NTKOG #94: The kind of tragic/romantic hobo envier who throws caution to the wind — and saves a couple of bucks — by stowing away on the train.
I am: law-abiding; already in possession of a monthly T pass.
I am not: a modern-day hopalong. Or else I would be publishing my memoirs now. Duh.
The Scene: T stop on the B Line in Brighton, near my house. My commute to current temp job consists of a three-stop T ride (which is actually a nice walk, for people with better time management skills than I) followed by a twenty-minute bus ride. Standing at the stop, I tucked my sacred Monthly Link Pass into a Good Vibrations bag in my purse, grabbed a random old stored value card, and prepared to board.
My brilliant scheme was to board from the middle of the car, hold my totally valueless old card up to confuse the driver, then sit pretty for three stops. First snag in the plan: the train huffed up to my face, but the middle doors didn’t budge. I smacked ‘em with my purse, but they sat there, resolute, insurmountable. If anything, smacking them only made them angrier.
“Get up to the front!” growled the driver. Shit. I hopped up in front of her and began pantomiming going through my pockets in search of my hidden T Pass.
“The fare is two dollars!” she bellowed. First one pocket, then the other — I contemplated vaudeville-ishly lifting my fedora to check its lining, but I could actually hear the driver expelling hot air through her nose.
“I’m going to let you out right now,” she menaced, reaching for the lever. Just then, the train started chugging forward. She glared at me as though I were the one driving it. “Fine, but you get out at the next stop.”
To add some credibility to the thing, I continued tearing through my personal effects for the length of the ride, then — afraid of getting fined — prepared to exit through the front door after the train pulled up to the next stop.
“Where you going?” she grimaced. I told her I was getting off, just like she’d asked, and the tension washed out of her cheeks. “Get back on the train, honey. Have a good week.”
I was still smiling by the time I got to the bus stop, and my grin only upped its wattage when I saw the driver: a soft-wrinkled old grandma-type who was all but wearing a sequined cat brooch on her uniform. Absolute cake.
I politely waited for the rest of the (paying) customers to take their places on the bus and, while the bus waited through a long stop sign, stood in front of the driver and began my little pantomime.
“Can’t find your pass, hon?” she asked. I nodded with feigned befuddlement, beginning to nudge toward the aisle. She tilted her head up to me and smiled sweetly:
“Then get off my damn bus.”
Miraculously, my T pass managed to appear before she could physically push me to the street.
The Verdict: Oh hell no. Just purchase your dang subway pass. Much easier on your conscience, your heart, and your atrophied high-school acting muscles.
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While I wasn’t busy with my fugitive lifestyle this week, I was writing my Wednesday post for Secret Society of List Addicts about things my Roomba does that make me want to drop it in a bathtub. Check it out!
Also: Dudes, thanks for your dozens of awesome comments on low-budget eating on yesterday’s post! I’m looking forward to trying your cheapo recipes — starting with the huge pot of lentil soup I have simmering in my slow-cooker!
And as a thank-you for being awesome dudes: anyone want a 10% Off coupon for Good Vibrations? Good for in-store or online purchase. Nothing too exciting, but they handed it to me last time I was there (as though I could love their store any more!) and I thought someone a bit less stocked-up than I might want it.
If you’re interested in saving 10% on a vibrating cock ring, or if you just want everyone who reads this to know you’re a frugal friggin’ fornicator, go ahead and leave a comment on this entry by noon tomorrow. I’ll throw the comments on random.org, choose a person, and mail out the coupon tomorrow.
{ 30 comments… read them below or add one }
Ha, I always have my pass in case they catch me!! The one time I did forget it, though, the machines were down so he couldn’t actually print off a new ticket… so maybe it was just pure luck!
love this one! because i am the kind of tragic/romantic hobo envier who reads jack kerouac and stares longingly after real trains — y’know the ones with freight — out west. the problem is in real life i’m petrified of being caught without my pass or with an old one or without the fare (and really, who ever has $2.25 in exact change?). this is one antic i can’t imagine trying, vagabondish dreams aside.
I’ve never done this in Boston (for obvious reasons, never having been there), but I’ve had lots of buck-shee train rides when I genuinely couldn’t buy a ticket before boarding (is it my fault the ticket office is closed and there are no working machines?) and the inspector never came near me the whole trip!
Or one that was more like this; I managed to board a “pay the driver, change given” bus with 20c and a $10 bill, and ask for a 60c fare! He decided he could not be bothered trying to find $9-40 in change, and no way am I as cute as TKOG!
Yeah, the anxiety would do me in; not worth the free ride!
Just came across your blog via FB and think it’s pretty flippin sweet. Thanks for the entertainment!
This is a favorite trick of mine, but you have to hit it just right. I usually only resort to it when I realize I’ve forgotten to put money on my card. Whoops.
Also – 10% off? Yes plz.
Finally…I just realized I have no freaking clue what a Roomba is.
*sings* “Oh she never returned, oh she never returned and her fate is still unlearned….”
ha! i love that the sweet looking old broad told you to get off her damn bus. awesome.
You are brave girl!!! I have never stowed away, but if I did I think I’d like it to be on a train. Like in the old Western movies… but maybe I’d settle for a bus. I’m supposed to go to Boston in a few weeks… maybe I’ll try it out!!
Oh my god. I can’t believe you purposefully irritated T drivers! I live in fear of them taking their wrath out on me.
One time, I had a monthly pass on my card, but the bus reader refused to read it. The driver started to yell at me when I insisted that I had a monthly pass, and he relented. Being a woman helps, I think.
Whenever I have tried to cheat my way onto a bus, the driver was just too jaded, tired, or thought he was too hip to care. Free rides have abounded xD To be fair, I always have the cah JUST IN CASE.
it’s harder on the T, actually, especially if you’re at a stop where you have to swipe to get onto the platform let alone the train. Lame. However, sometimes there are just no T officials in the area so just slip in behind someone else. If no one is around to hear the alarm…did it go off?
Dude, you are a FUGITIVE! I never would have guessed!
The T has messed with my schedule and my life far too many times (cue mad crowds of silly sports fans), and we have a very stormy relationship. I take my victories where I can.
I enjoyed reading that quite a bit. I don’t think I’d have the balls to do all that, but I’m certainly glad you did.
SECRET SOCIETY OF LIST ADDICTS?? Oh, how have I not discovered this before??
I am so glad I don’t have to take public transit, because I’d lose my card every day AND be too scared to be a fugitive. Seriously. I’d have more anxiety than I do now, and that’s saying something.
This reminds me of the days when the T was transitioning from using tokens to using Charlie Tickets/Cards. Rather than have tellers collect the money (probably because there aren’t multiple windows at a lot of the stations or any at all at the above grounds stations to handle the masses of traveling Bostonians) they would just set out a cardboard box with “please pay here” written with your standard, classy sharpie. The extent of my rebellion was not paying, while others definitely mocked the system by throwing in rubber bands and jacks. Like, actual jacks…which I thought only existed in cartoons when people emptied their pockets and in the early 90s.
This is something we can’t get away with on the bus or subway in Glasgow, but trains are a whole different story. Because not all stations are manned, you get a lot of people on trains without tickets or passes – I’ve gotten away with it myself on quite a few occasions, but not intentionally!
True this; it was the “Blue Trains” (which you’ll understand; for everyone else it’s the commuter heavy rail network in and around Glasgow) I was talking about too.
haha, I know of this friend…who buys passes for underground trains but always ends up saving it because she somehow or another manages to get on the other side of the automatic barrier by shoving the guy infront who has just gotten his pass scanned!
i used to do this every once in a while when i lived in france and would take a tram every day. i nearly had a heart attack each time i tried… so not worth it for this goody two-shoes!
I believe in the “Over Fifty” rule. Just look dazed and confused, which actually is not far from the truth. We (Dad and me) have never been able to buy a ticket from any mass transit machine without assistance worldwide. Your Roomba article was a hoot. (It’s a little machine that propels itself and picks up dust bunnies etc. from the floor.)
I can work, and even program, a computer, or a personal video recorder, so WTF are automatic ticket machines so frigging complicated?
Ken O, dear, are you a member of the “Over Fifty Club” or is the cold weather affecting your kilt? When traveling one must have the correct currency, know which direction one is going and be able to read the language: not easy when you are dazed and confused.
Neither thanks Mom; I’m 47, and my complaint about automatic ticketing machines is that the interfaces are so massively non-intuitive!
Add to that the number that seem to have issues with accepting notes, or even coins sometimes…
Now I understand Ken O dear. You were agreeing with me that ticketing machines are difficult to understand. I thought you were attacking my lack of skills. Thank you for your compassion.
I love that your Mom comments on your blog. :)
Thank you, dear for the support. I’m also proud of TKOG’s
keen alliteration, but I would not say so due to the content.
haha, I am blessed with one of the all-time truly cool moms.
I’ve done that before. The DC metro drivers have all been cool about it but I’ve only done it because I remember that I don’t have my card or money right as I get to the stop and am too lazy to go back to my apartment.
When I was in high school in Mexico, I used to take buses to school. These were buses that were old and decomissioned in the US and brought over to Mexico to be used as public transportation.
Once I had no money on me. Nothing – and I was already at the bus stop waiting to go home when I realized this. I needed to get home but what to do with zero cash? I waited for the fullest bus possible (where I lived, buses seemed not to have any schedule whatsoever. They came randomly) and when I saw a bus approaching with people nearly hanging out the door, I flagged it down. I got in, barely managing to be inside before the door closed. I couldn’t reach the driver and so didn’t pay. At one stop, a few stops before my house, a bunch of people got off, so I did too. I only had to walk home about half a mile.