Tuesday, November 15, 2005

the smell of pot

In all my travelings, hitchhikings in Europe, nights on the floors of air ports, and train travels there is one kind of person I can always trust to help me out. The pot-head. Today I thought I'd be adventurous and do something people don't even speak of around here, bike a long ways for non-recreational reasons. Destination: Trinity Western University. Distance: 17.33mi. Estimated duration: 33min by car (or "45min by bike". Who makes up those estimations anyways? Have they ever biked?). In all my bikings to airports, camps, and cities in Japan I have never undergone such a grueling bike ride. Fist, what's with the people that drive by and honk their horn? Is it an encouraging "keep on going"? or is it a, "get off the freaken road!"? As the honking went on, and after one mysterious motion in sign language depicting an upraised middle finger, I chose to believe that the honking of the horn was indicating something along the lines of an encouraging thumbs up.

After 1.5 hours of cars and trucks whizzing by so fast that their wind almost knocked me into the ditch on several occasions, and after 1.5 hours of biking on a road THAT WOULD NOT STAY LEVEL! (I used to think that the term "valley" meant a flat area of land, but now I see that it actually means "an area of land that is not a sharp pointy mountain"-an unusual occurrence in Canada. So unusual in fact, that they get over excited and think they have a valley. Well I think they need to visit Tokyo) I finally arrived at TWU sweaty, tired, and traumatized. The visit, scary. TWU looks like a daunting prison; it even has a little security post in the middle of the lanes on its driveway-just like military bases in Japan. By the time I was about to start biking back, it was dark and I didn't want to. And why has no one in this bloody country heard of trans-city buses? WHY?! Abbotsford is just one city away, you'd think they could afford a flippin bus!!! Despite the lack of trans-city buses, I decided to take a city bus as far as possible and then bike the rest of the way. Unmentionable thing #2 take a bus. And I tried to, but when I went up to put my bike on the bus bike rack, the bus driver honked at me (rude honk #5 of the day, not to mention at point blank range) and told me they can't put the bike rack down at night. So the bus drove off and it began to rain.

Upon girdling up my loins, sticking my chest out, and flipping the bus off after it left (sorry mom), I began the ride back. And after being honked at again I pulled off into a gas station to ask directions. The lady behind the desk couldn't believe that I was going to bike back in the rain at night, and after telling her about the honks, and the finger, I passionately proceeded to tell how I should be honking at them! THEY ARE THE ONES polluting the atmosphere THEY ARE THE ONES contributing to global warming THEY help Middle Eastern "terrorist" countries get rich! Heck, Saddam Hussein’s probably making prophet/liter gas sold! I SHOULD BE HONKING AT THEM for contributing to the axis of evil!! And I told that store lady how next time I go biking I'm going to bring an air horn just to spite cars! And I told her how if I had a car I would be driving it so they should shove their horns up their ear canals and shut up! Then after receiving a "maybe I should call security" look from the lady behind the counter, I walked out. And on the other side of the door, a beat up-looking SUV with a trailer and a guy hanging out the passenger door speaking the beautiful words "dude wanna ride? I heard you in the store". I proceeded to get in the truck and, after noticing it smelt kind of funny, listened to my savior talk about his relationship with pot. Apparently they are doing quite well together. The whole truck smelt of it.

It’s always those people on the fringes of society that are the most helpful. Maybe because they have nothing to lose, as opposed to rich Christians who's car seats might get dirty by picking some on up off the street. After the experience, I am a firm believer in people, not rich people, but normal people.

11 comments:

Chrissy2sheds said...

Yes.. mmm I wondered at first if you were going so say something like "I looked down and realised I had forgotten to dress" and what is Global worming ? Perhaps after all the birds die of flu the worms will multiply and rise up and take over the world. As for pot ..well.. reminds me of Iran where I leant over the bridge at Esfahan and looked down at the tea house where the men were smoking their hubble bubble pipes. Oh the sweet smell that wafted up .A bit stonger than pot I think

Chrissy2sheds said...

sorry me again ..thinking about it you could write it up as a modern day Good Samaritan sketch A challenge for Capernwary next Feb/March perhaps

° ÐãVeØ ° said...

Yeah Brent. You have all the adventures and life-teaching experiences.
And you have encouraged me roomie.
Yes. You have encouraged me to start smoking pot.
I've never done it before, but I think we need more people like that pothead.
Here's a challenge... let's all smoke pot.

Janice said...

not hard to smoke in BC...not my point though. not all buses are cool but vancouver certainly has better ones than seattle, hm? and why did you go out to TWU? just for the heck of a really long bike ride? if you want a long bike ride come see me! i'll drive you back. i promise.

Unknown said...

Yeah Brent! You're a stud and you make me laugh. See you soon.

Megs said...

you know I was just thinking about christians and how most often it is not them who help...people don't expect them too, why?! ...for fear of a tangent I shall leave my comment at that...

luke said...

s4. the most powerful drug on the planet.

Pamela Joy said...

You do realize you went on a tangent about the evils of gasoline to a lady who worked at a gas-station... right? Juuuuust checkin'. If you want a really long bikeride you could always ride down here... I'm not sure I'd give you a ride home, but Cammy probably would... he seems pretty nice like that...

Pamela Joy said...

Sorry, I just noticed I spell his name wrong and it's written right here. I meant Cami. I really did.

roberry said...

wow, do you ever rack up the comments.

so, cami and i were talking about how we both had terrible first-time-riding-bikes-in-north-america experiences. i was honked at too. oh, and i got multiple flat tires. that meant my tire looked like swiss cheese and was totally unrepairable. end of biking.

Benjamin said...

come ride your bike to see me.
it's all down hill from were you are to southern cal

by the way, you are an amazing blogger
these is the most comments i've ever seen