A straphanger's diary of the ridiculous happenings aboard the A train. A circus of entertainment for only $2.50!

DAY 10

Panhandling is an art. Sometimes your reaction is: look down/ignore; pretend to be sleeping; fish a quarter or banana from my pocket; or... hey, nice job.

A 30-something guy dressed in a dark gray suit and red tie made his way through the train car trying to sell $15 copies of an inspirational book he wrote about getting out of prison and getting his life together. His strategy was pretty smart: hand out a dozen or so 200-something page, soft-cover books to people who look slightly interested and pitch to them as they look over the book. The man told everyone to buy the book now before he gets on Oprah or some morning show as he shared interesting snippets from the book. On his way back through the train, he collected the books back from people who were not interested and accepted $15 from those who purchased the book. He made $45.

(Note:  The same sort of thing happened to me once at Starbucks. A homeless man got around the whole don't-panhandle-in-starbucks rule. He placed pens down on the table of each person as he walked down to the end of the store. The pens had a paper note attached explaining his need and that if you want to help, just put a dollar out on the table and you could keep the pen. Otherwise he will collect back the pens. Minimal interaction and effort.)

DAY 9

I feel bad for the seated skinny guy who is being crushed up against the wall by two enormous human beings who clearly need 1.5-2 seats each.

DAY 8

Grossness: On a crowded train, a young man sitting next to me started clipping his fingernails. Little bits went all over the place including on the lap of yours truly. I quickly flicked the nail off and gave the man a disgusted look. He apologized. And continued clipping.

Now that got me thinking... If the train is 44 years old, how many nail clippings have accumulated? How many crumbs? Pieces of hair? Germs? Are there 1970s germs on me? Sometimes it is best to just ignore and block-out the gross shit (including the guy clipping his nails onto the floor) or else you will go mad and be unable to take public transportation.

DAY 7

Teenagers are often associated with shananagans for a reason. At 59th street a crew of purple shirt kids came on the downtown A. They were, predictably, boisterous. But their dance skills were kind of great. Moonwalk x10. One boy, who sported a pair of purple "beats by dre" headphones, began dancing up on a girl and gave her a very inappropriate lap dance. I mean, there was an impressionable infant three feet away. But his eyes were fixed on his dad's iPhone.

DAY 6

A train : wool :: F train : cashmere //
A train : rock concert :: F train : string quartet // A train : scrambled eggs :: F train : poached eggs

DAY 5

The A train is so loud and rickety that I can't hear my iPod. The conductor wears noise-canceling headphones.

DAY 4

Nothing major. In the afternoon a category 4 FOP entered the downtown train at 168th street. He sat down right next to me and I was trapped on the inside of those two front-facing seats. Even breathing through my mouth didn't help. I twisted my head around in vain to find clean air. The bile rose in my throat and I felt like I was suffocating. Until he got off at 42nd street.

DAY 3

You really can count on the A train to wake you up in the morning. At around 7:30am a FOP entered the uptown train at Chambers Street. This particular man had an amusing, yet annoyingly offensive, tic. He picked up on one phrase and yelled it out repeatedly for at least five minutes like a cuckoo clock while varying the syllables he emphasized: "WASHington Heights! WASHington Heights! WASHington Heights! WashingTON Heights! WashingTON Heights! WashingTON Heights!" etc., etc. Other choice words: UNion Square! UNion Square! UNion Square! Union SQUARE! Union SQUARE! Union SQUARE! Pretty Girls! Pretty Girls! Timessss Square! Timessss Square! Timessss Square!

The amusing part was the sound of his voice: rough, jagged hiss. And he interspersed a creepy, slow, guttural chuckle between his repetitive screams. Heeeuh, Heeeuh, Heeeuh.

DAY 2

At around 7:30AM, a 60-something homeless man came aboard the uptown A. He was only about a category one FOP, thankfully. However, for at least 15 minutes this guy went on a tirade as screamed at the top of his lungs, "You fucking bitch! I killed you! I saw your dead body and I laughed. I murdered you! [hideous laugh]. You are dead and I'm happy!" etc., etc., etc.

DAY 1

Riding the A train is a unique experience. The lovable eighth avenue express line operates between 207th Street in Inwood and Far Rockaway, Queens or Lefferts Boulevard, Queens. It travels the longest distance of all the trains: 31 miles. So, in short, a lot of shit can happen. For example, today there was a foul-odored person (FOP) in my train car. On the foul-odor scale it was a category 3. Not too bad, but too pungent to ignore. One of my fellow strap hangers, a man dressed in a suit, opened his large, leather briefcase and pulled out a can of air freshener. He sprayed the air intensely for about five seconds. Thereafter, he sprayed a small puff every five minutes. Yes, like one of those automatic bathroom air fresheners. Rude, yes. But many passengers were pretty happy about it. MTA-Note: Install wall-mounted air fresheners in each car. (Possibly also baking soda. And those silica gel things.)