Angry bus driver!

So I was wedged into the 147 last night, heading up Lake Shore Drive with 539 other Chicagoans. It was a beautiful evening, and I was half an hour from meeting New Running Buddy for our regular Wednesday run and dinner.

We were making good time when we suddenly screeched to a stop with horns a-blaring just south of the Belmont exit, which is habitually backed up sometimes a whole mile after work and on summer weekends. We were one lane over, which means last night’s backup shouldn’t have affected us, but Retarded Cab Driver in front of us apparently decided to stop cold and try to squeeze into the exit lane at the last possible minute.

Angry Bus Driver, who until this moment had just been Quiet, Unremarkable Bus Driver, was not pleased, and he sat on his horn for what felt like a good two minutes. Then he inched up to the point he was practically on the cab.

Then, as Retarded Cab Driver managed to squeeze into the exit lane and we started to squeeze around him, Angry Bus Driver opened his door, which I thought was just to facilitate standard driver-on-driver verbal abuse. But I overestimated Angry Bus Driver’s impulse control. Because as we passed Retarded Cab Driver, Angry Bus Driver threw what looked to be a gallon of water out the bus door and into Retarded Cab Driver’s open window. I have no clue where the water came from—I know if I were driving a lengthy bus shift I wouldn’t keep enough water on hand to necessitate building a Hoover Dam in my pants, and I didn’t see any window washers or clown-in-a-bucket circus acts in the front few rows—but Angry Bus Driver obviously had a lot of water at his disposal. And deadly aim.

Of course, the 539 other people on the bus just shrugged and went back to their reading/iPods/conversations/window gazing/surreptitious farting. Which is probably for the best—road rage is like Mary Cheney; if you acknowledge it and buy its book, it starts to get delusions of relevance. Besides, if you interrupt people’s bus farting, you make the commute more enjoyable. And nobody wants that.

Anyway, soon enough I was home and changed and pounding out seven miles with NRB. We were gonna do only five, but we felt great at the turnaround so we just kept going—and I wore the shoes I’d run last year’s marathon in, so I didn’t have any of that crushing shin and ankle pain that my new shoes have been causing me.

It was my turn to cook this week, and since I’m getting a little more confident in the kitchen I just made up a recipe on the spot: chicken breasts stuffed with a puree of spinach, garlic, feta and mozzarella and covered in olive oil and parmesan and baked with a bunch of cute little tomatoes; three-cheese biscuits (three-cheese motif!); steamed green beans; and nutmeg-sprinkled custard for dessert. Why am I telling you all this? I have no idea. But it was damn good.

And after a long run with a great guy, nothing beats cheese and breasts and custard. And a menu that requires semicolons.

Dude. I totally just said colon.