No, I did not set it ablaze, but after my recent experiences I would not blame anyone who did. As with most disaster victims, I had no idea what was going on until it was over. I was confused when the Megabus driver pulled over to the Kankakee rest area on northbound I-65, because there were no scheduled stops between Indianapolis and Chicago. Yes, the construction had forced us into one lane and an accident in that one lane had turned the freeway into a linear parking lot for an hour, but we’d finally gotten past the congestion. Why were we still traveling at 25mph?

When we pulled into the parking lot and the driver dove for the fire extinguisher under the front seat, I began to realize something was wrong. Then he opened the door and white smoke started to billow in, at which time I almost pissed myself and decided I needed that rest stop after all. I grabbed my backpack and hustled down the narrow aisle into a cloud of white smoke.

During the stop and go traffic, our bus had decided it would rather stop and go at the same time. The brakes had locked up and we’d been smokin’ down the highway for I do not know how long. We had to wait almost three hours for a replacement bus to be sent through the mess of construction from Chicago, which according to the maps at the Kankakee rest area was 65 miles away. This is why I had Chex Mix, Junior Mints, and a Fiber One Peanut and Oats bar for dinner Thursday evening. It is also why I finished the book I’d thought would last the whole trip to and from Chi-town. This left me plenty of time to mentally inventory the items in my suitcase and decide whether I would miss anything that might have been charred to a crisp in the luggage compartment.

Thankfully, I did not have to be in Chicago at a certain time, however one of my fellow travelers was supposed to catch a charter bus to New York for the weekend, which I’m pretty sure didn’t happen. The replacement bus finally came, we transferred all our luggage (which thankfully hadn’t been barbecued), and we were off to Chicago with an overall 4 hour delay. I had been planning on taking the Chicago bus to my hotel, but decided not to risk another bus incident, and took a cab instead.

At this point, I was willing to forgive the Megabus corporation for the trouble. Busses break. That can’t be avoided, and they’d sent a replacement within a reasonable amount of time given the traffic circumstances. Also, the bus driver had gotten us to a safe place with water, food, restrooms and shelter. It had been annoying yes, but you can’t control what happens to you in life, only how you react to it, and all in all everyone had reacted well.

Then came Sunday.

I sat on the sidewalk near Chicago’s Union Station for the 11 o’clock Megabus to Chicago. A pair of hairy legs in green shorts stood next to me as I read a magazine, and if this had been an episode of Lost, this is where the camera would have zoomed in on the man attached to these legs in a flashback because he was going to play a large part in the upcoming events.

The bus was about 15 minutes late, but this is the Megabus, and I did not expect it to be on time. We loaded up onto the muggy and somewhat warm bus and the bus driver told us that although it was hot right now, once we got on the road the air would kick in and it would get cooler.

We got on the road, but the air did not kick in and it did not get cooler.

About 10 minutes into the trip, a man from back walked down the aisle and complained to the bus driver that it was still hot. “Get behind the line,” she told him. There is a white line painted on the aisle floor that passengers are not supposed to cross. This line seemed very important to our bus driver of Megabus 64184 from Chicago to Indianapolis departing at 11:00am on Sunday, July 26, 2009. The driver then fiddled with the knobs and got on the line with dispatch who told her to fiddle more knobs, and still the air did not kick in and it did not get cooler.

The driver got through the first toll both of the Chicago skyway and then pulled over to the side of the road, across from a McDonald’s oasis that sat in the middle of the highway. She got up and told us that because the air conditioning wasn’t working, they were going to send another bus for us. This announcement was met with groans, and after 10 minutes of waiting the passengers started to get unruly. People started yelling, “Let’s just go!” and several people started complaining to each other about the man who had whined about the heat. I sat quietly in my seat, trying not to attract attention.

I had to ride a school bus for all of middle school and high school. It did not have air conditioning. You opened the windows and you did not bitch about it. Yes, it was hot. Yes, it was uncomfortable. Yes, your sweaty thighs became glued to the vinyl seats and ripped at your skin when you got up. You lived with it because that was just the way it was. Yes, the Megabus was warm, but it was tolerable, and if they had designed the bus so we could actually open the windows, there wouldn’t have been a problem. I can only imagine that people who ride beat-up busses with their chickens in the seat next to them as they descend narrow mountain roads in Peru would have laughed at what spoiled Americans we were.

The man in green shorts got up to talk to the bus driver, to which she replied, “Get behind the line please.” I’m not sure what else they said, but then Green Shorts not only stepped past the line, he sat on the steps next to the driver. All of this behavior was non-threatening, but he had literally just crossed the line which the driver seemed rather fixated on. After their conversation the bus driver got up and made a speech against us mutineers telling us she was not driving anywhere in a hot bus and no one was going to tell her how to run her bus.

Green Shorts then asked if anyone on the bus wanted drinks from McDonalds. Another guy told Green Shorts he was crazy to go across four lanes of traffic accelerating to 70mph, but I just handed the guy my water bottle and asked for a refill. If he wanted to risk his life, I was happy to get rehydrated at the same time. I was growing increasingly worried that the stuffiness, stress and dehydration were going to escalate my constant tension headache to a full-blown migraine.

Our savior managed to cross the traffic and return with two caddies filled with ice cold water and let us know it was much cooler outside the bus in the fresh air. The bus driver had gotten off the bus at this point and I was surprised no one leaped into the driver’s seat to hijack the bus to Indy. Everyone was rather pissed at this point, particularly me and one other woman who’d been on the doomed bus trip up to Chicago on Thursday. I’m sure sociologists would have been fascinated to study the changing group dynamics and the bond we all felt by hating the bus driver’s attitude.

I got off the bus and cut my arm crawling over a guard rail, after which I had to keep telling myself I would not get tetanus from it. I sat in the grass and my thoughts oscillated back and forth between, “I cannot believe this is happening again,” and “I hope this isn’t the part of the story where a car collides with the back of the bus and I am beheaded by flying shrapnel.” While I was trying to decide whether I would become more quickly dehydrated in the warm, stuffy bus or in the cooler outdoors in direct sunlight, Green Shorts was making a phone call. He snapped his phone closed and then said, “We’ll see what the police have to say about this.”

After about an hour and a half waiting on the side of the road, a replacement bus finally arrived. It wasn’t even a Megabus, just a white coach bus that came from God knows where. The men on the new bus started transferring our luggage, when the bus driver walked up to Green Shorts and told him he could not get on the new bus.

I know!

Again, if this were an episode of Lost, Green Shorts would have been one of the lead players who might be killed by the smoke monster by episode nine. I was playing the part of one of the nameless extras who kept their heads down and their names out of the credits. Green Shorts was not allowed onto the new bus, and although I did not actually see the cop cars, people on the bus said they had arrived. I’m sure the Chicago police had nothing better to do than moderate a power fight between a Megabus driver and a Good Samaritan passenger on their Sunday afternoon.

I know not what happened to Green Shorts, but eventually the driver got onto the new bus and we headed back to Indy. Halfway there…THE BUS BEGAN TO GET HOT. My new seatmate and I mumbled something about it to each other and made a pact to murder the first passenger who said anything about the temperature. I also tweeted the events as they happened on Twitter, and only later did I discover that not only had katydid6, another BlogHer attendee, been doing the same, I had been sitting next to her on the first bus! Yet, because I don’t have a Twitter app on my mobile phone, I was unaware of this until I checked my replies on my home Internet.

I spent the rest of the trip completely dehydrated, despite drinking two bottles of water. Once I got off the bus at Indy, I immediately walked two blocks and bought water from the closest available source, a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant. Before I’d gotten more than a block away, I watched the Megabus roll off for its next destination, Columbus, or hell, I know not which.

So, take this as a warning, DO NOT RIDE THE MEGABUS!!! I have ridden the service roundtrip from Chicago two other times before and did not have problems, but after this trip they’ve scored a 33% failure rate with me. I was willing to blame the brake failure on the first trip to bad luck, but after the air conditioning fiasco it became clear to me that Megabus does not take care of their busses. The first bus driver had been complaining about the brakes for days to dispatch, and the second bus driver was aware the air was broken, yet nothing was done until the situations had escalated too far. In addition, the second driver’s poor communication skills escalated the situation to a place it did not need to go, further delaying and complicating our trip. I do not expect much from the Megabus. Their fares are insanely cheap, so much so that I don’t feel it’s even worth it to demand a refund. I expect them to be late. I expect the bus to be somewhat uncomfortable. However, I do not expect to be stranded on the side of the road for a grand total of 5 hours on a round trip that takes 6 hours.

If you decide not to heed my advice and do ride the Megabus, expect the bus to be 2-3 hours late picking you up and dropping you off. Be sure to bring at least two large bottles of water (or preferably three to engender good will with thirsty passengers), enough food for two meals, and lots of reading materials. Preferably, you should also bring an extra bus.

****

UPDATED at 5:45pm on July 27, 2009 – As is the way of the Internet, someone from Megabus found my entry or my Twitters. I received an email from the Operations Manager today at 2:11pm apologizing for the poor service I experienced. They’ve refunded my ticket and offered a free roundtrip ticket on Megabus to make amends. I’m glad their customer service people are attuned to the Internet and that they’re at least aware of the problems I experienced. I accepted the free ticket because I have friends in Chicago I wouldn’t mind visiting as long as I’m not glued to a strict timetable. Megabus is not the most reliable means of public transit you will find, but I appreciate the fact that they listened and have done their best to make up for the problems I experienced.

The plane dipped up and then down like the Thunder Run roller coaster at Kentucky Kingdom. I pulled down the arm rest by the empty seat next to me so I could grip it tightly. Whatever happens will happen I told myself as I breathed deeply in and out. You are not driving the plane. You are not creating the winds. It is out of your control. The plane jittered and bounced as it hit the runway. Then it swerved slightly to left and right. If we crash into a ball of flames at the end of the runway, at least I’ll have seen Europe. And then the plane stopped and there was silence broken by the sound of the whole plane applauding. “As you can tell, we have most definitely landed,” the copilot announced over the intercom and finally I breathed out and was relieved to be back on the ground again in the US of A.

Any complaints I might have about spending 21 hours traveling are dampened by the knowledge that 100 years ago such a trip would not have be possible. Instead of riding planes and trains and automobiles, I would have crossed the ocean in a boat. Instead of two days travelling back and forth, I would have spent at least a week on my journey instead of only 20% of my time.

There were other bumps, besides the ones I felt upon “landing.” The French proved they do not understand the concept of coffee-to-go when a barista handed me a steaming drink in a plastic cup without any insulation ring. I was so excited to barely hop on the latest Metro train that I didn’t notice it was the wrong Metro train until the doors had closed. When I did get to the right station, a cute boy on the platform gave me a smile and tried to talk to me in French, but all I could say was, “Where were you four days ago? I would have learned French for you!” before hopping into the railcar. In the line at airport security I suddenly remembered I had a water bottle in my purse and chugged 16 ounces of water in 3 minutes to get through the gates. After I arrived in Chicago, I got lost trying to find the CTA to ride downtown to catch my bus to Indianapolis, proving that I don’t just get lost in international airports but domestic ones too. Once I boarded my bus, after running towards it madly because I had been waiting on the wrong corner, I got an honest-to-God migraine, complete with nausea and unilateral pain on the left side of my head, but only after I’d stowed my luggage under the bus with my abortive medications. Then finally I was back in Indianapolis, dragging my suitcase four blocks to the parking garage, hoping no one from the Wheeler Mission tried to mug me before I got there. Thankfully, my car had not been towed and it started like it was supposed to and I drove back to my apartment.

Upon opening the door and stepping into the living room I said to the empty space, “Oh right. I live here.” For I had been gone an awfully long time and seen lots of pretty and old things, and had forcibly pushed any thoughts of my “real” life out of my head whenever they tried creeping to my attention. But here I was again and those were my plates in the dish rack and there were my curtains I’d bought at Big Lots and there was my long tube of toothpaste I could not take on the plane. Here was my life just as I had left it. The only thing that seemed out of place was me. The girl stepping in the door was not the exact same girl who left 10 days ago, but she would assimilate soon and take over the life the other girl had left behind. There were bills to pay and emails to respond to and cable internet providers to contact about the lack of service. And there was another trip to plan, perhaps for next year or the year after that, for this continent or another, but undoubtedly there was some place to go because once you’ve been elsewhere it is hard not to return.

The other odd thing is that I get on board at some random street corner in downtown Indianapolis. They don’t use the bus station, nor do they use tickets. You just reserve a spot online and bring your receipt with the confirmation number. I suppose that keeps overhead down. You get cheaper rates the earlier you reserve. If I were to try to buy my tickets right now it would cost me $46.00. They only service the Midwest right now, so if you live in an area of the country without corn, you’re out of luck.

I weighed in early since I won’t be weighing myself this weekend. (Oh no! A three-day gap in my weight chart! What ever shall I do?) I am allotting myself five vacation pounds, even though I plan on walking everywhere. If I end up gaining more than five, then I can start beating myself up. Otherwise, par-tay! And honestly, if history repeats itself, I might end up losing weight from dehydration or just because my body likes to screw with me.

I might try posting from the conference. It will depend on how tired or wired I am and how much I am willing to pay for a computer terminal. I have no laptop or wifi, which makes it harder to get online. I am looking forward to meeting a lot of my fellow weight-loss bloggers and other interesting peeps I have met on these here Internets over the past couple years. I went shopping this past weekend and now own pants that fit, so at least they won’t laugh at my droopy jeans. If you’re in town and recognize me, feel free to come say hi. I will respond to “Jennette” or “PastaQueen” or “PQ.” I’m hoping to meet lots of new people, learn a lot and most importantly have lots of fun! If you don’t know what I look like, here’s 360 degrees of PastaQueen.