It began at work where Cloudy and I received a lecture on something insignificant. I outright rolled my eyes and said whatever. It pissed us both off. It made me spend the majority of the day updating my resume.
It continued later in the day with an argument with some stupid people at work who can’t do anything on right or on time and tried to blame us for it. Again, Cloudy and I gave each other this look like what. the. fuck. I told them that they want this project way too late in the game and its not happening. Turning a complete 180 my stupid boss’ boss who lectured us previously tried to be all supportive. Cloudy and I didn’t buy it for a second. We covertly rolled our eyes.
Because of the aforementioned event, I was held up at work. By the time I left to go to the BART it was approximately 6pm. As I entered the station, I noticed that there were at least 10x the amount of people waiting on the platforms than normal. I had no idea why, I just thought a train was delayed. All I knew is that I wanted the fucking long-haired dust cloak gamer behind me on the escalator to stop touching my back as he went down the steps. I turned around and fucking said, ‘please do not touch me.’ He did it again–push-touching me until i turned around again and almost yelled ‘Rape.” Dont fuck w/me fucking nerd–not today.
Approximately 6:20, after waiting quite some time for the BART, I boarded the train on the opposite platform that I usually board. Again, I had no idea why, I just followed the herd and entered the train. The conductor was really gung-ho about people not stepping on the yellow boarding/caution strip, and would not move the train until everyone had cleared the yellow line. As we passed Powell station (the first stop after mine), the conductor reminded us that we would not be stopping at Powell due to a “medical emergency.” Still, it didnt register until we passed through the station and I saw yellow police tape, gurneys, and tons of cops. Shit. Someone was hit. Not only that, had I not been delayed at work because of other peoples incompetence, I literally would have been on that train. Immediately upon seeing that, I felt completely sick to my stomach and I wanted to puke. (Later we found out that a man apparently commited suicide by climbing down on the tracks and waiting for the train. It is not clear how or why nobody stopped him unless he just jumped down in front of the train. My belief is that people saw him but did nothing. Just like how, when reading the news to find out wtf happened, I stumbled across tons of people complaining about how they had to wait 20 minutes extra to get home and that if he wanted to die do it on his own time. I’m not going to claim to be a fucking mother theresa, but come on, that’s a bit much. At the same time–so typical San Franciscan. Shaking head. People here are at the pinnacle of disappointing).
Two hours later, at about 8:05, the house began to shake. I didn’t really feel it, but I heard my roomies talking excitedly in the living room. NG and I rushed out to see what all the commotion was. Turns out it was a 5.6 earthquake in San Jose. Come to think of it…our cat was acting very very very very weird all weekend and especially today.
I took NG to the airport later. We were a bit freaked and not to be overly superstitious, but today just gave me that nervous pit-of-the-stomach feeling all day long. I didn’t want to risk it by driving over the notoriously unsafe Bay Bridge. We made it most of the way on the bridge when all of a sudden traffic began to slow practically to a halt. A few cars in front of us, we noticed a police car zigzagging across 5 lanes, back and forth, and saying something from his speakers like “get over to the side, NOW.” I had NO clue what to do or what was going on or why this cop was swerving across all the lanes. 5 seconds later, a tow truck barreled through the traffic and followed the cop. We still have no idea what the meaning of it all was, but when we got off the bridge we saw a couple cars and a couple cop cars. We think it might have been the tail end of a chase.
Almost to the airport–and the pickup in front of me loses his hubcab. Hubcab comes swirling off the truck with extreme velocity, the metal scraping across the cement enough to create minor sparks. It swirled and rolled millimeters from the front of my car. I missed it by *this much.*
And finally, on the way back home from the airport–not 1, not 2, not 3 but 4 traffic jams–all the same–car stalled with no driver in the middle of the road.
I’m sure this string of bizarre events is all the result of a random mix, but I will admit to being a bit on the freaked side. Sleeping tonight with my doors locked, my snowboarding helmet by my bed (in case of another quake), and tempted to sleep with a weapon of some sort near my bed or under my pillow. I am also a bit freaked about NG flying back home and getting into work. Overreaction perhaps, but I am feeling a bit rattled by today.
The only good/calm/peaceful part of today that makes it somewhat salvageable are the couple of hours I took for lunch (defiantly and angrily skipping work) to hang out with NG. We had sandwiches at a small, random place in chinatown, then proceeded to walk around the shops like tourists. We found an awesome tea place and tried like 10 different teas before settling on lychee black tea and this tea called “blue people” that is mellow at first w/a honey sweet aftertaste. After browsing through the Paul Frank store, NG walked me back to work.
If I remember anything about today, I hope its those 2 hours.
Thankfully, *today* is officially over.
