Greyhound

Yesterday I took the Greyhound for the first time. My friend Nate insists that it is actually two separate words, “Grey” and “Hound”, “grey” to mean slow and dim-witted and “hound” to mean a dopey mutt … I think we’ve hit on an appropriate definition.

Actually it wasn’t bad at all. For $20 you can get from DC to Wilmington (10 points to anyone who knows why this city is of worth), about 111 miles, and 2.5 hours of cellphone yapping and wondering why the driver is incased in a bulletproof all-glass enclosure.

For an additional $25 you can take a taxi ride through downtown Wilmington for approximately 4 miles for 10 minutes while listening to the lifestory of a man from Connecticut. Somehow the math just doesn’t add up.

So are taxi drivers really narcissistic? Do they like to hear themselves chatter? Do they have their entire speech laid out and ready for each rider? Do they condense/expand their story depending on the length of the client’s ride?

And how do you respond to a complete stranger telling you about how he buried his brother 3 weeks ago in Florida? Where did I put my counseling hat???