The Smell Was Intoxicating

The smell was intoxicating. Seven caramel colored Latina ladies entered the train on 14th Street. One more prettier than the next. Their perfume interminging with each others becoming one sweet scent. Different heights, different color hair of varied lengths and styles. Blue jeans, tights, slacks, white pants, leather jackets, trenchcoats, half length, full length, heels, boots, and flats. All seven had one thing in common. Femininity. Pure and sexual. On the prowl on this Sunday evening. The boys out need to watch out. Names will be taken, Notches cut out of their belts and hearts will be broken. Good times had by all. Well, maybe for some.

FH

The Smoker on the 6 Train

On my ride home after a slow Friday night a few weeks ago, my reading was rudely interrupted. An older black woman was talking out loud to herself. I would have made the assumption that she was mentally ill, drunk or just didn't give a damn. One by one the people who were seating near her got up and moved as she started to sing louder and louder off key. Another night on the Iron Horse. Right? 

So the woman ends her serenade by lighting up a cigarette. Immediately two people tell her that she shouldn't smoke that on the train. Now, maybe it's just me but if the woman was talking and singing out loud to herself what makes you think that she gives a damn what those two people thought. The woman let out an impressive stream of expletives directed to both of her antagonizers. I even had to take my headphones off to hear what she had to say. She continued on with her yelling while puffing away on the cigarette. Occasionally she would yell something un-intelligible to attract attention to herself. 

My thing is this, why would you even get into verbal confrontation with someone who might be unstable. Who knows what that woman is carrying that she can use to harm someone. Why would you put yourself in that situation. Do like the others did and move to the next car. It's really that simple. 

In the end, the woman adjusted her spring hat and decided to lay down and lounge like Cleopatra on a dais. Sometimes all you can do is just laugh and shake your head. You'll stay healthier by doing that. No?

FH

Waking Someone on the Train

I often wonder about what kind of judgment some people use while riding the subway. That is bad enough to think about during "normal" riding hours. Multiply that tenfold during the late hours that I ride on the trains. Allow me to elaborate on what I mean.

I was riding the train after work last night/this morning and the train had a mix of people coming home from work, those going to work and those coming back from Friday night's entertainments. I tend to sit in the middle of the car. Why? I'm not sure. Perhaps it's because I'm a creature of habit in certain aspects of my life. To be honest, during the late night hours, the corner seats tens to be occupied by sprawled out sleepers and/or homeless people. To get to the point, apparently there was a guy either sitting asleep or had his legs on one of the long corner seats while asleep. Nothing strange about it, right? Well, here comes my source of wonderment.

This older guy gets on the train and yells out "Wake up and get your feet off of the seat". Naturally he startled everyone on the train including the sleeper who the message was intended for. The older guy who was of a decent size decides to sit directly across the now awakened and pissed off man to further browbeat him. He tells him that it's illegal to occupy more than one seat while on the subway. Now, while that is true, unless you're a police officer why stick you're neck out. Sure the older dude was wearing a baseball cap that had the word police written across the side but I would hardly say that his hat would qualify him to be a law enforcement official. 

So the man continues to bust this dude's balls to the point where the awakened man tells him to "Just shut the fuck up already". That seemed to end the now truly amusing exchange between the two men. The sleeper went back to sleep and the old dude was left grumbling about God knows what. Ok, so you would think that would be the end of my little tale. Nope, not quite. Fast forward the train ride to the Hunts Point station in the Bronx.

The train pulls into said station and the sleeper gets up to get off the train. As he steps off the older man yells something out at him and starts wagging his index finger at him. The man steps back on the train and looks like wanted to throttle the man. He, unlike the older man, showed better judgment by just exiting the train avoiding any further confrontation. The older man focused his attention a teen who got on at Hunts Point and was wearing a Pittsburgh Pirates hat. The older man told the teen "Now that's a team" while pointing at the hat. The teen just opened the side door and went into the next car. LOL.

I mean what are people thinking. What if the dude who was sleeping had a bad day, a bad week or a bad month. Why risk putting yourself in a position where you could be assaulted or worse. People need to learn to just mind their business and just sir there quietly. You hear of it often enough in the news (and on YouTube) about how the person who stuck their nose in someone's business on the train got the taste smacked out of their mouth. Come on now people. Just ride the iron horse and get home safe. 

FH

The Man in the Burgundy Sweater

I'm not sure on what stop this man got on the Downtown #6 train but it was somewhere in the Bronx. I only noticed him since I could hear his rustling over the music in my headphones. I look to my right and see this man with many small black garbage bags in front of him. He seems to be organizing his possessions based on the bags. Not to make assumptions, but the man seems to be homeless or displaced. He doesn't seem to smell or look dirty. He makes an interesting figure.

He looks like he could be in his 50's or 60's of thin build and average height. He's wearing a burgundy colored sweater with brown denim or corduroy pants and sneakers. It's his face that really interests me. He has long stringy brown hair that seems to hang off the sides of his head. He's bald on top. He has a grey bushy beard that adds depth to his otherwise skinny face. His forehead is heavily creased and his mouth is puckered, maybe even toothless. Where his face seems aged his eyes seemed at peace. They looked placid like those of a person who is at ease with the skin that they live in. His eyes lack the look of someone who is living a stressful life. Makes me wonder who he might have been in a former life. A businessman? An administrator? Who. It also makes me wonder who is freer, him without the trappings of everyday life or me saddled with them. I'll never know since he disembarked from the train on 116th Street with all of his black bags consolidated into one big bag slung over his left shoulder. Take care. Happy carefree travels.

FH

The Blonde and the Blabbermouth

The Uptown #6 train pulls into Union Square and groups of people get on and off the train. This one blonde woman gets on and looks at the electronic strip-map and notices that it is a local. I glance in her direction and even though I was wearing my headphones listening to sone Elvis Presley, Stuck on You to be precise, I see she mouths "I want an express". Well, at 5:20am there are no express trains and I tell her so and she thanks me as she gets back on the train. She sits down in front of a black man with thick black rimmed "coke bottle" glasses who proceeds to explain why there are no express trains. Once he's done with that line of talk he starts rambling on about a bunch of nothing. The woman desperately tries to avoid making eye contact with the man but he just continues to talk to no one in particular and laughing at a joke only he seems to find amusing. The look on her face and her posture is priceless. 

She sits there trying dearly to apply the looking through you while looking at you that us New Yorkers have down pat. It doesn't work for her since the man starts right back up talking to her as a few riders, including myself just start chuckling to ourselves. The poor woman looks just miserable. She obviously doesn't want to be rude since he is polite but annoying. At one point she just puts her head back and looks out the window. He just won't stop talking to her. Maybe she wishes that she got off the train and waited for the express that would never come. Better that than the ride she was enduring now. Finally her desired stop approaches and see politely waves goodbye to the man and exits the train. The ironic thing is, she gets off on a local stop. Did she have enough of the jibber-jabber? Hard to tell since I lost track of her as the train pulled away leaving the rest of the passengers to listen to the man with the thick black rimmed "coke bottle" glasses just talk on and on.

FH

How's This For An Entertaining Commute

There's a couple sleeping at the end of the car that I am on and another man is sleeping across from them on why I like to call the "Four seater". There's another man a few seats from them jabbering about how the man who is laying down is going to get arrested since he's taking up more than one seat. The seated man says that he was  already warned. The adviser keeps jabbering on about getting arrested when the man who is laying down pops up and yells "I am the cops!" to which the woman who is sitting across from him sleeping wakes up and promptly tells him to "Shut The Fuck Up Before I put a Boot in Your Face". Mind you this is going on from Bleecker Street to Astor Place, just one stop. The man who originally spoke about getting arrested was smart enough to get off of the train. This is all on my right hand side. 

Now to my left is a man holding a small Whole Foods bag who seems to have a rubber band around his wrist. He seems to be upset about something since he keeps banging the bag on the floor and snapping the band on his wrist as he repeats the same word that I can't seem to make out. At random intervals he puts his palms out asking for something.

As he's doing that another man gets on the car through the emergency doors as he walks by everyone and gives us the peace sign. The lady sitting next to me says "Is this the looney car". LOL. But it continues.

On enters the man I refer to as the "Please" man. He's the guy who always yells "Please" when asking for money. As he walks by, rubber band man yells out Please for the man to please shut up and proceeds to say please in about five or six languages before going back to snapping the rubber band and talking to himself. And with that I arrive at my stop and get off the train. Talk about an entertaining ride. Beat that.

FH

Seat Jockeying on the 2 Train

Its funny to watch people jockeying for seats on the train. For example, while I'm riding down on the 2 train headed towards the American Museum of Natural History, this woman who I can't tell whether she's pregnant or just fat gets on the train and bullies her way into a seat leaving a small space between her and another woman sitting in the corner near the door. She's grumbling something as she opens up her NY Post. The train moves on.

A few stops later an older woman gets on and attempts to sit in the small space. Now I feel as if the woman didn't really fit in the seat being as "hippy" as she was, but apparently she thought she could fit. She says excuse me once, twice to no avail. Big mamma jamma is ignoring her requests to move over by holding the paper over her face while giving the mad dog look. The woman waits another few seconds and squeezes her "hippy" self into another tight (albeit somewhat bigger) spot and Big Mamma Jamma has a smirk of victory on her mean mug of a face. People truly are funny on the trains.

Go Fuck Yourself MTA

I'm really tired of bitching about the MTA, but given the current state of gas and oil prices, I have nonviable choice but to ride the trains. So back to my original point, I'm getting tired of bitching about the MTA. I know shit happens. The system is old, over 100 years old to be exact so things break down. Trust me, I get it. But if something broke down yesterday, you can let people know about it though the PA system that is on the trains. For example, there apparently is a problem with the downtown local platform on 14th Street and Union Square. Now if you're riding down on the downtown express train and are looking to make a connection with the downtown local at Union Square you can't since the local train is not stopping there due to the platform condition. Knowing that, you think that the conductors would announce it over the PA at 42nd Street and Grand Central. No, that would be logical and too easy. They wait until the train pulls into 14th Street to let those want to transfer know that they can't. So we have to ride down to Brooklyn Bridge to transfer for an Uptown local train or just walk. All I have to say is fuck you MTA. You fucking blow!

FH

Drama Drama Drama

Before I go into the brief story I am presenting to you today, allow me to add this little tidbit. I have no idea of what events led into what was happening when I walked down the stairs into the train station. Given that brief prologue, here goes. 

I left work as I usually do, walked down Bleecker Street and crossed Lafayette Street to catch the Uptown #6 train. I had yet to put on my headphones so I could hear that there was some kind of commotion on the platform. As I take a few steps down, I hear something hitting the floor and breaking. I hesitated briefly on the staircase before continuing down. As I reach the bottom of the stairs, a man is throwing what looks like the remnants of a portable CD player to the wall. Yes, I did say a portable CD player. You do remember what those devices looked like in the Pre-iPod/MP3 player days. Right? But I digress.

Now, as I stated at the beginning of this post, I don't know why this guy was so irate as to ruin his music player. Now I assume that it was his since none of his friends (who were keeping their distance from him) were complaining about the destroyed electronic device. I made brief eye contact with the pissed off dude and stepped over his CD as I kept on my way to the turnstile. All I could hear as I swiped my Metrocard was f-bomb this and I don't give a f-bomb about that. This dude was seriously irate. 

As I stood on the platform, I decided to look back to see what was going on. Nothing worse that having major issues go down behind you and not knowing about it. Chalk it up to my being nosy. Anyway, I see the pissed off individual yelling at the token booth clerk while being restrained by one of his buddies. Yes, I realize that the term "token booth" is referring to a relic of an earlier era when riders used token coins to gain entry to the subway. If you have another more socially relevant name for the enclosure, let me know. Until then, back to the story at hand. 

The man was yelling at the clerk and the clerk kept saying something to him over the microphone. I was unsure of what he said since it was garbled but I don't think they were sweet nothings, since the man went even more ballistic. Now he started kicking the bottom of the booth and threatening to wait for the clerk to finish his shift and kick his ass. As amusing as the spectacle was, it grew quite tired and I decided to proceed towards the middle of the platform, shaking my head the whole way down. Another interesting night in the NYC Subway system.

FH 

It's Bad Over There

A guy comes up to me while I'm waiting for the Downtown #6 train on 14th Street-Union Square. He's pointing to the rear of the station an saying that things are worse over there. I take my headphones off to hear him, not knowing if there was a problem of if he was just a nut. Lo and behold, he was a little screwy.

He says to me that things are bad over there but are worse in Santo Domingo and Puerto Rico. He's dipping in and out of English and Spanish as he spoke not sure if I understood him. He goes on to say that going to jail in Santo Domingo and Puerto Rico is not like going to jail here. There are no libraries or free lawyers. I just nodded to him and as he walked away he yelled out in Spanish: Coño, ni hay agua, which for you monolinguals means Damnit, there's not even water.

The moral of the story? If you are going to go to jail, don't do it in Santo Domingo or Puerto Rico or how about this thought, how about trying not to go to jail. Just saying.

FH

To Watch or Not To Watch. That Is the question.

I found this oldie but goodie from the archives in my notes from a few years back. Here goes:

I'm walking down the stairs on the Uptown #6 train at Union Square and see a man sitting on the stairs in front of me watching a movie on a portable DVD player with his headphones in the device. I think to myself that he's being very considerate of the other passengers. As I look closer to the image on his screen, I see he's watching a hardcore porn movie. No folks, he's not watching one of those tame Skinimax flicks. He's watching some hardcore orgy action. I laugh to myself as I walk pass him. The train comes into the station a few minutes later and we both get in the same car.

A few cars go by and the train starts to fill up with people heading to work. At one point a man sits next to him and noticed what he's watching and looks visibly disturbed. Instead of moving and taking a different seat, the man decides to be nosy and ask the man a question. Here's how the brief discussion went:

Nosy Man taps Movie Man on the shoulder. Annoyed, Movie Man takes his headphones off and looks at Nosy Man.

Nosy Man: Excuse me sir. Why are you watching that movie on the train.

Without missing a beat, Movie man shrugs his shoulders and says "Cause I can" puts his headphones back on his head and goes back to watching his movie.

Well I guess he told him. ;)

FH

Claudius and Hamlet Take the L to Brooklyn

As I'm riding the "L" train this past Tuesday night to meet Justin and Myron at the Brooklyn Public House on DeKalb Avenue, I seemed to have walked into an impromptu performance. Why do I say that? Where it started with one man giving a monologue (or just talking out loud to himself) and looking rather intense and somewhat nuts while dropping to his knees supplicating to an unseen figure. Then a second man joins him and my suspicions of a performance were confirmed. At quick listen I thought it may have been one of William Shakespeare's works they were enacting, in particular it sounded like Hamlet. After they were done, they explained to the riders that it was in fact Hamlet Act 3 Scene 3. I give the Brooklyn trains credit, all we get in the Bronx are the dancers, the beggars and people talking to themselves. The Bronx train thespians, artists and savants needs to step up it's game.

FH

The Rat and the Sleeper on the Subway

Rat on the train video

I posted a video I found on YouTube the other day called Rat Riding NYC Subway Wakes Up Sleeping Homeless Man! Rat wakes up Homeless man. You can watch the video below:



As funny as it is to many of us New Yorkers, the comments that follow the video are even funnier. Now I am not targeting those comments that debate the authenticity of the video. I want to talk about some of the other comments. What I don't find amusing is how many people blame the MTA for this. Now for those of you that have read my blog before know that I am very critical of the MTA along many lines but I can't blame them entirely for the rat population in the subway system. The main ones who are to blame are those riders who treat the subway, it's platforms and the tunnels as their private garbage disposals. Yes folks, we in general and the pigs that litter in specific are the ones who should be blamed for the rats.

Honestly, when someone drops their half eaten food under their seat, on the platform and in the tunnel where do you think it goes. Maybe the refuse under the seats of the train car will eventually be cleaned by an MTA employee but in the other areas the rats take care of it. Imagine how dirtier the subway would be without the rats cleaning up our mess by eating what we carelessly discard. Now imagine this "unique" idea: How about if we all took our garbage with us when we left the trains and platforms and discarded said garbage in the provided garbage receptacles provided by the MTA. Don't you think that there would be less of a rat population if they had less to eat? I do. 

I don't blame the rats for doing what they do naturally which is survive. I blame the humans for doing what they naturally do which is ruin anything and anywhere they go to by being the filthy locusts that humans are.

FH

For Further Reading:
- Click Here to access Train Pigs, a blogpage devoted to Exposing Subway Eaters, One Pig at a Time

The Sleeper and the Yeller on the 6

On my way home from a long night this past Sunday morning, a  dude gets on the train and after a minute of nodding off he decides to lay down and sleep. The train pulls into 125th street and this couple boards the train and the man yells out "Call the Cops" waking the dozing man.

The sleeper gets up and asks the yeller what his problem is. To which the yeller says he has no problem. Sleeper says "Why you got to wake me up by yelling" It seems like the issue is squashed as sleeper lays back down. 

A few minutes later, sleeper sits up and starts to "sing" loudly to a raggae song that seems to be playing through his headphones. At random points sleeper looks at yeller and asks him if he has a problem. Yeller continues to answer that he doesn't. Sleeper sings a lyric that tells about someone who disrespects him and pays the price. Most times I'd say that it is only shit being spoken but I have to admit that Sleeper seem to be a real tough customer. A real scrapper. Sleeper bow starts to pace within the train car like a caged animal causing everyone on the car to look at each other cautiously but quickly. 

The train pulls in at Longwood Avenue and Yeller and his lady get up and Sleeper approaches them. I swear a collective psychic "Here it comes" is uttered by the passengers on the train, including myself. But here is the climax to the story. Sleeper tells Yeller to be careful on who he disrespects on a train. Yeller responds that he meant no disrespect towards Sleeper. Both guys shook hands and Sleeper sat back down to catch some more zzzz's. 

I know, not the ending you would expect at 5am on the Bronx bund 6-train. Hey, I have to admit, I'm proud of Sleeper. He took the high road when I thought that he would take the low road. Guess you really can't judge a book by it's cover. 

FH

Sisco's Snow Adventure December 2010

For all of you out there in the NYC tri-state area who were hoping for a white Christmas, you're wish almost came true. The cold white stuff came en-masse the day after and it is here to stay for a while. 

Starting during the morning of the 26th and mercifully coming to an end sometime during the early part of the 27th, NYC received over a foot and a half of snow. Guess who was on the move during the festivities. Yup, yours truly, the humble narrator. See, as a bar worker for a bar that NEVER closes, there's really no snow days. Sure, I could have called out but why should I lose out on making money. In my line of work, no work=no pay. So in the middle of the storm I bundled up and went on my merry way. As you can see in the video that follows this paragraph my trip down was a bit intense but somewhat manageable. Heck, I got downtown in such a speedy fashion that I was able to make a detour at Best Buy in Union Square. For the record, the place was busy...and the economy is bad, but I digress. 



Throughout the night we were visited by many poor souls who for one reason or another were thrust outside in the snow and came to our oasis-like doors for some warmth and nourishment of the liquid kind. In and out they came and the snow continued to fall at a steady pace. As the hours ticked on by, Mike and I wondered how bad our respective commutes would be. He was going to the Upper West Side while those of you who have read this blog before know that I live in the Bronx, over a mile from the subway. That little tidbit will loom large later on. As you will see from the next video, getting downstairs to get the train would prove to be hazardous to the most hardiest of souls. Lo and behold, I made it down unscathed and was told by a mysterious oracle that my very moves were being watched. Interesting indeed.



As I mentioned in the last video, my ride on my favorite Philly Iron Horse #6 would indeed be the proverbial quiet before the storm. Having arrived at the Morrison-Soundview Station at 4:57am, I figured that I could catch either the Bx27 or the Bx4 buses. To my surprise, Lady Fate threw me a curveball. There were no buses. AT ALL. To make matters worse, there were no cabs to be seen. So after 25 minutes I gave up hope of relying on automotive transportation and started hoofing the over one and a half miles to my humble abode. Videos #3 and 4 brings my epic journey to a close. Odysseus had nothing on me. A man-eating Cyclops? Bah!!! Amateurish. Try walking the mean streets of the Bronx at 6am with the wind whipping snow and ice from every conceivable direction. That my friends is EPIC!!!!!! LOL.





Anyway, have a laugh at my adventures. I know I can now especially since I'm writing this while on the train heading back down to work after having walked another mile since the buses STILL aren't running and I am anticipating another mile walk home at around 5am. Thanks to the lord for giving me the strong legs and the strength that I use to plow my way through the snow. Until my next adventure folks. Stay tuned

FH