us, which just arrived. We all get up except the second crazy in the back. The driver of the second bus gets out and grabs a quick smoke break. he will tell us when he comes back on that it's the first break he's had since he started four hours ago. Holiday shopping traffic out east, from where he came, is causing delays. Outside, he tells the mom-on-the-phone guy he dropped his glove. I'm standing watching the driver when, after picking up his glove, the guy tells me to get on the bus. (?) Is everyone telling me what to do today? I must not know anything. Once onboard, we get going. Yesterday's guy on the phone with his mom is, this evening, an expert on every kind of sports team the city has. The driver is politely laughing along at his critiques. Cigarette guy gets off somewhere along the way. The other crazy is also sitting in back of this bus. His drops his box-in-a-bag and the driver asks him if "everything " is "okay back there?"
Kick off your celebrations with [a] hometown throwdown... Then on the 31st, drop it like the Times Square ball... Don't have plans for New Year's Eve? You do now! ...a smorgasbord of passion...for the jam band scene. ...a...jam sesh hot enough to melt the snow off the Rockies. ...musical melange of indie rock, psychedelic jazz... ...three whole nights of debauchery... ...progressive bluegrass, jazz, neo-psychedelic, rock, funk, and jam band influences. Pull on your party pants... - Westword, 12/22-28/2022
A Lump of Coal for My Old Deathburger and "Don't Take."
Christmas Day. I do appreciate the Chinese place across the street, and the Vietnamese place behind where I live. Very much. I just don't feel like fried rice for my Christmas lunch before the afternoon feast. Now, a search engine claims that my old deathburger is open today. Not only that, but it claims that every individual deathburger of the franchise in the metro area is open today. Okay, well...maybe. We'll ride up the street and find out. It's a short ride. And the snow is disappearing. I'm not kidding, Thursday and Friday, the high was 5 degrees F. As it closes in on noon, it feels close to 60 degrees outside. Yesterday, the forecast was for 63 today. And I caught up on my sleep from yesterday, when I woke up before 3 AM and instead of lying there not being able to go back to sleep, I got up and did dishes. On "a quiet Christmas morning in" what's left and rapidly melting of "the Colorado snow," I'm rolling downhill and dodging slush, until I pull up to the empty deathburger parking lot. No lights inside, locked door. A pickup slowly moves around the lot and through the drive through. A note on the door claims that they will be open today at 5. It's unlikely it means PM. Actually, it reads that the place will close today at 4, reopening tomorrow at 5. If by "today" it means today and not yesterday, then they were for some reason open before 4 AM and then closed at $ AM. Which is somehow even less likely. Anything is more likely that these two possibilities. It appears that every single employee had the same idea: "If I'm not there today, the others can handle it without me." I turn and ride back toward home, up my boulevard. I don't get far when I see one of many Mexican places around here which I've never been into. The neon sign declares it open. Indeed it is. I love this boulevard. There are a smattering of Spanish speaking customers. And, once again, none of the staff speak English. This ain't a problem for this Wero. I have a Coca de Dieta, and when she brings me a can, I have to ask for a cup with ice. It doesn't get any more authentic than this. I have a plato con huevos y jamon, arroz, lechuga, tomate, and a small wedge of zucchini. Peeled by hand. No shit. The waitresses all wear holiday shirts which read, in English, "Be a good person." I ask her if she knows what it means, and I do my best to translate.
I can't go to the supermarket today, because they are all closed. I get back to my corner, where I see that the Vietnamese grocery is not only open, it's busier on Christmas than Macy's in Manhattan. I assume that this is because its patrons want to make a fresh holiday meal. In their case, by holiday, for some this means a day off when everyone is home. One of my customers manages a water treatment plant in Denver. In fact, I go past it twice a day to and from work. Yesterday he came in, and I asked him about water use on days when families were gathered together. It's not a matter of volume, he explained, it's rate of flow. The rate of flow here is elevated. I'm able to grab a pile of vegetables, which I will be able to chop later this afternoon or evening, instead of having to wait until tomorrow. I love this boulevard. I get back home, wrap a last present, and roll off to the sister's. We have a little food, they watch football, and we exchange presents. We have desert. Then I'm off to the train back home. It's twilight when I'm onboard with my bag of gifts. Through a window, I look down the side streets we pass, at the occasional homeless campers which frequent these lonely blocks so close to the rail line. No empty stool or crutch without an owner, but homeless campers as the evening of Christmas Day approaches. I disembark at the station, contemplating riding home. Even now the temps are in the 50s F. At the bus gate for one of the routes back to my neighborhood sits a lonely figure in the dark. I immediately smell marijuana. We both get on a bus which arrives. It's a short ride home. A t a corner of my boulevard, a homeless guy steps aboard. He's dressed from the cap on his head to his pants in black. He struggles to get a walker inside. The walker has a big box on the seat. Around the middle is wrapped a long gauze bandage. Written on the side facing me is "Don't take."
It's the day after Christmas. And I have plenty to do. Not really, but a handful of things takes me the entire damned day. And today is hardly an exception. I take the trail to a Target, where I pick up a new pair of sweatpants. I wear them around the house. And the ones I have are falling down because I am losing weight. The grocery side is out of eggs, so I may as well wait to pick up my perishables later in the day. I hit the Chilis in the shopping center for lunch. I hit the gym. Then it's off to the train. I need to go downtown to the sporting goods supercenter. Somewhere along the way this week, I lost my balaclava. And I never effing lose anything. Anything. The one I had was beginning to droop over my left eye, so perhaps it's just as well. It's my staple piece of cold weather gear. I also end up grabbing a new neck gator. I check out and put on the new balaclava, for which it is just cold enough. Supercenter patrons walking the plaza outside are looking at me. It a reaction from these self-believing sport experts which strikes me as perfect. Perfectly bewildered. This must be the single piece of gear which just ain't their thing. Story of my life. I retrace my path back to the train and take it to a supermarket on the way to the pizza place. I pick up everything but a couple of things which, again, this chain does not carry. One is a book of transit system ride coupons, which they're out of. From here it gets better. I ride to the pizza place for dinner. They are closed today, as well as the past two days. Damned stoners. I break out plan B. I ride down to a Denny's on the way home. It's a lower class place where service is usually slow, even when it's half empty. This early evening though, it's not bad at all. Now, back at the supermarket, I spotted a homeless guy as I was walking inside. He has a distinctive chin jutting out from the hood of his winter coat. He was bundled up on a day which may have reached 60 degrees F.; standing outside the front door, next to a trash can, eating something. Now, I'm locking up my bike outside a Dennys, the parking lot of which was not long ago popular with homeless tents and campers. Not to mention panhandlers on the corner here, of a busy highway and avenue. And he has the current panhandling shift here on the corner.
Tuesday. The year itself only has a few more days to go. This morning is partly cloudy and incredibly beautiful. By 10 AM it must be 60 degrees F. I leave the house shortly before 9. I refill a prescription a few blocks away. Then I hit my usual supermarket for the two items I couldn't get yesterday. Then it's across the street to my bank. Then a crosstown ride to the bus which shall take me to work's doorstep in time for lunch at the bakery next door. On the way to the bus stop, I cross to the other end of an interstate on ramp. I'm on the sidewalk, but right next to the ramp. A tractor trailer is turning onto the ramp as he honks at me. I don't realize that he's letting me know I'm too close to the ramp until he has already slowly entered the ramp, without his back end turning too sharply and coming onto the end of the sidewalk. And on top of me. On Friday, it's been a second day of melting snow, and the second day I decided again that I don't want to deal with riding across ice. It began to rain Wednesday afternoon. I took the transit system home before it turned to snow, before I went to bed. Friday morning, I'm still not on the bike. I discovered when I got to work yesterday morning that I was missing one of my ski mittens. I considered heading up to the sporting goods supercenter before work today. I did grab a bus as soon as I made it across the street to the bus stop. But it crawled the few blocks to the train station. And I just missed the train when I got there. I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to grab a new pair of ski mittens as i would be on the transit system anyway. Instead, I abort this plan and transfer to a train down to the bus which drops me at work's doorstep. While I am waiting for the first train, I'm at the station next to the football stadium. I haven't had any bike breakdowns lately and haven't been here since perhaps the summer. Back then, it seemed as if the transit system security were running off the homeless as a part of some concerted plan. I haven't seen many around my usual station. This corner, however, is a kind of hang out for local neighborhood homeless, as well as those local to my boulevard. There are four gathered on a big section of the platform, designed for the throngs of fans who disembark here for the football stands. They are huddled around the post of a painted steel security fence. A can of shaving cream sits atop the post. Mornings this week have started off as low as the 20s F., but the days get up to the 40s. This morning, the sun is out. The tallest guy is in a cap and an insulated jumpsuit. He does an elbow bump, popular during Covid, with a smaller guy in a navy wool 3/4 coat. This guy also has a US flag do rag tied around his head. A heavy guy is wearing a sleeping bag instead of a coat. He eventually decides to sit down on the concrete.
New Year's Eve, 2022. I don't yet trust the streets with my bike. One more day on the transit system. Though there's more snow forecast for Sunday night into Monday. Was it last week I lost my balaclava? This week I lost one of a pair of ski mittens which I've had for years. No, I don't think I'm getting old. I think I'm just stupid. I kept the one of the last pair which I lost. Unfortunately, I managed to lose the mitten for the same hand as the other pair. I ponder a return to REI, until someone recommends a store in the shopping center where I work. After work today, I will indeed find a pair there. This morning, I grab a bus to the train. When you rely on the transit system, especially on the weekend, you make do with layovers between bus or train. Even in cold weather. With the exception of my ski mittens, I'm geared up. Twenty minutes ain't bad. I'm on the way to finishing a book. And in a reversal of fortune, daylight is breaking instead of waning. On the train, I take a seat not far from someone who I assume is a young woman. Whoever it is has a women's crocheted hat on. When their mask comes down, I first notice the beard and moustache. A younger homeless guy walks down to our end of the train. He shows the crocheted hat guy a small flashlight for which he's asking $5. The guy tries it out. He turns it on and off and uses the button to make it rapidly flash. He touches the back end to a disabled rail on the wall of the train car. {?} The younger guy points out the various features to him. Crocheted hat guy responds with a puzzled look on his face. This feels as if it's an authentic ending to his year.
