CTA Tattler

The vulgar spitter

It’s 11:30 p.m. on a Friday night, heading north on the Red Line. A youngish couple gets on. She’s fat. She sits in the back of the car in that single seat adjacent to the door. He sits in the double seat ahead of her.

They fight almost constantly all the way to Bryn Mawr. A small sample:

“You’re a f---ing bitch. I only f---ed you because you were there.” He punctuates his words with a fist on the seat’s grab bar. She’s got her head in her lap, crying.

“You a f---ing ho. And I’m NOT drunk!”

He gets up to leave at Bryn Mawr, and grabs the girl roughly by the arm. As he exits, he spits on the red shoe of a woman who had been giving him the hairy eyeball.

He shouted, “Vice Lord K!” And banged on the window as the train pulled out.

Can't get no satisfaction

Here's yet another shameless lift from a last week's Tribune Getting Around column by transportation writer Jon Hilkevitch. This one covers the CTA's customer satisfaction survey. (The link in this graph is to today's column. Last week's is no longer free online.)

"Operating like all too many CTA buses, an 8:30 a.m. meeting last Wednesday of the transit agency's Committees on Strategic Planning and Service Delivery got under way 45 minutes late.

"The failure to keep to a schedule, if not surprising, was at least poetic justice.

"The Chicago Transit Authority board members who finally showed up for the meeting heard a report on rider feedback about the agency's performance. The report was based on polling that is done every two years, what Getting Around calls the CTA Customer Dissatisfaction Survey.

Lactation woes

It’s not easy being a new mom. A 30-ish woman tells her cell-phone mate:

“Oh, he’s gonna be awake and I’ll have to breast-feed him when I get home in a minute. I can feel it. My boobs hurt. They’re like anvils.”

The Bitch with Style

I'm on the Purple Line at evening rush hour, pulling into Howard, waiting to get off. I look down and see an attractive woman in her mid-to-late 40s, dressed in a conservative business suit.

On her lap is a canvas briefcase/bag that says:

Bitch's Bag

I am a Bitch with Style

Being in Total Control of Myself

And she was.

Those wacky 151 Sheridan drivers

Today I'm shamelessly stealing an anecdote from the Chicago Tribune's excellent transportation writer, Jon Hilkevitch:

"Getting Around [Hilkevitch's column name] had a CTA experience (recently), which already has been conveyed to the transit agency, showing how poorly some CTA employees are doing their jobs -- despite receiving more than $22 an hour....

"A group of about 20 people was waiting outside Union Station for a CTA No. 151 Sheridan bus. When a No. 151 pulled up, the driver opened the doors to announce he would not be the next bus departing. He said he had passed another No. 151 that was supposed to be in front of him, but was actually about five minutes behind still completing the route. After more than five minutes passed, and the other bus had not appeared, the No. 151 driver got off the bus and walked over to another CTA driver standing in the crowd, which had gotten larger.

"But as he exited, the driver told the waiting commuters to get on his bus, because it would be the next No. 151 to depart. While the driver talked to his friend, people boarded. But hardly any of them--except for Getting Around and a couple of tourists who had already bought transit passes--paid their fares. Most just laughed and took a seat. One man used foul language to ridicule the few people who paid to ride.

"The bus driver then boarded after making no attempt to ensure fares were collected. In fact, he seemed to go out of his way to make sure they weren't. It made me recall Kruesi, after he was verbally beat up by Mayor Richard Daley over the 25-cent fare increase this year, saying he was sorry, but there was no alternative.

"A few times when the No. 151 driver pulled up at bus stops in the downtown area, individuals apparently unfamiliar with the CTA system asked him, What's the fare?

"$50," he said, laughing each time, before giving the correct fare information and waving the dumbfounded patrons aboard."

How romantic!

When you commute for more than 20 years on North Side buses, you get lots of good stories. And so I have to thank my Mom again for this one:

She was waiting for the 151 Sheridan bus at about 5:30 a.m., on her way to work. A blind guy walked up to the stop and asked, “Can you tell me when the 151 comes?”

My ever helpful Mom replied, “Sure, that’s what I’m waiting for.”

The bus arrived and Mom made sure he got on OK. Then he sat down beside her. They rode along for a few blocks and chatted.

Then he said: “You know, you really have been very nice. Would you come and live with me?”

My Mom gasped and said, “No! Sorry.”

“Well why not? It would be cheaper because we could share expenses.”

“Sorry. I already have my own responsibilities. Oops, this is my stop.”

And she got up and moved to another seat.

Gotta hold your nose

This Tattler Tale comes from a work colleague:

"One day I got on the train with my mother and we stood next to a homeless man who reeked of urine. She looked at me and said, 'You ride this everyday?' "

"I couldn't believe it myself.

"Another time, there was a homeless woman on the train who smelled so horrible, the train was stopped, the police summoned and she was asked to leave. (I think she was mentally ill and had been soiling herself.)

"That time I made sure to stand way at the back of the train where I could breath without gagging."

Let's play cards

Have you ever seen four teenagers set up a card table on the El and play poker?

Now you can:

Click here for movie with sound. Be patient. Give the movie some time to load. Not necessarily safe for work -- these youngsters swear! Good gosh!

Pumps in a box

Seen on the Red Line: A young woman boarded at Addison. She was pulling a wheelie suitcase and clutching a large round, cardboard box with a lid, and a cord attached to it. Kind of like a hat box.

But printed on the top and sides were vintage drawings of stilletto heel pumps. And the word “Vintage” printed on the top.

Exit, stage left!

It was the end of another work day. I stepped onto the Red Line train at Grand and State at around 5 p.m.

Across from the open door I noticed a large man looking furtively around. He seemed very agitated. Suddenly, he pulled the overhead knob to open the doors and kind of just rolled his body smoothly out the door and onto the tracks below. Luckily for him, the train was stopped just opposite a pass-through to the other side. (There is a solid wall at Grand separating the northbound and southbound tracks. There are maybe two openings in that wall at the station.)

Next I spotted him lumbering up the wall off the southbound tracks and running up the steps on the other side of the station.

The train conductor had to reset the door and checked the tracks to make sure that Mr. Gymnast was no longer on the tracks.