Riding the #105 up the hill in Renton, I was seated behind a young Asian man, who was looking out the window nervously. He said nothing, but his body language said he was lost, or worried that he was on the wrong bus.
It’s a look you see often, and I sure wore it for my first few weeks after moving back to Seattle a few years ago. The bus system is complicated, so when someone’s lost or confused, it’s nice to offer help.
“Where are you headed?” I asked over his shoulder, hoping I sounded nice not nosy.
“Enricks,” he said to me, and I probably frowned. Then he said a full sentence in Japanese. Oh, he’s a foreigner. Seeing the confusion on my face, he said, “Enricks” again, and with that, the language barrier evaporated and I understood.
“Two more stops,” I said, holding index and middle fingers in a peace sign. He understood well enough to look relieved, and when the McDonald’s came into sight I rang the bus’s bell for him. “This’ll be your stop,” I said.
The bus rolled past the fast-food and stopped across the street, at Greenwood Cemetery, where Jimi Hendrix (“Enricks”) is buried. You can’t see the huge Hendrix memorial from the street, so I pointed in the general direction, and said, “You won’t miss it. It’s a bit gaudy.”
“Gody,” he said to me. “Hai, a god.” I know no Japanese, but I saw Shogun, so I know ‘hai’ means ‘yes’. Then he added, “Arigatou gozaimasu,” and translated it himself, “Thank you,” as he stepped off the bus.
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On days when there’s a home game for the baseball team, stadium staff often rides the bus. It’s cheaper and easier than driving and parking, and the #99 goes right by the ball park.
Often, I see two stadium staffers in uniform, an old white guy and an old black guy, but they usually ride separately. On this particular day they were both waiting at the Burien Transit Center. They said ‘hi’ to each other, like co-workers not friends, but on the bus they sat in sideways seats opposite each other for their commute. After a few sentences they said nothing more for their entire ride.
I said nothing either, but shook my head, because they were both carrying transparent plastic backpacks full of their personal stuff. One of them had a sci-fi novel and a pack of cigarettes in his backpack. The other had a small pink umbrella, a water bottle, two prescription medicines, and a change of socks.
For security reasons, fans at games aren’t allowed inside the stadium with a backpack, unless it’s transparent. Guess it’s required for employees, too.
For security reasons… so cops know you’re not a terrorist… would you wear clothes with transparent pockets? Would you pack transparent luggage for a trip? Would you drive a car with a transparent trunk and glove compartment?
I wouldn’t. There’s not a dildo or Barbie doll or anything illegal or embarrassing in my backpack, but privacy matters, especially mine. I’ll never go transparent.
See-through backpacks are the rule, though. It’s another slice of the rot eating America alive, and it’s about half the reason I’ve attended my last Major League Baseball game.
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On an extra social day a while back, I had two genuine conversations in my bus travels. First, an obviously homeless guy at the bus station was listening to a baseball game on his transistor radio, so I asked him about the radio. It looked like an antique, exactly like the Japanese-made transistor radio I had in the 1970s. He said he’d had it since the 1970s, and, “Man, I’ve listened to the Mariners lose a thousand games on this thing.”
We agreed we’d both be dead before the Mariners win a pennant, and talked about Trump and the weather and how weird it is being old, and I noticed but didn’t mention that he reeked of urine. Then his bus came, so he said goodbye and walked to catch the RapidRide H.
As he walked away, I could see from the two-tone color of his pants that he’d massively wet himself, and he’d been soaking in it, just like Madge and the dishwashing liquid.
Hours later, ready to return from a late afternoon with Mom, I waited at a bus stop in the Highlands, and an old black woman approached, carrying two bags of groceries. She was sweaty and it was hot, so I gallantly offered her my seat at the bus shelter.
She said thanks and sat, and told me all about what she’d bought at the grocery, and what she was planning to cook, and who’d be coming over for dinner, and how diabetes was eating her feet. She wasn’t all-talk, though, she could listen too, and asked where I was from, and a few other questions, all of which I answered.
It was a nice conversation, but guess what? That lady also stank of urine. Which seemed unlikely, because she was clearly a middle-class lady out in the ‘burbs, so I wondered whether maybe the pee-stink was me?
It hasn’t happened often, but it has happened. I generally wear the same pants for a week at a time, and sometimes there are penis-drips after peeing, or I’ve peed standing up and the liquid has mysteriously shot all over my pants instead of into the toilet.
Also, factoring in the baseball conversation earlier, plus several hours spent with my mom and sister, I’d reached the limits of my sociability, so it was sweet relief when the bus came, and it was too crowded for me and the nice lady to sit together. She sat up front in a sideways seat, and I went almost all the way to the back.
After sitting down, I discretely ran my fingers over the crotch of my britches, then took a whiff of my hand, and to my relief, nope, I was carrying no particular scent of urine. This time.
This weekend, it’ll be 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, but mourning seems more appropriate than celebration. Going to a parade, a fireworks show, anything to seriously celebrate America in 2026 would be an obscenity.
Of course, patriotism has always been bullshit, but I used to go along with it for a few hours on the 4th, telling myself that for all its faults, America was better than a few short decades ago. More people had more rights, and the stupid wars have been shorter since Vietnam — I could celebrate that, and have.
Can’t do it this year, though. America has become mask-off ugliness, 24/7. I’ll celebrate when we the people can finally stand together in joy at the news of Donald Trump’s death, preferably by accident — I’m hoping he’ll tumble head-over-heels down the boarding stairs for his new Qatar-gifted Air Force One, cracking his skull on a step or handrail.
Until that glorious day, let me recommend this hard-hitting look at political violence in the USA — it’s one of the finest essays I’ve read in mainstream media.
Excerpt: If you are reading this, sweaty with the worry that I am “normalizing” or “justifying” political violence, consider that I am only asking why you find so many forms of political violence so normal, so justifiable, so adequately met with well, it’s a shame, of course, while the specter of old radicals looms like a nightmare. Sometimes you must stand athwart history, yelling Are you fucking serious? Is it only that you get used to that stench of American life after a while? Is it worth it?
If this isn’t promptly overturned, then anyone opposing Trump and fascism can be judged a terrorist.
Excerpt: Since the charges in the case, the government has brought a number of similar prosecutions against activists. Earlier this month, prosecutors filed criminal conspiracy charges against 15 activists in Minneapolis who allegedly interfered with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in performing their duties. A federal jury in Spokane, Washington, found three protesters guilty of conspiracy for participating in a 2025 protest at an ICE facility. A similar case in Chicago against protesters fell apart after it was revealed there was misconduct before grand jurors.
Excerpt: When Mr. Landor reported for a five-month sentence for drug possession in Louisiana, he had not cut his hair for almost two decades, in keeping with his faith. His dreadlocks fell nearly to his knees.
Four months into his term, in 2020, he was transferred to a new prison. He carried with him a copy of a 2017 legal opinion that held that inmates must be allowed to keep their dreadlocks under a federal law protecting prisoners’ religious freedom.
When he pulled out a copy of that decision, a guard threw it in the trash, according to court documents he filed in a later lawsuit.
Two guards then handcuffed Mr. Landor to a chair and forcibly shaved him bald.
Me again: Six of nine on the Supreme Court belong on the other side of the courtroom.
Excerpt: They will get an Android tablet, an American flag and copies of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. They will also receive a packet of literature that provides a sanitized, Trump-approved view of American and South African history, one that criticizes racial equity and civil rights laws and promotes claims of discrimination against white people.
Dude sent ICE Director an email comparing him to a Nazi, so DHS agents stalked him, and gave his wife a letter warning of criminal prosecution. Which sounds sorta like something Nazis would do.
Welp, that’s the end of independent, non-political government agencies. If America had an opposition party (we don’t), and if we’re allowed free elections and a sane President at some future date, perhaps the new President will fire six Supreme Court justices. Doing so would be no more unConstitutional than today’s rulings.
Excerpt: Three years ago this month, the Justice Department indicted Donald Trump under the Espionage Act for concealing and refusing to return classified documents after his departure from the White House. Mr. Trump hasn’t had to face trial, and he hasn’t had to fully account to the public for his actions, either.
The Justice Department abandoned the case against Mr. Trump after he won the 2024 election, citing a longstanding departmental policy against prosecuting sitting presidents. Since Mr. Trump returned to the White House, the Justice Department has worked hand in glove with his current lawyers to suppress the department’s report about its investigation of his actions. Judge Aileen Cannon of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, a Trump appointee who presided over Mr. Trump’s case, has issued an order prohibiting the Justice Department from disseminating the report — and effectively prohibiting Jack Smith, the special counsel who wrote it, from speaking about it publicly or even testifying about it to Congress.
This victim of the Secret Police had a pending Green Carp application, and special permission from the government to travel to Egypt for his father’s funeral. ICE kidnapped him, held him in an American gulag, and kept him from medical care for his kidney disease.
Excerpt: That night, the twins slept at their grandparents’ house. The authorities required them to sit alone for the interviews with the CPS workers, as is common during such investigations.
Me again: Being forced to “sit alone” with CPS staffers is pretty rough for a kid, and if CPS “requires” it without first requiring some damned evidence, that’s a form of child abuse.
This is surreal — The View is inane chitchat that barely qualifies as journalism, but Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar are too edgy for Trump & the Republicans.
Roundup causes cancer. Not sure when or whether that fact that was scientifically quantified, but there were reports of Roundup sickening people as early as the 1990s.
Excerpt: Why Delaware? Under our system of government, corporate oversight was left to the states, and in time it became permissible for a company based in one state to register its business in another. Pint-size Delaware, with the incentives it offered, proved to be an especially popular choice. These days, it is the legal domicile for two-thirds of the companies in the Fortune 500. Including limited liability companies, or L.L.C.s, there are more than two million business entities incorporated in Delaware, which is more than double the number of people.
Other than who she was once willing to pork, Ms Scott seems cool and all, and cooler still if she cuts me a check, but the media’s endless adulation for billionaires is almost as evil as the very concept of billionaires. Wealth of that magnitude is invariably stolen, so instead of lauding billionaires who play philanthropist, let’s try a 100% tax on any human’s net worth that exceeds one billion dollars.
Excerpt: With trillions of dollars on the line, it should come as no surprise that tech companies are spending gobs of cash on the upcoming US midterm elections. What is surprising is the scale of electoral financing, as certain newly-founded AI super PACs are now spending more on candidates than the candidates are spending on themselves.
Excerpt: Police officials in Washington Township did not return calls from The Times for this article. Commanders in Franklin Township, which was temporarily taken over by the Hunterdon County prosecutor’s office in the aftermath of the killings, declined to comment.
Pretty sure this is an article I’d like to read, but it’s formatted so you have to scroll forever to keep reading one paragraph at a time, and it freezes my browser after each half-acre of scroll-downs. It’s illustrated, and the pictures are the star, with so few words (at least before the recurring freezes) it feels like I’m reading a comic book for 2nd-graders when I thought I was reading the New York fucking Times. Is this format somehow an improvement over the traditional journalistic method where one paragraph precedes the next paragraph, without scrolling so much my index finger gets blisters?
Special thanks to Linden Arden, Becky Jo, Joey Jo Jo & John the Basketemeritus, Jeff Meyer, Dave S, Name Withheld, and always extra special thanks to my lovely late Stephanie, who gave me 21 years and proved that the world isn’t always shitty.
News always and only from reliable sources, and I decide what’s reliable — no right-wing bullshit, no Substack because fuck Nazis, and no RawStory, Newsweek, or other clickbait sites. Written news is preferred; video links will be rare, and damned near never to videos where the reporter sits, stands, or strolls in front of a camera — that’s show biz, not news.
If you’re blocked from reading anything linked above, please send an email, and I’ll reply with the article’s complete text, via my computer’s fine ad-blockers and paywall-vaulters.
Ride buses enough, you’ll get to know some of the regulars, maybe not by name, but by face and demeanor, especially on the routes nearest your house. For me that’s the #99, and today I’ll introduce you to a few frequent riders…
Fat Superman is a large, bald, presumably mentally challenged man who always wears superhero t-shirts. Couple of weeks ago, he was wearing Spider-Man and riding home from shopping, with a portable cart full of groceries. His cart was an unusual design, kinda cool, and I was only a few seats away, so I said, “Nice cart.”
He grunted something I couldn’t hear, so I said again, a little louder, “I really like your cart.”
He looked at me but didn’t say anything. My feelings were slightly hurt, but everyone says not to talk to strangers, and I’m a strange stranger, so I nodded at him and flashed a smile. Which was pointless, because I always wear a mask on the bus, so he couldn’t see the smile.
Eventually, Fat Superman rang the bell and got off the bus, and I noticed that his cart was missing a wheel, and slightly dented. So when I’d complimented the cart, he must’ve thought I was picking on him. Damn, I feel bad about that.
It’s crazy how often I see that guy on the bus or at the bus station, so I’ll undoubtedly ride with him again in a few days. Will I apologize, try to explain that I genuinely liked his cart, wasn’t trying to be an asshole? Probably not.
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Once or twice weekly, an oldish white lady with a cane rides the bus, and talks a lot, usually about passengers who board without paying.
A black man didn’t pay, and she said: “You didn’t pay. Why don’t you pay?” But she was talking more to herself than him, and if he heard it, he ignored it.
A Hispanic man in paint-splattered overalls didn’t pay, and she said: “You didn’t pay. So many people don’t pay.” No reply.
A white woman with green hair didn’t pay, and she said: “You’re supposed to pay, but you don’t pay.” No reply.
A couple of college-age kids didn’t pay, and she said: “That’s seven people so far who haven’t paid, and yes, I am counting.” No reply.
A black guy in an orange vest didn’t pay, and she said: “You didn’t pay. Maybe I should start not paying.”
This time, a reply: “Maybe you should start shutting up, bitch.”
For the rest of her ride, Oldish White Lady with A Cane said: Not a word.
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Impatient Guy rides alone and talks to himself, always complaining about how slow the bus is. “C’mon, c’mon, stop stopping every two blocks.”
And I’ll admit, I mutter such complaints myself when the bus is running late and I’m in a hurry, but Impatient Guy always seems to be running late or in a hurry.
The guy in the orange vest was correct, of course. “Start shutting up, bitch” is my mantra for bus behavior, so I shut up.
What I was thinking, though, what I’m always thinking when Impatient Guy is being impatient, was, “Dude, the bus stops every two blocks because there are bus stops every two blocks. It’s why they’re called bus stops. When people are waiting at the bus stops, the bus stops. Welcome to public transit.”
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Wheelchair riders board the bus via the ramp, then park their chairs and latch their brakes. The driver comes back and attaches restraints to the wheelchair, so it doesn’t go flying if they have to really slam on the brakes.
Securing wheelchairs is a rule, but the person in the wheelchair can decline. Sometimes they’ll say, “No chains for me,” as they roll past the driver. They’re trusting their brakes, holding a stanchion, and I’ve never yet seen a wheelchair fly.
An athletically built 30-something white man in a wheelchair rides the #99 once in a while, and always he says to the driver, “No chains for me.” He doesn’t ride unchained, though. He carries a grabber with a hook on the end, reaches behind the wheelchair, and lifts and attaches both restraints to his chair. When he rings the bell to get off, he uses the grabber again, to reach back and unhook his chains.
I’ve seen him do this a dozen times. It’s difficult but he does it, and always it’s impressive, but one time something else happened, and damn it, I missed it.
What I saw was, he rang the bell, and the bus pulled over. No Chains For Me reached back and undid his chains, and said something to the driver, but a pretty woman across the street is where my attention was.
A truck stopped in traffic, tragically blocking my view of the woman, so my consciousness came back to the bus, and I noticed that No Chains For Me was now on the sidewalk, waving ‘thanks’ at the driver.
But, wait — the ramp on this bus goes beep-beep-beep when it’s going down and beep-beep-beep again when it’s coming up, and I’d heard no beeps at all. Even distracted by a gorgeous babe, the beeps are piercing, and I’m aware of them. I am absolutely positive there’d been no beeps.
No Chains For Me is in good shape. His chest has definition, his arms have muscles. Is it possible, conceivable, that he’d asked the driver to skip the ramp, same as he always says to skip the chains, and then wheeled himself right off the edge of the bus and — boom — down to the sidewalk below? It’s a drop of perhaps ten inches, maybe a foot. Did he—? What the—? No way, but—?
I was in a sideways seat, closest to the driver, so like an idiot I asked him, “Did you lower the ramp for that guy?”
He said nothing, just looked at me like I’m an idiot. Which, we’ve already established, I am. But maybe he hadn’t lowered the ramp, maybe the guy dive-bombed it, and the driver knows he’d get in trouble for allowing it…
