With my car in the shop, I took TheBus yesterday. I sat down behind a pretty lady; I would have sat next to her haven't she barricaded herself around with a ton of bags. She read one of the mainstream household mags to endarken herself. You know, the glossy pub that consists of 30 pages of recipes and 30 pages of diets; a DIY article on prostate removal while-U-walk, the weekly prognosis of Elvis sightings, and informative treatises such as "He Has An Affair: What Color Nails To Scratch His Eyes Out With."

Then He-Man appeared.

(Background music: muted, wobbling timpani)

A guy with a face that tells you, you could sell him a bicycle with an air conditioner. Overall looks? In before / after ads he is "during". So dull, every time he wakes up from a nap, there must be a tag on his toe. He walked over to her and stared at her for a whole minute. His two eyeballs rolling closer to each other, he gaped. (A signal for a new paragraph, I presume?) Then he broke the silence:

- Hey, what's yer name ? Where are you going ?

Ugggh! I know not everyone has the maestria of "Hello, may I turn the pages for you?", but this bombed worse than the Alfred P. Murrah federal building. The lady answered with a polite smile. She was headed to Kaneohe.

- Oh really? You are going to Kaneohe ?- the guy repeated, amazed.

Not at all, she plans to hijack this bus to Cuba. That's why she carries purple bikinis in her beach bag, so that she won't scare the penguins there. I know there are no penguins in Cuba. She is carrying them in her 12 other bags.

The lady replied politely yes, she is indeed going to Kaneohe. How about him?

- I hate Kaneohe, you know.

Well, that's a relief... Oh, never mind, I'll just read that prostate article. If anyone seeks me I'm not here... Kudos to this guy for his courage, but he is so awkward, girls probably routinely sit on his face just to shut him up.

- What's your name, again ?

Yay, romance got dispatched with a tomahawk too... The lady repeated her name, patiently.

I noticed she started paying an eager attention to the prostate article, too. I could read her thoughts: "To think is the best other sex we got. Yet he has the self-confidence of a small furry forest critter. If I scare him away he'll talk to women next when he is 56."

Ten minutes of silence.

We arrived to the first stop in Kaneohe. He-Man stayed on the bus, to see more of Kaneohe he hates.

The lady gently took off with her bags.

I helped her carry them home.