I Love my iPod

Man gets his hustle on in the Subway.

Monday Mullings: Loonies and Goonies on public transportation.

I normally travel to work by car. Commuting to the West Loop each day is not fun, but the stop and go car parade that is the Dan Ryan expressway is quite tolerable provided you listen to the right radio station. However, public transportation is a whole different animal, with a whole host of problems. Every now and then, I am forced to hop aboard Chicago’s primary colored “L” trains and ride into and out of the Loop, all the while, squeezing in between, ducking under, and mixing it up with the many lunatics that fill this city. And today, I’m mulling on those very lunatics. 3 categories of lunacy are particularly intriguing, and I will discuss them as I know anyone who has been on public transportation has wondered the same thing about these characters.

Hustle Man
Guy Selling Enormous Bags of Small Candy from car to car

Right off the bat let me say that I’m not hating on anyone getting their hustle on. I actually admire how much these guys know the value of a dollar. But you have to know your market. I think it’s safe to say that a 2 pound plastic bag of those disgusting penny candies is an “impulse buy”…and the price is right,(I have never heard them charge more than a dollar a bag)…but there are no 8 year olds on the train at 9 AM who would even be enticed by that deal, despite the tremendous value….know you’re market,..sell some shitty donuts, fruit, Advil, or 5-hour energy. Adults will actually buy that.

Musical Hustle Man

Guy Singing in the L Station

Once again, get your hustle on, showcase your musical abilities, it’s often refreshing. But I have no idea what these guys are thinking when they decide to start singing. None of these people have good voices, not even average ones, they are ALL (and this is not a generalization) miserable. Plus the acoustics in the subway are horrible w the trains running by every ten minutes, it makes a bad voice sound worse. As if that weren’t enough, their song selection is something to take issue with as well. I heard a guy singing Silent Night this morning like it was the middle of December….if you want to make a little change showcasing musical talent, play an instrument,…even if you don’t know how…I would much rather throw a buck in a hat for a guy who is struggling to play the saxophone than a dude who butchers classic songs by crooning with his lousy voice.

Preacher Man

Guy delivering impromptu sermons on the Red Line (THIS MORNING)

I understand this is a great way to reach your audience, but I am completely in awe of the thought process that motivates any person to start preaching to a car full of disgruntled commuters who normally do anything to keep to themselves during travel. Not only are these sermons incoherent and irrelevant,…often times they aren’t religious in anyway. The guy this morning wasn’t even holding a bible to pass himself off as a credible person…dude was holding a Red Eye...Additionally, every time anyone has preached to me on the “L”, they have been so pessimistic. They are often about repenting before god and the final day of reckoning. And while I do appreciate their concern for my eternal soul, this is why iPods were created; having the ability to drown these loonies out is simply the rawness.

Honorable mention:

Too Hood For His Own GoodGuy on the “L” or bus who listens to hardcore, unedited, gangsta rap from his phone loud enough for everyone in his seating area to hear. I cannot fathom how these people can be that far from socially acceptable.