We must’ve been separated at birth. Fortunately, I’ve got some heft and muscle behind my movement out the door. I square my shoulders and go forward. I don’t try to lead with just one shoulder to make me skinny (wouldn’t work anyway). (Un)common courtesy says you let people off the train first.
If you’re already late for work, I am sure that your boss will allow you a few extra minutes when you tell him or her of the Public Service you had to perform. But you should piss on Lord Fuckemup before he loses complete conciousness. Just for that extra little bit of humiliation.
A mate of mine is a Sydney train driver, and if anybody asks him what he does for a living, he tells them he’s in the “live spastic export trade”. He’s right. Sydney commuters suck big time. I’ve missed trains because of a crowd of people surging up the stairs ten abreast like a fucken phalanx of fucken dickturds. This isn’t merely not keeping left, but rather just making sure that any downward path simply does not exist. Luckily, I’m 6’4" and built like a brick shithouse, so I just went down anyway yelling hair-curling insults at them the entire way down. Unluckily, I still missed my train and was late for work.
Though the worst are the OMG LOL NOTICE ME sixteen year-old girls who sit right across the bottom step, and there might be room for one commuter at a time to squeeze by one by one - if they deign to allow it.
Loaded Dog, you made me laugh out loud. You can be my new hero.
Bloody, bloody Sydney city is the worst but people at the Quay Make. Me. Weep. Daily.
It’s a double affront when it appears not one other mo’fo in Sydney seems to have the courtesy to realise not everyone wants to dawdle behind them, or bang into them.
There’s an old guy at the gym, he’s there Monday through Friday. He moves pretty slowly and often causes gridlock through the main drag of our locker room. I can’t swear to it, but I’m pretty sure last Friday I heard the guy caught behind him cluck like he was driving a horse.
It’s sad that we’re in so much of a hurry that we lose our humanity.
I used to be in a hurry too but as I age, I’m gaining a new respect for slowing down.
Your story saddens me, El Cid Viscoso.
I came to a conclusion a long time ago. I’m going that way. If you are blocking my only option to go that way, I will not stop. I usually have about a forty pound load of gear on me, and a low center of gravity. And, of course, F=MA. And I have A on my side, too.
Unless you’re having a heart attack, if you’re doing the stop and gawk, you’re going to have a nice, if short, trip.
It may be rude, but I’ve got a deadline to make.
Note: This only applies for public locations and doors. Inside a locker room is something different. As is clocking 80 year old grandmothers)
I not sure of your intended message E-Sabbath. If it is that you have every right to steam roller anyone who impedes your progress at your chosen rate, I must disagree and insist that is no better than the person who impedes the progress of all for no apparent reason. Both say “I am the most important person in the world and up yours.” Run them over because you have a low center of gravity and can do it? Kind of lame. I am hoping you were just using the “Heart attack” exeption as an example not a rule. My wife is legally blind she cannot always move that fast in unfamiliar territory. We try to keep her out of those types of situations, and when we have to be there make sure I or a trusted guide are in place to keep her moving. There are situations which cannot be avoided, we try to be way early, avoid rush times and stay to the side. I hope that your heart attack comment was just that, a flip comment. If not, please reconsider those without obvious disabilities as deserving better than the bowling effect. And I agree with the OP, the guy was an ass, and I have run into far more of those situations than others.
Escalators without stairs? I’m not picturing it. I have visions of a conveyor belt that people stand on with their carts, but then when it gets halfway up they start sliding down, causing a massive pileup at the bottom. I like the word “travelator” though. It’s fun to say!
High five to OP
Surely you’ve got these things in the States, what with you guys’ love of malls (where they are usually found).
A travelator isn’t a rubberised belt like the airport ones. It’s exactly the same as an escalator in construction in that the ‘belt’ is made of grooved metal segments the same size and shape as an escalator “step”. Heck, for all I know they might even use the same template to make the things. The only difference is that it’s not stepped, but the individual plates are flush with one another, and the angle of the thing is much gentler than an escalator. The shopping trolleys (shopping carts to you 'merkins) have wheels without tyres on them. Just nylon (or whatever) wheels with two flanges. These flanges fall into the slots in the tread of the travelator. Behind the back wheels are two little hinged lugs that provide no resistance pushing the trolley forward, but lock into place going backwards. The idea is that you can let go of your trolley on the travelator and it won’t roll back. In theory.
But people don’t take shopping carts from store to store in a mall (unless it’s one they brought themselves). Each store has their own.
I get now that the cart can lock (supposedly) but what about the people? With no steps how do they stand up straight, and avoid sliding back down? Can you find me a picture because I can’t visualize it.
I’m not sure. Generally, a mall has one or two big supermarkets in it (these are the guys with the shopping carts), maybe a department store, and a whole lot of “specialty stores” boutiques, etc. Yes, these latter don’t like the trolleys coming in, but that’s up to their own policy. Normally, I think either the people browsing the boutiques are a different market to the supermarket shoppers, or somehow if people are doing both on the same day, they go to the supermarket last. Whatever it is, people just tend to take their full supermarket trolley/cart to the carpark, unload it, and some pimply fifteen year-old supermarket employee will bring it back.
Um… haven’t you ever walked up a hill?
I tried Googling “Travelator” on images, but got a lot of pics of perfectly horizontal airport-type ones, and those that were inclined weren’t good pictures.
You know that couple of feet at the top and bottom of an escalator where you get on and off? You know how the “stairs” are flat and flush with one another at that point? Imagine them staying like that for the whole distance of their travel to the top. Now, imagine that the angle is much, much gentler than a typical escalator. People walk (or stand still) on it just as they would on a steep sidewalk going up a hill. There’s no weird secret to it.
Ok, I found a picture of one here: http://mightymac.org/gb060.JPG. I guess they are very mildly sloped. It seems like they’d take up a lot of real estate.
So I take it the name “travelator” is interchangable between the flat versions and the inclined versions.
Most of the “travelators” I found in Search are just flat people movers as used often in airports. I love those things. They have them at O’Hare Airport and they’re a godsend when you’re in a hurry, though once I had sandals on and my foot was too close to the edge where the moving sidewalk meets the stationary side, and a screw sticking out tore the hell out of my little toe and the side of my foot. That was painful. I learned to keep my feet away from the edge. Better than dying by one collapsing and being caught in the mechanism though!
While looking for pictures I read about this new high-speed flat version in Paris. It looks like fun! Dangerous, but fun.
I’ve only seen an escalator for carts in Ikea; you lock your cart into position on a small specialized escalator that runs parallel to the one that carries people.
Buddy, get a clue. I’m not a heartless stomper of humans. I’m just saying that, in these situations where some schmuck decides to exit a turnstile and stand in the way, or hang around at the bottom of escalators or at the end of moving walkways, or just stands in a revolving door, and I don’t have an option to go around, I go through.
I’m reasonably good at this whole ‘judgment’ thing, and it’s possible I may make a mistake, but on the whole, I think I’m going to judge correctly.
I’ve been having fun saying “travelator” since yesterday. But sometimes it morphs with the word “elevator” in my speech center and comes out “tralevator”, but it’s okay, since that’s fun to say too.
No, I’ve never seen an inclined one in the U.S., but they look pretty cool. Ignorance fought!
I’ve only seen one of these (and it’s been awhile since I saw it, but then I haven’t been to that store in a number of years) and it was a rubberized one. If you had a cart, you just held onto it (or leaned into it). I loved that thing, I thought it so much more fun than an escalator.
The Zellers here put those in. I was surprised when I first saw them, but thought it was pretty cool. If it were busy though, you’d have to grab your cart fast so there is no backup. That could be worse than someone just stopping at the top I’d think.
Just to give everyone an update: I saw Lord Douchebag again today! And he had Lady Douchebag with him. They were on the escalator (sorry, not the Travelator) a few people ahead of me, engaged in a crucial conversation. It probably involved the destruction of rain forests, eviction of orphans and the plot to keep the 200 mpg SUV away from the American public. The two of them were standing side by side so no one could get past them.
He glanced over his shoulder and did a double take when he saw me. His eyes bugged out. I smiled and waggled my Dunkin Donuts coffee cup at him. He grabbed Lady Douchbag’s hand and practically dragged her up the rest of the steps and out the front door.
Keep in mind that I am average height, average (OK, slightly over) weight, no menacing scars and I don’t have razor blades strapped to my fingers. It felt good to get a look from him like I was going to rip out his intestines and use them for a jump rope.
My mission will continue, though: saving the world from human roadblocks, one dipshit at a time.
“It is better to be feared than loved, if you must take public transit.”
–Niccolo Machiavelli (approximately)
Travelator and Tralevator are now my two most favorite words!
Here’s another piccie of an inclined tavelator. I don’t think they have those anywhere in the US.
erie774, my man, you rock!