a rare day in new york

i had one of those rare days yesterday when i was in new york... and not so rare that i was standing around waiting for an assignment wondering how did the bus bays and the dispatchers desk, these bastions of dimly lit concrete alleyways that used to be incredibly hot in the summer become so cold now? it was a slow day. i was told when i got in that i would probably stand around and be bored for about three hours before getting the pleasure of being cushioned home, that is, driven home on another drivers route. being cushioned always make feel like i am riding a school bus again despite the fact that i drive one of these for a living now and the fact that if the other driver wanted to get up and hand me the wheel i would have no problem. that was a story that i heard once from a driver. driver said to the guy cushioning, hey, i have to go to the restroom, take the wheel and unbuckled his seatbelt and started to get up at which point the other driver took over, cursing his name. i was cushioned on sunday and had a different version happen to me. halfway to new york in the dismal section of the thruway south of harriman when even the signs taunt your boredom, fatigue, etc... "15 more miles to new jersey!", i had to get up to relieve myself. the last seat in the back next to the restroom was inhabited by a sleepy man laying beneath a new york times. as i opened the door he woke up, probably only just realising where he was, the bus is till moving and what?! there's the driver walking by me opening the restroom door... what?!? i saw the look of oh my god, this thing doesn't have autopilot on his face as i shut the door.
when you get four or five drivers together with hours to kill and a new york city dispatcher who has seen the port at its height of squalor when you couldn't even leave a bus door with a padlock on it for ten minutes without it getting broken into and all of your belongings stolen, you get to hear alot of stories about thieves, catching them, unruly passengers, practical jokes, the cops, drunks, break downs and ways to fix them. i had this honour yesterday.
people are still asking me how to find buses to philadelphia and when the bus to tampa leaves, but i've picked up a few things. i made a reasonably convincing answer to where to get a cab yesterday... but last week i was in new paltz when a delivery driver came up to me with a delivery order sheet and asked me how to get to a certain address. i looked at it with a certain amount of savoir-faire for someone who had lived in new paltz for a few years. i had no idea where it was. i couldn't give him the answer. what is the world coming to?