I just completed the long expected road trip to attend my mother’s last days which included a total of two rental cars, and nine buses (total of 7 transfers).
I do part time graphics editing for a few clients. I am paid a retainer to be on call. To this end the bag of geek gear and accessories had to travel with me. I carry extra laptop batteries.I also carry a true brick of a recharger unit, it is the size of a house brick and weighs 1kg. (It will run the laptop or charge the phone several times). This thing is big, huge, heavy, and required.
I start the five bus, 4 transfer ordeal at 3 am (bus is running late). Some fellow acting like he is super speshul, is talking on his cell, blathering, and he’s so much a wheeler dealer on a long distance semi-express during dark hours. Nobody’s sleeping because of him and apparently he’s been doing this since about 9 the previous night when this route started. (Some would be riding this one end to end, btw, I joined it a quarter in and would ride most of the way). Why the driver didn’t make him hang up I don’t know.
Most of the buses are now equipped with plug-ins, and really nice ones have USB plugs. Some, however, do not work. This was the case with this one, it blew something enroute. So phones were going low. Including our speshul snowflake. And a few hours yet to enough of a stop to be able to plug in at the stop.
Having to keep available, I dig out the brick, put the 12″ lightning cord on it, and plug in my phone. Mr. Super-Important reaches across the aisle, unplugs my phone and snags the end to plug his phone in. I pull away and he pulls the plug out and has my short cord.
He tries to reach for the brick again. I say very loudly “You Keep Your Hands OFF me and GIVE me my cord back!” He goes, “Gimme That”, and tries to grab again. I repeat loudly, “Keep Your Hands Off, this Is Mine and GIVE ME MY CORD BACK.”
The driver raises voice and asks what is the problem. The fellow repeats, “Give Me That!” I tell the driver the fellow is trying to take my phone charger and took my lightning cord. The bus pulls over. We are very late on schedule and we are still in a big urban area. Mr. Speshul tries to make a case for his so important need for my charger as his phone is almost dead. He is conducting BUSINESS and needs to recharge and I’m being selfish since I won’t share! It turns out he’s not a doctor or otherwise on call for something about as important (say transporting an organ for transplant)-the driver is asking these sorts of questions. Mr. Speshul gets removed from the bus. Either he can leave or have the authorities do so and be charged, so he was left several miles from the depot on the side of the road. With much protests about how I’m being the unreasonable one and won’t share because I have a large charger and his phone is dead.
“It Takes A Village” with the translation of “if you have something I need and you don’t give it to me you are a horrid selfish being” is getting old. Yes I got my cord back. 0505-17
Good lord, the audacity of some people! At least they are of some entertainment value as we horrify people with our tales of encounters with them.
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“Why the driver didn’t make him hang up I don’t know.”
The driver can’t – he can inform the rider about the rules (if there is a rule on this bus about no talking on a cell) but if the rider says “I don’t care” then that’s pretty much that unless the driver wants to get into a physical fight to remove him. The only way the driver could do anything is if the corporate HQ lets all drivers know that if someone is disruptive, ask them to debark, if they refuse, call the police. Most won’t if no crime is being committed (and constantly on the cell phone is not a crime although it might have felt like assault on the ears to other riders).
However, when Mr. Snow Flake TOOK OP’s charger – we are in crime territory now, although theft of a charger & cord is not in the same category as, say, first degree murder. But it is theft. Now the driver has authority (I’m guessing but it would make sense for HQ to want drivers to address crime on the vehicle, especially against another rider) to address Mr. Snow Flake via the proper authorities.
And why did this man think that taking another person’s property was not on acceptable but to prevent him from doing so was the transgression. If there truly was something urgent, he should have gotten off the bus, taken a taxi to the nearest store (a 24 hour Wal Mart should have chargers), bought the necessary equipment and that would be that. He deserved to be left by the side of the road. I’m wondering if his business was legal since his behavior is so out of bounds.
Wow. talk about rude and entitled. I just don’t have any words for that. I can see MAYBE if he had asked nicely (not sure how something like that actually functions) but if you said no, not possible, gone back to his seat.
But to actually reach over and snatch something that is clearly yours, and demand that you let HIM use it, oh no. Good for the driver for kicking him off the bus.
Wow. I am glad the bus driver intervened. I can’t believe he didn’t even ASK, just yanked it right from you and unplugged your phone. And then yelled at YOU to give him YOUR property back! I’m actually sorry he was left by the side of the road, because I think he should have been arrested.
I am not sorry. He got a consequence for acting the way he did that was inconvenient, but not life threatening or causing long term damage. The bus driver did a good job. Like a naughty child who receives a punishment, hopefully he will remember this before he steals somebody’s personal property out in public (or if not, hopefully he will be punished instead or rewarded for his actions the next time it happens).
The audacity of some people! Glad that he got removed from the bus…amazing how rude and presumptuous folks can be.
People are straight up bonkers when it comes to charging their devices.
I was in a small regional airport with a 3 hour layover.
My phone was dying, but the airport had not been upgraded with a lot of extra electrical outlets like most larger airports.
So I walked away from the gate and found an outlet on a pillar along the main corridor.
I sat on the ground with my back against the side of the pillar so I was out of the way of everyone and I plugged in my phone charger.
I was reading a paperback book with my phone in my lap (charging) when this woman came bustling over and immediately demanded I unplug my phone so she could charge both her phone and her kid’s tablet.
I told her that my phone was still charging but it looked like there was another outlet six pillars down the terminal. She started shrieking that she wasn’t going to leave her phone and her kid’s tablet unattended. That’s why she wanted to use this pillar.
Apparently she expected me to unplug my phone and then continue sitting there to babysit her phone and tablet so she could go back and sit with her family. Because her knees are bad and she can’t sit on the floor.
I told her that if she left her phone and tablet with me I’d consider them very generous gifts considering we were strangers, but I’d heard so much about hospitality in the south, who I am to look a gift phone and tablet in the mouth?
She flounced off and her very embarrassed husband came over about 10 minutes later. He sat on the other side of the pillar, plugged in his laptop in the open electrical socket (since my charger was only taking up one of the two sockets) and then plugged the phone and tablet into the USB ports on his laptop to charge.
Exactly. I end up travelling more these days and finding an outlet may be problematic and I sit my device (almost always my phone) even if it is the vacuum plug in in an out of the way place. And yes, if I’m in a restaurant and allowed to seat myself, I look for the vacuum plug in in the perimeter and sit there! Expecting someone to unplug if they were there first AND guard their stuff for them, at the very least I could go make a long tour of the bathroom and let someone else have ‘gypsy christmas’ by the plug in…
Good grief! That’s beyond “nervy” and well into “Can you believe that some people would behave that way? Bless her heart!” territory!
… o.O
Um… what? Wow… just – wow.
I would have been tempted to unplug mine and let her plug her two in – just so I could hear her squawk when I got up to walk to the next pillar/outlet.
But I recognize that wouldn’t be proper etiquette.
Then again, if I did that because I was clueless that she expected me to babysit her equipment because it would never occur to me that she would expect a complete stranger to watch her goods (which, BTW, is against federal transportation policy), that’s not an etiquette violation.
The perfect time for “your failure to plan ……”.
+1
The bus driver is a hero!
The sad thing is, had this idiot asked nicely, the OP might well have been willing to let him use the charger, at least for a short time. But what kind of cretin thinks grabbing someone else’s property, and refusing to give it back, is appropriate behavior?
Ditto. Most of my experience in the charging issue is at conventions. I’m taking credit card payments through my phone, and enough of those will really drain the battery. Other vendors who are lucky enough to have their space against a wall with an outlet are pretty much always nice about letting you hop behind/under their table to charge up while it’s slow.
At bigger conventions you’ll see a lot of people propped on the floor charging between panels and such. If you see there’s a free socket by someone you just ask if it’s fine if you plug in too, and I’ve never seen an example where the 1st person didn’t agree and shuffle over to give more room.
In situations like these where you know going in that something’s going to be an issue (lack of places to charge, long lines, inadequate seating) you just mitigate the best you can and understand that everyone else is in the exact same boat.
‘But what kind of cretin thinks grabbing someone else’s property, and refusing to give it back, is appropriate behavior?’
Answer: a sociopath. Based on movies people think of sociopaths as easily identifiable. They’re not. They seem just like you and me, until the moment you’re standing between them and the thing they want. In my line of work(a court) I see them occasionally luckily only once or twice a year. Their actions and a sense of entitlement that fails to account for anyone having the same needs is the strongest indicator.
My condolences on the loss of your mother.
These guy is brave or stupid. He didn’t even bother to ask before he just took the OP’s cord to charge his phone. That kind of thing could have caused a much more serious incident than it did here. I applaud the OP for keeping their cool and very clearly letting him know to back off and the bus driver for putting him off.
It’s pretty extreme. If your ordeal included two rental cars and nine buses, why not stick with the rental cars? Bus tickets aren’t cheap and your journey seems complex, arduous and expensive. Would one rental not have gotten you to your destination? And why would the driver allow him to blather on with no requirement that he limit his call volume (both the time he talked and the noise that he made)? I’m tempted to hope that this narrative is just an example of “revenge porn” (a tale concocted for the horror, amusement and sympathy it arouses when the villain gets their comeuppance). It’s story line is so symmetrically aligned with such a narrative that it seems likely.
Buses can be cheaper than rental cars, depending on distance driven and the individual bus and rental companies. Also, maybe “rental car” means something different to OP than the most common use of the term. Maybe she actually means something like a taxi or an Uber?
Considering that the OP boarded this bus at 3 am, I would guess that it’s probably a 12 hour/18 hour/24 hour or more trip. Perhaps that felt it was more efficient both timewise and moneywise to travel by bus than to have to find a motel (or multiple motels, depending on the length of the trip), which would add both more expense and more travel time.
I could see if there was a few thousand miles to traverse and a week or two involved that the cost of a rental car might have been too much. Why ride a bus when flying is faster? I flew to the west coast last fall and had a rental car for two weeks, that was a bit pricy… and maybe the OP didn’t want to drive the whole way. If their nerves were shot/they were stressed out, it might have been a safer option.
One rental car would probably get her to her destination but she’d have to stay in hotels on the way. She doesn’t mention the distance but nine buses tells me she was going across the country (assuming it’s US or Canada). She probably wanted to get there as quickly as possible given the circumstances and like most people, wouldn’t be able to stay up more than ~16 hours.
I’ve found bus tickets to be reasonable compared to plane tickets.
The driver allowed the passenger to blather on because blathering on loudly is not a crime and he likely cannot eject passengers for obnoxious but legal behavior.
This made me laugh! Completely off topic but totally accurate. Can we add that there was absolutely no need for the misspelling of “special” ?
It added nothing to the narrative.
Glad you rate your own comment as “totally accurate.”
But I beg to disagree. “Speshul” conveys in a single word that the man thinks he’s special, but he’s actually stupid (i.e., too stupid to sell it correctly).
There’s a big difference between renting a car and riding in a bus. They are two completely different actions. I’ve taken really long bus trips multiple times on the same route but never drove it myself, even though I owned a reliable vehicle at the time. Many of my friends and family did the same when they were traveling. We don’t know why OP chose to ride instead of drive the whole route, but clearly driving it was not an option for him/her. That doesn’t seem odd to me.
There’s lots of reasons to explain why OP’s journey was very complex. Money is the most obvious – maybe OP got a deal on bus tickets that they couldn’t get on rental cars. Who knows, really. But it ultimately doesn’t matter. That’s the way OP had the trip lined up, that’s the way it went down.
Maybe she stuck with the buses as it is obvious she had a long way to go and sleeping on a bus is cheaper than sleeping in a motel, plus you are still travelling while you are sleeping.
Depending on where the OP lives, buses could well be the cheaper option (they are in my neck of the woods – renting a car is pricey, especially considering how much petrol costs).
There are a lot of reasons one would use rental cars & buses. In my own case, I hate driving long distances alone & at night and would much rather have someone else drive me while I can zone out or work.
Possibly OP only used the rental car locally while she was staying in the city then took the Greyhound/Megabus back to her hometown. Maybe she didn’t want to drive while grieving. Maybe having a rental car would have cost more than a bus. Maybe OP is under 25 and didn’t want to pay an extra 100$/day. Maybe OP doesn’t have a drivers license and was getting rides from someone else who had a rental car. Maybe OP was using Uber and decided to call it a rental car for the story.
It’s strange that you zero’ed in on that to call the story fake.
That is not what revenge porn means at all. Revenge porn is someone posting intimate and private pictures or videos of their ex online in a way to humiliated their ex after a break up.
“why not stick with the rental cars?”
Because you can’t sleep and drive at the same time, but you can sleep on a bus. Add one or more nights at a hotel, and the rental car is maybe not so cheap.
I would assume that the rentals were to get OP to and from the bus depots, and the bus transfers were required because there wasn’t a direct route. I’ve done similar things – taken the train to airport, flight with two layovers/transfers, take the bus from the airport to the boat dock, taken the boat out to an island, walked two miles to my cabin from the dock. Yes, I could have rented a car and driven to the dock, but that would require two hotel stays and having the rental for not just the journey, but the entire time I was on the island. They charge by the day, sadly.
That’s not what “revenge porn” means. Unfortunately revenge porn is an act that is much more sinister and often illegal.
Not the OP but I would guess that the bus was chosen because if you rent a car you have to drive the whole way. With a bus you can sleep (assuming all the busses aren’t plagued with boorish people like this one was!)
Good for you for calling attention to his bad behavior. People never cease to amaze me.
Wow! That’s a lot of entitlement contained in the body of just one person. You handled it perfectly, OP, as did the bus driver. You can’t prevent stupidity but you can sure do a lot to head it off at the pass, as shown in this scenario.
Wow! A number of things going on here. First of all, why did the bus driver allow this passenger to be so disruptive on an overnight bus trip? Does the bus line not have some kind of posted policy?
Second, I wonder if OP could have been more discreet about the use of their recharging device? What this individual did was a shock, for sure, but everyone on the bus was in the same boat (or bus) regarding the lack of recharging facilities.
I carry a recharging device in my bag–it’s small. I’ve never once thought it might be rude for me to use it because other people also want to recharge. If you can afford an iPhone, you can afford a backup battery.
There is zero reason to be discreet about recharging your phone.
Does that require OP to be discreet, though? She should be able to use her own charger freely.
It’s not as if she had the last piece of bread on a bus full of starving people.
I ride a commuter bus to work every day. They have posted policy about talking on a cell phone but the drivers have no authority to enforce it (ie they can’t kick people off who are violating it). Most people comply but when someone decides the hour long ride is the perfect time to catch up via cell with their BFF, we all get to listen.
What was OP doing wrong? Why did she need to be “discreet” in using her own phone charger? What does she have to be ashamed of?
The other people on the bus could have charged their phones ahead of time or bought their own phone chargers. It’s not like she was eating a feast in front of starving orphans. If other people don’t plan ahead that is not her fault.
The bus driver specifically asked the guy if he was a doctor or otherwise expecting emergency calls. Even that wouldn’t excuse him though. Anyone in that situation should make their own preparations, not try to steal someone else’s, and using “I saw it and I wanted it” is not an excuse.
Certainly it is not a reason to tell a person using their own things as is perfectly normal that they should hide it.
It’s not that it’s polite to be discreet, merely that it is prudent. As illustrated above, crazy people have cell phones too.
Why on earth should OP have to be discreet about it? Charging one’s devices is a part of nearly everyone’s daily life and they should be prepared to deal with it. I have a few power blocks at home, but a recent power outage compelled me to buy two 10,000 mAh. blocks, each of which can recharge a phone five times. I take them with me when we travel, and outside of the direst of emergencies, I would not allow anyone to use them. I’m not about to deprive myself of a potential need to charge my own devices in order to favour someone who doesn’t think ahead.
And that thinking ahead thing goes for everyone I know who doesn’t want to carry a charger in their purse but wants to use my smaller one if their phone dies when we’re out and about. I’m not about to enable anyone else’s need to carry as few items as possible.
It is hard to be discreet with something as large as a brick.
I don’t see why she needed to be discreet. It’s her charging device and she is entitled to use it. Other people might look on with envy, but they have the option to purchase such a thing for next time.
He just up and grabbed your cord?! He didn’t even ask? WTF?
I love you!
It is one thing to ask nicely ”could I please (important word) use your power pack for an emergency?”, and another thing to say ”Me, myself and I want it”.
As a veteran commuter I am reasonable able to tune out people with their ”verbal safety catch on full automatic”, and I could let others use my power pack if it would be possible. But if you just demand, and it is not an emergency: ”Sorry kid, you’re on your own”
For the record; in my world, this kind of behaviour is not gender specific. Nice people and a••h•••s come from any gender, ethnicity, colour or other things.
Seconded. I have a lengthy daily commute and have run into Hugh Glassbowls of every stripe. I’ve had people demand to use my charger, and I’ve been the one asking if anyone has a spare charger, but I’ve never had anyone GRAB it with nary a word before! That’s just so out there!
“Lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part.” and “What I have is mine and what you have is mine too.” runs through my mind. Sheesh.
I think OP was rather restrained. Somebody grabs at my property, the words “deck him” cross my mind immediately.
First of all, I am just so impressed that OP was able to react so quickly. I am afraid that I would have just gaped at the guy for a full minute in complete disbelief. Just…how does this person exist?
Sir Speshul of the Entytled Sneauflaek!!
Wow, I’m speechless. How entitled could a person be?
I remember being on a train once in which the plug sockets were broken. The man opposite me was using a laptop so I asked, nicely, if he would mind letting me plug my usb charger into it. He very kindly agreed.
I just wanted to share that, it was a nice journey. ^_^
This reminds me of the first convention I ever went to. I went as a staff member for a booth that was selling a piece of software. Our setup included several powerful computers, and six large monitors. At this convention, if you need electricity for your booth, you have to pay for it, and you get clearly marked surge protectors that are marked with your booth name, number, and several warnings that they are not to be used by anyone but whoever paid for them. We paid for enough to be certain we had enough power, and have some extra outlets in case we needed to charge a cell phone.
After we set everything up and did several hours of test runs, we shut everything down and closed it all up to go to lunch. We came back and turned everything on because we wanted to have a good idea of how long it was going to take to start stuff up each day, and arrive with more than enough time…so when we started turning everything on, and noticed that some of the monitors were browning out, one wouldn’t turn on at all, and the computers were sluggish, obviously we were worried. If our stuff shorted out before the convention, we’d be out the cost of all the equipment, and the cost of the booth.
So the other two people in the booth are frantically shutting things down while I go under the tables to see what is up with our power strips…I find that every plug is full, and one of our monitors has been unplugged. A slight tug reveals that the cords that are not ours belong to the booth behind us in another aisle.
The owner of my booth goes around to confront the owner of the other booth, and does so as politely as possible for someone who just about lost nearly $10,000 in computer equipment. The owner of the other booth waves him off. So the owner of my booth comes back around and unplugs anything that isn’t ours from our surge protectors. Owner of the other booth comes around and starts cussing and yelling, saying that because the owner of my booth is not convention staff, he has no right to do that.
Owner of my booth used to work for the company that founded the convention. Half of his cell phone contacts are friends of his that still work for the company and are AT the convention working. He calls the one who happens to be in charge of booth registration. The owner of the other booth got REAL quiet really quickly when he realized who the owner of my booth had just called from his personal cell phone. He never actually apologized but we didn’t have any other issues with our computers that weekend.
Interestingly enough, the other booth was banned from the convention a year or two later after it was found to be selling EXTREMELY racist material.
This is exactly why I don’t “make” my preschooler share. Because it’s simply not applicable to real life. As adults, we don’t demand or whine about using something someone else owns or is possessing.
I think maybe this man’s mama taught him that he has a right to anything anyone else has…and he never outgrew this 2-year old mentality.
“Why the driver didn’t make him hang up I don’t know.”
He probably couldn’t. Unless the bus company has a clear rule requiring passengers on their buses to be quiet at night, he had no right to make that demand.
I find it hard to imagine any sane person, however entitled, deciding to simply wrench another person’s (expensive) personal property out of their hands in front of a crowd of witnesses; even the most speshul of snowflakes knows that’s possibly robbery (only possibly, because theft requires intent to deprive the owner permanently) and certainly assault. So I do wonder if this guy was somehow under the impression that OP’s charger and cord were part of the bus equipment, which he had as much right to use as OP, and when OP said “this is mine” he either just wasn’t hearing or thought OP was using playground language (‘Mine! I saw it first!’). That wouldn’t of course excuse his entitlement and assault, but it would make the whole episode a bit more explicable.
This is why I am such a fan of the quiet car on trains. It’s a shame more buses don’t have this; the one I take from NYC to Philly has a “no cell phones” rule that is strictly enforced.
Wasn’t there a case a few years back on a long east coast run one where a very curvy black woman ensconced herself in the quiet car and talked for HOURS and when asked to quiet down or move, got belligerent… they finally took her off at a stop and she uttered the famous bit about she was being disrespected?
Hey, while I know details are good for recall with stories, I don’t think “very curvy black” were necessary modifiers to “a woman.” Stereotypes are already over-highlighted enough.
It was a California to Oregon Amtrak train where the woman was talking on her phone, in the quiet car, for 16 hours.
I put the descriptors in there to try to jog other’s memories, as I remember seeing a picture of the woman as she was removed from the train and that’s what she looked like. It’s true, it doesn’t really matter what she looked like, the only important part was what she did.
A few years ago (actually more like ten 🙁 ) I used to regularly travel with a laptop, phone and chargers. Just as mobile phones started becoming “smart”, and batteries started to last <1 day there was a explosion of people asking to borrow my charger(s) on trains, in stations etc (never had anyone try to "take" a charger though). I eventually got so fed up I got a bag that held the laptop "in place" and the wires could be pulled out of side zips etc. as a result concealed a lot of what else was going on (i.e. there was a dual extension plug in there with a phone charger). Thankful this stopped a 99% of the people bothering me but there was always 1 or 2 every few weeks who were curious as to why I was using a laptop in a bag and would "spot" I was also charging my phone, then conversation would follow a predictable pattern "hey your bags plugged into the wall, that's smart… my battery is rubbish… Wish I thought of that or just remembered to carry a charger with me.. since you're getting the electricity for free can I use yours." I took to charging the phone inside a pocket and only took it out after I was done with charging so people couldn't see I had a phone charger with the laptop.
I’ve reminded myself of a weird run-in I had at a kiosk in a station. The shop was doing a buy one get one free offer on a particular chocolate bar. So I picked up 2 and a drink started to pay. A middle aged (and fairly affluent looking) man then asked if he could have the free one, since I wouldn’t want to get fat eating both. I declined saying I was saving the second for another day. “But I’m hungry now” was his reply. The shopkeeper then suggested he buy two then. “But I only want one and that one is a free one”. I thankful had paid buy this point and ran off while he paid for his paper and argued so more with the shopkeeper.
Pretty cheeky trying to coerce/score a candy bar… Your money, your purchase, your right to do with it as you wish. Moochers can buy their own.
The gall of that guy. Geez.
It’s always seemed strange to me that there are adults around who act like awful children, and that most children don’t throw tantrums when the world doesn’t revolve around them. (I mean no disrespect to the many parents of the world that are dealing with children who DO throw tantrums, because taking care of a child isn’t some easy. textbook thing.) It’s just been my experience that when another human being has annoyed me, 80% of the time it’s an adult acting like a spoiled child. This story is a perfect example.
I once had the misfortune to sit opposite one of these guys on a train. He felt the need to loudly make phone call after phone call, all designed to make it clear to everyone around that he was a very important person, and that his business recommendations were vital. As we were all British, we ignored it, until eventually he hit someone’s boiling point. A guy from another seat stood up, tapped him on the shoulder, and told him to take it outside. “I’m not bothering anyone else,” said the loud jerk, but the guy who’d had the guts to stand up was looking at me. “You’re bothering me,” I squeaked. “Fine,” he said, and walked off into the space between compartments, where we could all hear him rabbiting on. It was a slight victory though.
Not an electronic device story, but one about those who feel entitled. I was on a train one time and it was very cold in the car. I was prepared for this and had a nice wool blanket that I was snuggled under. The lady behind me kept moaning to her seatmate about how cold she was. I got the definite impression she wanted me to give her my blanket. She would say, “I wish I had a blanket like you,” and things like that. The thing is, during this moaning she mentioned she had a sweater in her case but she was going to a party once she arrived at her destination and didn’t want to wrinkle the dress she was going to wear by getting the sweater out of the case. I kept my blanket.
Don’t blame you at all. You were prepared, and she could have alleviated her problem if she just went after her sweater. The snarky me might have offered to SELL her the blanket for like $200 cash. No? Fine. Snuggle back in.