transporting
03/07/2008
Traffic has been a little bit of a hassle lately. Our downtown route is pretty gridlocked at the times of the day when we need to be downtown.
So today we took the Muni. It’s like a lightrail that goes on streets, though our route is through the tunnels. The entire ride took about 15 minutes, and door to door it took us as long to get downtown by Muni than it does by car, though it was so much more relaxing. No crazy bikers hovering around you which is pretty much the scene on Market Street, no massive jam to get through just to go around the block because you can’t make a left turn, stuff like that. It only cost $1.50 one way.
The only annoying thing is having to put up with those damn Google Transit ads on the outside of the Munis. Dammit, can’t I get by one day without them sneaking in somehow?
Which is pretty much the summary for life according to me. Even when it’s good, you’ll always have to bear with something. And I’ve found that most of that something, is usually someone’s ego.
An old friend pointed me to this yesterday.
The best paraphrase in the list is: If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck – it’s a duck. And I realise, despite our best efforts, we really do have a knack for making things more complicated than they should be.
Call it “concern”, call it “looking out for you”, call it “education”, call it “tradition”, call it “symbolism”, call it “well-intentioned”. It looks like ego, it sounds like ego, it smells of ego – it’s ego. And since I clearly have my own to satisfy, I am having a hard time deciding the trade-off between the seemingly quick-and-easy go-through-the-motions-and-get-it-over-and-done-with, and the more labourious stop-it-in-its-tracks-be-difficult-and-make-a-f**king-stand.
Familiarity breeds contempt.
The internal debate in my head is unnerving and circular – but I’m convinced I’ve a balanced mind.
Stuff like -
Maybe if I try a little Feeling it will smooth things over vs WTF, it’s them f**king feelers that started it.
Just this once vs precedence.
It’s life, everyone’s involved vs it’s my life, now bugger the f**k out.
is surely evidence of that.
Blah blah blah. In the grand scheme of things, it really doesn’t matter. It’s not earth-shattering. So maybe I should just coast life in neutral and go with whatever. Maybe then it’ll make sense.
And how we travelled to this topic from completely innocent findings about public transport, is proudly brought to you by Google. Are you feeling lucky, punk?
