Captain Morgan of the Winnipeg Transit

Love this, from Laura:

One day last summer I was bussing down portage on my way to work. The bus was kind of crowded, and there were only a few seats left at the back of the bus. This guy got on, sat down across from me and started trying to talk to a couple people including myself. We ignored him because he was drunk and fishing for someone to start a fight with. When he realized he wasn't getting anywhere reached into his back back and pulled out a 66 of captains and just started drinking. I got off the bus shortly after and just walked to work from there.

The Bus Fart Olympics

via Kijiji

Spit your Spitz somewherez else

Here's a really gross story from Holly:

I climbed aboard the crowded 137 St. Norbert and managed to find a seat at the very back of the bus. After a few moments, a waft of some sort of nut smell filled my nostrils. Across from me sat a quirky regular, today we'll call him Mr. Seed. Mr. Seed would reach into his lunch bag, toss some sunflower seeds in his mouth, spit the shells into his hand, then flick the saliva-coated shells into a Ziploc bag. On a packed bus. Disgusting.

Mr. Seed changed seats to then sit in an empty seat next to me at the very back, continuing with his snacking. As the bus began emptying out, Awesome Guy sitting on the other side of me was about to get off the bus and he had had enough of Mr. Seed's poor choice of snack. He sarcastically said to Mr. Seed, "That was considerate of you to spit in your hand then touch the poles." I began giggling. Mr. Seed said, "I haven't touched anything." Awesome Guy corrected him and said, "You touched that pole AND that pole." I burst out laughing at this point. Mr. Seed half-heartedly said, "Sorry," and halted his snacking.

After Awesome Guy left the bus and my laughing subsided, Mr. Seed turned to me for solace (WHY?!?!) and said, "I'd hate to know what other germs are all over this bus." I said to him, "I feel the same way as that guy. That (the seed eating and spitting on a bus) is pretty disgusting." I think Mr. Seed quietly said, "I'm on a diet," or something like that. I'm not entirely sure as I was listening to my iPod and his attempt to justify spitting in his hand wasn't worth turning down my music. He then went on to say about kids with snot on bars, blah blah blah. I clearly was not listening so he trailed off and stopped talking.

People, having a snack that requires you to put saliva on your hand is NOT a snack to have on a bus, diet or not! You can get shelled seeds.

Halloween Bus

Here's a cute story from Holly about a Halloween themed transit bus:

I seemed to be one of the few adults in costume for Halloween. Imagine my surprise after work when I got on board the 137 St. Norbert to find the awesome bus driver not only dressed up, but had decorated the bus with spooky decor and had treats for the kids!

She squealed, "Oh my god! Another person dressed up!" The driver and I were the only ones in costume. She asked if she could get a picture which was great because I also brought a camera. I told her that I didn't see too many adults dressed up this year so I thought I had the wrong date. She told me that she made special arrangements with Transit so she could have the same bus the whole day: ("I don't want to decorate 2 buses." *lol*). There were a few other drivers, maybe 3 others, who had also dressed up, one was Smurfette, so I hope people got pics. We chatted a bit more and I said I had wished more people dressed up or decorated and she said that it's important; that people need something positive like that.

As I was getting off the bus, she said, "See ya later, roadkill!" while I wished her a Happy Halloween in my ghoulish voice. Coolest bus driver ever!

Halloween Chronic

Daniel tells the spooky tale of the halloween chronic:

I was heading home from garden city on Halloween, about 2 stops in a group of people got on the bus and came and sat near me in the back of the bus.

All fine and dandy eventually they started talking about pot and smoking and stuff eventually one of them pulled out a cigarette and another pulled out a pipe and they started smoking some pot on the bus!

while this was happening they slowly got louder and louder the bus driver kept looking back to see what was going on never being able to see anything.

the guy sitting next to me eventually asked me if I wanted to take a hoot. I ignored him but he kept rambling on about how good his pot was.

I got off a few stops later and the bus driver asked if they were smoking in the back in the back I sent him a nod and then jumped off.

during my ride he kicked a different group of 3 passengers looked to be about 17-18 years old off for smoking by the back doors.

All in all a funny Halloween.

And here's a related video of some guy smoking his "medicine" on the Winnipeg Transit:

Backus Packus Breakus Windows

Continuing with the recent backpack themed stories, here's one from Erik:

I was riding a half empty 11 down Portage Avenue several years ago. It was summer. It was hot and the bus had no air conditioning.

There was an annoying fly flying around the bus, landing on sticky, sweaty people causing them to pause from fanning themselves to brush the fly away.

There was one woman sitting up at the front in the sideways seats who was more skittish with the fly. She swatted furiously at it whenever it got near. Eventually it landed on the window next to her so she swung the large backpack that she was holding at it, trying to squish it on the window. She missed.

Her backpack must have contained something big and heavy because when it hit the window it made an incredible bang. It cracked the window in several places. The bus driver hit the brakes, leaned back and asked, "What the hell was that? I thought someone threw a brick at us!"

The woman hugged her backpack closer and got off the bus at the next stop with her head down. The fly continued to buzz around the bus landing on the sweaty, sticky people and the broken window.

Backus Packus Breakus Bones

This story seems to be in a continuing series of stories about people paranoid of backpacks. Here's an anonymous story about one such event:

This is probably the most boring story ever. I get on the 11 to go home from class last week and I had one of those shoulder bags where the flap occasionally flips open. The bus was packed because it was just after 5, so I stand in the very corner near the flip up wheel chair seats.

Beside me, there's a woman who appears to be 80-85 talking to a man about the same age about how "mothers with strollers get respect on the bus but old folks with walkers and canes don't." (She happened to have neither.)

So the bus stops and slap of my bag swings forward and his this woman's knee. She goes "That girl's bag must way 20 pounds and hit my fractured knee!" Everyone watching knew it didn't so I just ignored her.

The second time, the bus stops and the flap hits her leg again so I go to hold it closed. She goes "Excuse me, I already have a fractured rib, I don't need a fractured knee!"

Well, I had to get off at that point because everyone was staring at me and I was embarrassed as fuck.

Backus Packus Smackus

Heather seems to have the same affliction as myself: being a weirdo magnet.

This incident actually resulted in me calling 311 to demand security guards placed on certain routes.
Addicts on the bus seem to plague me. Me and my daughter were heading home on the 47, I was sitting in the seat next to the stairs. This girl and her friend (I think it was her friend) sat in the seats next to me. This girl who sat closest to me must have been tripping out on drugs: she was shaking, constantly rummaging through her back pack, frantic about finding something. I couldn't help but glance, and make sure she wasn't going to wig out on me. I was just looking around out the windows. Apparently, to addicts, you can't even look slightly in their direction. "STOP STARING AT ME" she yelled at me. I didn't even know what to do. This girl was like a wild animal. I was afraid of making any sudden movements. She was so paranoid. She flinched and raised her hand everytime someone whisked past her or made a loud sound: like a laugh. The part that really scared me was when she got off the bus: she stood up and slammed her back pack into me and acted as if she didn't do anything or she didn't care. The scarier part was that there could have been needles in her back pack that may have poked me

"There's a baby in there!"

Heather writes:

 I am probably one of the few who will openly say that I encourage babies stay in strollers on the bus. It's the safest place for a baby since it is a moving vehicle that stops (often abruptly) frequently while passengers are jerked around unrestrained.

Anyways, me and my 10-year-old daughter got on the 19, after her doctors appointment. We were having a pleasant day, despite the bus being packed. There was a stroller to our right and people standing, squished to our left and front. Of course, more people were let on and they were pushing me into the stroller. I was trying to be respectful and mind the child. The mother, who seemed to be either an addict of some sort or a recovering addict, snapped loudly "THERE'S A BABY IN THERE." I turned and saw that, indeed, she was screaming at me. I don't know what her issue was with me. I have never seen her before.

But shortly later, when the bus emptied of passengers enough for us to sit down, another young mom holding a toddler came on and the snipe-y mom was talking to this teen mom all fine and dandy.

I got off the bus relieved I didn't have to risk another run in with that crazy mom. Or so I thought. My and my daughter made it across Portage waiting to cross Vaughan. I hear "MOVE IT, FUCK". I looked behind me and the nasty mom was walking up to The Bay doors, well away enough from us that we could not possible be in her way. She was giving us the most awful look. It put stain on our lovely day.

Ya Broke Whore

Here's a great story from Monica about an altercation between three random people on the bus yesterday morning:

It’s Tuesday, 10:30am. I am on the 18 heading downtown.

I’m sitting in the back left corner and “Shelly” is in the back right. Shelly is probably in her early 40s, casually put together but unpolished, maybe had a slightly rough life. She has been on her phone and was talking slightly louder than she should have. She gets off saying even louder, “Disperse, disperse!” Kinda odd, but nothing too crazy for the 18.

Then a bunch of people get on at River and Osborne.

“Brenda”, a seemingly lower class late 30-something makes her way to the back and sits in the middle of the long back seat and “Doug”, a late 20s middle class wannabe gangsta, sits on the back sideways bench in front of me on the left side.

Doug is wearing shiny white sneakers, baggy jeans, over the ear headphones and a shirt with the likeness of Marilyn Monroe wearing a kerchief over her face, clad in a bikini and covered in gang tattoos.



As soon as Brenda sees this shirt she says with contempt, “Is that what happens 50 years later, you gotta be sold like a slut?” Doug chuckles.

Wait 15 seconds…she starts in again. "Fuck man, celebrities get no respect for all the shit they did and now this. Bing treated like sluts." Something, something "$10 blow jobs." And with this sentence she looks at Shelly trying to get a “comrade” to agree with her.

Shelly, obviously not impressed says, "What the fuck are you talking about. I don’t know about $10 blow jobs! Is that the going rate for blow jobs?"

Brenda, a little taken aback because she probably thought Shelly would agree with her replies "I don’t know, I’m just saying that they treat women like shit and it only costs them $10."

Shelly – "Why you fucking talking to me about $10 blow jobs. I don’t know how much whores charge for blow jobs. Is that how much you charge? Are you a fucking broke whore, ya broke whore?"

Brenda – "Fuck you I don’t know what blow jobs cost..."

Shelly – "Well you brought it up. Broke whore! Broke whore!"

We are now on Graham. Brenda gets up to leave, Doug, all riled up and wanting to join in to the trouble he caused says something like, "stop bitching about everything." Brenda retorts, giving him some body language, "you know what a bitch is. A fucking bitch is..." Well, in all honesty I don’t know what she said because all I could hear was Shelly yelling at the top her lungs, "Broke whore! Broke whore! Broke whore!" until Brenda was off the bus. Actually she kept yelling it out the window until we pulled away from the bus stop.

Doug and I look at each other and I say, "I don’t think you should wear that shirt again."

What Makes You Better Than Me???

I was minding my own business, waiting for my bus to arrive, when I noticed this drunk woman in a dirty sweatsuit nearly fall into the bus shack. Upon her grand entrance, she zeroes in on this rocker-looking dude and his girlfriend and randomly starts screaming at him. People started emptying out of the bus shack very quickly as she made her way over to him. Then the drunk woman starts pushing and throwing punches at this guy and he dishes it right back. She flies against the glass and he quickly reaches for the door to get the hell out, but she pushes it against him from the other side, so he then proceeds to smash her with the door until she is stunned.

The guy and girl leave the bus shack and everyone else is keeping a safe distance. The drunk woman emerges and they exchange a few punches and swears until finally he pushes her and she lands on the ground. Then she just begins to taunt him, continuously yelling "WHAT MAKES YOU BETTER THAN ME?" over and over again. They start waking away, telling her to leave them alone and she follows down the block, yelling this over and over again.

"WHAT MAKES YOU BETTER THAN ME?"

"WHAT MAKES YOU BETTER THAN ME?"

Then she just stood on the street corner and screamed this into the sky.

Dr. Dave's Tips for Riding the Bus

Here is Dr. Dave's list of things to keep you entertained while riding the bus:

1) Study ad panels and see if any good ones.

2) Look on floor and see if anyone lost any money - scoop up that spare quarter.

3) Get up and offer your seat to that 89 year old woman with a cane standing beside you, ya jerk.

4) Pretend you can’t hear when the guy behind you is saying, "FUCK…FUCK….FUCK…"

5) Stare at the book or cell phone messages from the person sitting across from you and try to decipher their importance. Stare at the message on your cell phone and try to decipher its importance.

6) Watch how every third person gets stuck trying to leave by the rear door (using the “supposedly easy to use” Yellow Strip Rear Door Exit. "BACK DOOR…PLEASE!!" The person who invented the “Yellow Strip Rear Door Exit” device should be forced to live in a house where EVERY SINGLE DOOR has the Yellow Two Strip Door Exit – except the bathroom door – which has THREE yellow strip door exits.

7) Scratch your head and wonder who wrote the Busology cartoon panels since the people they are often aimed at probably don’t read them and would never follow their instructions anyway. Invent new ones….Instead of Backus Packus Smackus….how about “Smellus… Badus…Get offus... Bus-us” Or “U..R.. CRAZEE…DON’T…SIT..NEAR..ME”

8) Take the gum off your shoe

9) Pretend you are crazy and stand up and start yelling and witness the response.

10) Study the clothing of fellow busees and realize that nobody in Winnipeg really has any fashion sense.

Spiders! On the Bus!

Here's a story from Kenton:

A few months ago, I found myself sitting behind Little Miss Muffet on a Winnipeg Transit bus.

I knew it was her, because she was wearing a sleeveless summer shirt, sensible shoes, and a big, black spider on the back of her neck.

No kidding. 

I looked a bit closer to make sure it wasn't a tattoo - it wasn't - and I weighed my options. Should I: 

• Brush it off;
• Blow on it;
• Squish it with my hand;
• Hit it with something;
• Tell her;
• Wait and see;
• Do absolutely nothing?

Having touched strangers' necks in the past and regretted it, I settled on just telling her, which seemed like a decent middle-ground thing to do. 

"Excuse me, young lass," I said, "but there appears to be a spider on your neck."

She sprung into the middle of the aisle, jumped up and down, screamed "Jesus Christ!" and flung the poor bastard across the bus. He never knew what hit him.

She dropped back onto her tuffet and hyperventilated.

I got off the bus, and as it pulled away, I whispered, "And she didn't even get a chance to thank me."

Caught on Tape Madness

I just took a quick look on youtube to see if anyone had uploaded any interesting videos related to our favourite transit system, and lo and behold! I haven't checked in a while, so it was quite surprising to find these. Here are 3 WTF Winnipeg Transit moments, caught on tape.

Here is some guy getting randomly beat up by a guy who looks like he just wandered out of a cave:


Not sure what the story is here, but here's a video of a guy getting arrested on the bus:


And finally, here's some awkward video of a girl serenading the 11 Portage passengers in song:

The Female "Frank Booth"

After reading this story from Ashley, I immediately thought of Frank Booth from the film Blue Velvet. But it's about a girl. A teenage girl. Holy hell. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, please see the video embedded after the story:

And just when I think I’ve seen it all.

We’ve all seen the same people on the bus. The rowdy kids sticking their arms out the windows, the ones with the strollers forcing elderly people out of their seats so they can squeeze in, the ones who roll hand-made cigarettes, the drunks who try and sneak a sip of Lucky when they think no one is looking. But has anyone ever seen someone doing drugs? I have, and she’s not pretty.

Let me just describe the situation. It’s about 3 o’clock in the afternoon and the 18 Jefferson is beyond full. I’m pretty sure the bus driver is turning people away because the bus was as packed as a mosh pit at a rock concert. I am in front of the back door, pressed up against people I don’t know and facing others I’d wished I wasn’t facing.

Then, this girl gets on. And this girl was crazy.

First, I hear her, from where I am, telling the driver “my friend has my transfer. She’s at the back of the bus.” Of course he lets her on - her friend has her transfer.

Then, she starts yelling at other passengers, “excuse me!” Now, I say yelling, because I shouldn’t be able to hear her from where I am. Then she tells her friend, “Hold onto me. I’m saying excuse me. If they don’t move, they’re rude.” No, they’re not rude, there just isn’t any room for people to move to. So, naturally, she starts pushing her way to where I am. She squeezes in with her friend in front of the back door and is now about an arms length away from me.

“I just bought so many pills! Yeah, look!” *Opens her purse and shakes around multiple pill bottles*

Uh. ‘Kay.

After screaming “whore” at a girl who got off the bus, the girl reaches into her purse and pulls out a small piece of paper and I now smell marijuana. I turn and look at her and as I turn back, I hear her tell her friends, “hold me up” and “cover me.” I can see her moving around some powder on what looked like a gum wrapper. Then she says, “It’s like people have never seen drugs before.” No, I’m sure they have, just not in the hands of a 16-year-old while riding public Transit during rush hour. But, that’s just a guess.

I’ll state here that I’ve never done drugs and know little, to nothing, about them.

I move back up onto the first stair and pretend to text on my phone when she and her two friends sit down in the three seats facing the back door but there were only two open seats so one girl sat on another girls lap. Little Miss Junkie then asked the elderly man beside her to move over. To where, the floor? He wasn’t taking up any more room than he was allowed. He looked at her and looked away without moving an inch. She turns back to her friends, “I asked him to move and he just looked at me.” Uh, DUH.

She starts pointing at someone and at first I think it’s me, and saying “What the f**k are you looking at? Don’t f**king look at me. Next time you look at me I’ll kick you a*s.” Then, thankfully, I figure out she isn’t talking about me and I make my way to the first open seat. I sit down and continue to look out the window and stare around the bus. But when I glance down at her for a second, I see her snorting whatever was in the gum wrapper and then stare blankly ahead.

She just snorted coke, on the bus, during rush hour.

Why do I assume it was coke? Because there was a nice white line of a chalky-looking substance smeared across her cheek, and I doubt she was snorting Rockets.

Transit Chivalry

Here's a positive story from JG about a nice old-school gentleman on the bus, when does this happen?

Many years ago in the spring, riding the 16 to Southdale I stepped onto a full bus. The only available seat was covered in mud from someone's shoes. The teenaged boy sitting on the other half of the seat was a true gentleman. He looked at me & then covered the seat with his duo-tang so that I could sit without getting mud everywhere.

The Booger Burglar

Here's a pretty disgusting story from Nicole:

About 2 years ago, I got on the 66 Grant to head to work during the busy Christmas season. I was so happy to find an empty seat beside a normal looking middle aged woman. The seat was a gift despite the bus being packed with people. I sat down relieved with my good luck and wondered why no one else took the opportunity to sit down. And then, the truth became disgustingly apparent. From the corner of my eye, I see my seat buddy pick her nose and proceed to "play" with the gigantic piece of yellow snot ball. It was probably the biggest piece of snot that I ever saw (and I work in health-care). After stretching it and rolling it, I am absolutely horrified when the woman proceeds to eat the mass of mucous like a delicious piece of candy. At this point, I am almost dry heaving. I quickly abandon the seat and stand for the remainder of my bus ride. A few stops later, a man got on the packed bus and sat down in the same seat, unaware of the horror that unfolded moments before. True to form, the woman again went in for a second helping of snot. The man looked as though he was trying to ignore it while I was dry heaving at the back of the bus.

Back Door = Busdriver Urinal?

Here's a weird story from Randy, I want to believe this is real, but either way it's a great story!:

My Father now deceased retired from Winnipeg Transit in the 80s but he left us with some hilarious stories. Here's one of them. He said on some routes there were no bathroom facilities for the drivers and at the end of the route they would open the back door slightly and relieve themselves from the steps when there were no passengers on the bus of course. As the story goes my Dad peed out the back door one evening and went back to the driver's seat. After he was settled a well dressed lady got on the bus rubbing her wet left shoulder and told my Dad he should check his bus because liquid was leaking from the side by the back door and she got sprayed when she walked by. Of course my Dad knew what had happened but he got off the bus to check the situation and came back to tell the lady he could not see anything wrong. He then proceeded to take the lady to her destination probably smiling all the way.

The Eye Cleaner

Here's a nice mental picture for you from Chichi:

No word of a lie, while I was on a Winnipeg transit bus today, I witnessed a man not just once, but twice clean out his eyes with his finger tips and then LICK ALL OF HIS FINGER TIPS!! So disgusting!

Negative Energy

Here's another odd bus story from Weirdos of Winnipeg:

An older man and a younger woman are sitting side-by-side on the bus. He's happily reading his Uptown magazine. They sit silently for several blocks. Then, out of nowhere:

She: You need to get your negative energy away from me.

He: Huh?

She: I saw the way you were looking at me at the bus stop. What right do you have to then come and sit beside me?

He: *confused*

She: And now you're giving me the same look. Your negative energy is ruining my day. You need to find a different place to sit.

He: [looks around. There is clearly no other place to sit] I'm ... just reading my paper.

She: And now you're looking at me like I'm crazy! Take your negative energy away from me. [rants for quite awhile about his negative energy]

He: Oh, just shut up already!

She: What right do you have to tell a stranger to shut up? You need to find a different place to sit. Next time there's a seat you need to find a different place to sit.

He: [reaches past her and dings the bell. Angrily.]