Speed 3

Speed took place on a large transit bus in Los Angeles. Speed 2 took place on a boat somewhere in water with Sandra Bullock. Speed 3 took place on a little transit bus in Siena, Italy. And it happened yesterday. I've been in a couple accidents, and there's a feeling you get in your bones when you see it coming. The hair on discreet parts of your body stands straight up as it attempts to abort ship, and you embrace for impact. That's how I felt the entire bus ride home yesterday, except we made it home without getting in an accident, despite the bus driver's best efforts.

It all started when bus drivers in Milan and Rome decided to stick it to the man yesterday and striked all day. Nobody knows what their demands were because they never specified, and I'm pretty sure they didn't know what their demands were either. Just a holiday at the beginning of October, I guess. Deer hunting day, that's what it was... So Rome's little cousin Siena caught wind of the strike, and some drivers thought they'd get in on the taking it to the streets action by keeping their buses off the streets. But some drivers gave in to corporate greed and what not and decided to stick to their normal routes. Or maybe they just thought they'd help out the city like they do every day and drive their buses? Whatever their rational was, I'm very grateful for the drivers that did come, because that saved me from hitching a ride or walking.

The story then continued into the afternoon as Rachel and I decided to head home after a group of one legged pigeons tried to steel our pizza. Don't trust a one legged pigeon. We saw the bus that goes closest to our house right in front of us, and we considered ourselves lucky to have a bus given there was somewhat of a strike going on. As our bus left the stop, this lady walking by on the side of the road yelled out in disgust at our driver, "I thought there was a strike today!" Apparently she was disappointed that the all-mighty dollar had won over a few hearts. The dude grumbled something back at her, but he obviously wasn't happy. We continued our adventure through the city until this girl and lady, who had been talking obnoxiously loud the entire ride, started yelling out, "Stop! I want to get off now!" Usually you're supposed to push the stop button on the bus, and it goes to the next stop. But this girl took ess into her own hands (that's a disgusting image of a girl holding poop in her hands. sorry...) and started yelling "Stop!" when there wasn't even a stop. The driver, looking confused and a little startled, slowed down real quick for the girl to get off. Then the girl said, "No, not here..." So the driver kept driving. But then literally 30 feet later, the girl yelled out, "Ok, here! I want to get off now." The driver, already upset at his apparent selling out for driving a bus and the old lady on the street giving him grief for it, was angered even further with the girls disrespect for the bus system. "I don't get what you're trying to do! Do you want to get off or stay?!" Then girl, who displayed no remorse for her disruptive behavior, casually answered that she wanted off, thus angering the driver even further. He let her off, but shared a few words with her first that I couldn't understand all that well (I don't know how to swear or insult people in Italian...). But after the girl got off, the incident wasn't finished there. The man decided to take out retribution on her friend that was in the back of the bus and yelled at her a couple times. Then the man decided that he, too, was sticking it the man, and he was on strike. Except his form of strike is the scary kind. Not the kind where you just quit driving your bus, but the kind where you lock everyone that's already in the bus in, and you don't let anyone else on. Then as a passenger, you hope the guy doesn't have a concealed weapons license and decide to completely snap that day.

So the man decided he was no longer at work, but that he was the main villain in his own version of Speed 3, and that the bus could not drop below 15 mph an hour. This usually isn't fast at all, but it is when you're driving through streets that were built 800 years ago with no intention of cars driving on them. They are super narrow and covered with people, and when you have an 8 foot wide bus creeping through them and refusing to stop, you're looking for an accident. But don't get me wrong, the guy didn't keep it at 15 mph, he did his best to get it up as fast as he could through the streets, probably reaching 40 or so on this one longer stretch of road. I was praying that nobody would step in front of him because he wasn't stopping. He also stopped yielding around blind corners, he ran a red light through this skinny little gate, and he refused to pick up the people that were waiting at the stops. At the first stop where I noticed he missed people, I told him that there were people there. But he responded with, "I'm striking today!" I was confused as to why he was still driving his route if he wasn't going to pick up anyone, but I guess old habits die hard... But then I wasn't sure if he was going to drop us off or not. So the lady that he yelled at earlier started asking him what in the aitch he was doing and if he would drop her off at her stop. He refused to answer her after she asked 3 or 4 times. He just kept driving like a madman, refusing to stop or slow down. He asked me where we were going, but he didn't say if he was going there or not. But as he made it close to our stop, I gave him the good old fashioned ring of the bell, and he stopped for us, after he almost ran head on into a semi truck that had veered into our lane. I was happy to know that the bus could, in fact, go slower than 15 mph without setting off a bomb, and that he let us off at our stop.

I had Rachel sneak off a couple shots of him driving the bus, because I knew this was prime time blog material. It's all I've got... So that's him driving up top and me holding on to what I've got.