The Greyhound Experience

This semester I have the unique privilege of traveling back and forth from DC and Philadelphia via America's most prized form of public transportation: the Greyhound Bus (or the Peter Pan Bus… coincidentally, I am currently working on a blog that compares a man's inability to form emotional attachments with others to the story of Peter, watch this space!).

There are a few pointers that I can dish out to any of you who are brave enough to ride a contraption that bears the name of an animal that is often shot to death when past its prime (which, strangely, all of the passengers have reached). Lucky the drivers of the Greyhound busses are not put up to the same standards of actual race dogs; just in case, the driver is nonetheless seated in a bulletproof enclosure.

If you buy your tickets on the internet you can "skip" the hassle of waiting in the speedy (like molasses) line of customers by circumventing them at the electronic "Will Call" booth (and, no joke: there is an actual red carpet leading up to the booth). There is a modest $4 fee for this service, and for the man who has to clean the red carpet. Sadly, it is a four dollars better spent elsewhere, as these booths are always broken and you end up waiting in the regular line besides- and, with no carpet (oooohhhh!!!).

Do not consume any liquids an entire 3 hours before your Greyhound ride; you will regret it if you do. Going to the bathroom on a bus is about as pleasant as riding home completely drunk and sick in the back of a cab driven by a blind person.

One highly disturbing aspect of the Greyhound voyage is their list of prohibited items; a list that would suggest that these items have been carried on board in the past and have been met with displeasure from other passengers.

They include: ammunition, combustible liquids, fireworks, hazardous materials, and other reasonable limitations. However, there is also mention of cremated remains, materials with a disagreeable odor (however no mention of humans with a disagreeable odor), and my favorite- corpses. Yes friends, you heard it here first: please do not check any baggage containing corpses on the Greyhound.

Naturally I am respectful of these baggage restrictions, yet while riding the doggy-style bus I have to wonder—man, some of these people aren't moving and may have actually become corpses in transit (chuck 'em at the next stop?), and "disagreeable odor" is the understatement of the year when you get a whiff of that damned onboard bathroom.