After getting on the bus the other night it's stuck in traffic in front of the gym on Wilshire. The one in Westwood. It has this big glass window so that people can look in and feel jealous of all the hard bodies working up a sweat. Or is it the other way around? Maybe people like to be watched when they're working out. It's the kind of thing you see a lot though so it must work, whatever the reason is.

Anyway, there's this crazy guy sitting in front of me. We're all sitting up close to the driver--in the chairs reserved for the handicapped. The crazy guy is spouting off about how this guy working his lower back is a marine. I join in by mentioning my idea of recruiting a bunch of friends to gather in front of this window to eat cheeseburgers, frys and shakes; twenty people should do it (it's my fantasy...) Crazy guy goes into a laughing fit. He sounds like one of those african animals. A hyena I guess. People are looking at him funny, I guess they were doing that before I got on the bus though. He's laughing so hard that he sprains a muscle in the back of his leg. He starts cussing: "shit! it really hurts! hey mister can you just put your hand right there!"

At the same time the bus driver has stopped to collect the extra 50 cents you need to pony up to ride the bus on the freeway. He's telling crazy guy: "you need to get off the bus". To which crazy guy (still screaming about his pulled muscle) replies: "you can't tell me what to do, this is america I can ride this bus as far as I want".

Crazy guy limps over to the fare box and drops in 50 cents. The bus driver has resumes driving and crazy guy launches into a rant. One of the things he says is: "the only way he can get me off this bus is to stop fast and and then I go crashing through the window. He could do that, he's got the power. That would be ok with me too as long as nobody got hurt."

When he says this I know the bus driver is probably going to call the cops or whatever bus drivers do when they have a maniac on their bus. Panic button... whatever it is. Crazy guy has just done the equivalent of mentioning the b or t words in an airport. On top of all the other crazy stuff he's doing.

The bus pulls onto the 405 southbound. Crazy guy is standing at this point. I guess cause his leg is bothering him. But it just makes him more appear more menacing to the other passengers. Most people are sitting within a seat of him--we're all at the front of the bus. Crazy guy towers over everybody. He's got this can of peachs that's rolling around on the seat next to him. Behind him there's a woman in one of those electric wheelchairs. Shes strapped into the bus to keep it from rolling around. She has that look that animals get when they are trapped.

After getting off the freeway, the bus driver just stopped the bus. We waited about ten or fifteen minutes. Crazy guy was the only one that didn't know we were waiting for the police...