CTA NYD

This story must be preceded with the Jean Shepherd warning. The one that goes: "Warning, the following is in bad taste. Then again, life itself is often in bad taste."

One of the things I love about Chicago is how well they treat their drunks.

For example, on New Year's they drop the subway fare to a penny from 8pm-6am on the 31st into the 1st and they run almost rush-hour frequency service from 1am-6am. You can't beat that.

Of course New Year's is also amateur night so you will often run into (not literally, hopefully) the odd gigantic pile of stuff that had been until recently residing in someone's stomach. However, play your cards right and said pile can provide you with great entertainment.

How do you play your cards right? Well, sit far enough away in the car that you can't smell the stuff for one thing. And then keep your eye on everyone that boards through the doors nearest the pile. Laugh as they grab their nose, gag, run out the door or run to your end of the car. The entertainment never stops unless one of the gagees makes another pile nearer to you. Then friend, you've got to move on as well.

So it transpired on the Red line from roughly 1-1:30am as the Mrs. and I journeyed back from a dinner party that just couldn't be beat for both the company and the food. Wave after wave of 20-somethings stumbled in and occasionally on to the semi-digested material and entertained the heck out of us with their reaction. One drunk young lady looked at it in disgust and slurred "It's the red line, what do you expect?" which is a remark I have yet to decipher. Do people upchuck less on say, the brown or blue line? Any Chicagoans out there want to shed any light on this?

Here's another thing about the CTA: for whatever reason, the seats on one side of a given car face the opposite direction of the seats on the other side of the car. So if you're on the right side facing forward in the direction of travel, a seat on the left side will be facing the rear. This has a disorienting affect on the intoxicated, and led to the following conversation between two celebrants:

"Murph"

"Yeah?"

"Murph"

"Yeah?"

"Murph"

"WHAT!"

"The train's backwards."

"What?"

"The train's going backwards. It's fucked up."

"No it isn't."

(Pause)

"Murph"

"Yeah?"

(Pause)

"Murph"

"Yeah?"

"It's backwards. Train's goin' in reverse."

"No it isn't."

"Murph"

"What?"

"Murph"

"What?"

"Why are we goin' backwards?"

"We're not going backwards."

"Murph"

"What?"

"Murph"

"What?"

"Murph"

"WHAT!"'

"Murph. Fuck you."

The recently croaked Harold Pinter couldn't have written better dialogue.

So it was with that joyful New Year's sentiment that we disembarked at Grand to walk back to our hotel, weaving through a mass of the young, well dressed and intoxicated on the way. Some poor bastards were trying to get cabs to no avail. Guys in rumpled suits with women in smeared makeup, high heels in hand and stockingless in the freezing cold. They should've jumped on the penny deal for some transportation and a show.

Merry New Year, one and all.