My history of bus riding goes back only as far as the "Legendary" RTS bus. And I mean "Legend" literally. This is the GMC RTS Legend. Ours had a collapsible bike rack on the front which was used about 1/10th of 1 percent of the time. Our old bus driver hated it...you can't tailgate someone NEARLY as effectively with the bike rack extended. Oh, there will be more on our old bus driver later, trust me!

This is (was, really) the classic workhorse commuter bus in use all over the nation. This picture, however, was NOT taken in California. C'mon! It never rains in California...duh! This slow, heavy, lumbering bus got me to work every day for years and years. It has two doors, in front and almost all the way in the rear. Which reminds me (here comes a story...get used to this part)...

Way back when, years ago, we had one of these busses that had a problem closing the back door. In fact, the only way to get the back door closed was to shut down the bus! Something about the pneumatic system that operated the door. Anyway, this little problem presented itself one day going down the freeway at top speed (it was a light traffic day on the way home). Well, the back door managed to work its way open just a "crack", but that was enough for the safety system to engage. Did I mention that when any of the doors open the safety system automatically engages the parking brake? No? Well it does. So going something like 60 down the freeway the bus comes to a grinding halt...in the middle lane. Trucks are FLYING by...cars are honking. During this "event" either no one thought to turn off the bus in the chaos, or that simply didn't work. I think it was the woman in Seat 2D that thought of popping out the fuse that engaged the "safety system" so we wouldn't get rear-ended by a Semi. (I'll refer to different riders by their seat number...to protect the innocent and all that). Seat 2D has been riding longer than ANYone on the bus...she knows the day she started, and she knows all about the bus! So imagine everyone sitting calmly in their seats (gripping the arm rest with white knuckles, with their head pressed firmly to the back of the seat, anticipating the imminent impact) when the bus lurches forward. Fortunately it lurched because the parking brake was disengaged. We sloooowly (remember "lumbering"?) got back up to speed and went on as if nothing had happened. NOT! I don't think anyone splept the rest of the way home...highly unusual. Good blog-fodder that day, even though no one knew what a "blog" was, not even hi-tech me.

Well, we all survived. They never fixed the problem permanently. We just told any new bus drivers not to ever open the back door, for any reason. So I guess the problem really WAS solved permanently.

Gotta love riding the bus.