When saving $30 on a Lyft means 3 hours longer transit time

The shortcomings of Dallas Area Rapid Transit were displayed again today after I finished jumping through the hoops to get the exact same medication I tried to get my regular doctor to prescribe 3 weeks ago. That would be Gabapentin 300 mg, take one before going to bed. It took less than a half-hour to get that done because that’s literally the first thing doctors go to when dealing with pain from neuropathy…

But that was just the beginning of the fun. I decided to spend $3 on a day pass and walk to the closest bus stop. Google Maps claimed it was just over a mile away. They lied. After hobbling around for almost a mile and a quarter because of having to detour around missing sidewalks and cross a major stroad 3 times (yes that’s a real word, look it up) that had 3 lanes of travel in both directions and multiple turn lanes (seriously, one intersection had 2 left turn lanes and a right turn lane, another had the same number but swap left and right), plus deal with one intersection that did not have crosswalks between any of the corners I would have taken (seriously, no crosswalk of any kind between corners located in different towns so nobody is responsible for one).

Then after finally staggering to the bus stop it was a 25 minute wait for the bus that was actually on time (I was shocked, too) and 3 buses and 3 hours later I staggered to Casa de El Poeta just shy of 4 hours after I left the doctor’s office. I pondered stopping at Harbor Freight and getting a box of nitrile gloves for working with the epoxy to repair the broken mug I showed earlier, but by that time I was on the road for over 2 hours and would have had to tack on another hour of travel time to catch the next bus to make it 5 hours from the doc’s office. I was tired, and more than a little hungry by this time.

When I got home I was dealing with swollen feet and left leg plus the balance issues I get when my legs get tired, but I managed to not fall down this time until I got to the couch, so it didn’t count. If I don’t hit the ground or the floor, it doesn’t count as an actual fall.🙃🤕

Addendum: I heard there is some research on gabapentin for relief of tinnitus that might explain why I didn’t have the tinitus until about a year after the wreck which was a few months after they stopped using Neurontin because I had seizures right after the wreck (in the ambulance and in the ER).

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I am getting so tired of this

Seriously, it happened again. I tried to catch a bus that never came again, which I think makes at least 4 times so far this year. I was there 10 minutes early, waited until the Lyft got there almost 20 minutes after the bus was scheduled to be there. Seriously, I was eyes on the stop by 1801 on a 1811 schedule and summoned the Lyft at 1816, and it got there about 1828. The time I hit the “Summon” button was when the bus was officially “late” by being five or more minutes behind schedule.

Seriously, this s#!+ has got to stop. If I can’t depend on the bus being there after a certain time of night even when scheduled then I’m stuck at home after dark.

It happened again, but I managed to get something done

We didn’t have bus service again this evening, this time just after 1800. I only traveled a bit over a mile to get my toes done and a haircut, but I was also supposed to deposit a check and get some cash to pay the lawn guy, which I could have done if the bus had come so I could use the ATM at the bank. Now my toes are great, and my hairs are cut, but I had to walk almost a mile to get home because I walked for almost 40 minutes just to get to the bus stop I would have gotten off at. This was about ²/₃ of a mile from the nail place and barbershop and another 0.4 mile from home. This makes either 2 or 3 times I tried to catch the 513 after 1800 and no bus. And also no bus coming for the next schedule, because I would have seen it coming before I got off the main road for the 0.4 mile trip to the house.

And I should say that by the time this gets posted “this evening” will be “last evening”.

Technically it was yesterday for this post, but since I haven’t been to bed yet today sucked

And as usual most of the suckage came from our transit system. I got there way early. The bus got there way late. I had a 1330 appointment for getting my taxes done, the bus schedule said the bus would be there 1307, I got there 1259, the bus got there 1325. Just a touch late, but I got to the tax preparer office at 1331. And because of the tax forms that went with the dissolving the trust I’ll have to go back next week to sign the documents. But next year we can use the EZ form, because I will just have incomes, taxes withheld, and standard deductions to deal with instead of endless itemization. Seriously there were like two dozen sources of income that had to be accounted for, and taxes that were withheld from them, and that meant two lines of data entered on the form, one each in two different areas.

As for the rest of the stuff I usually write about, I had too much else on my plate to even think about it. Besides the endless waiting for the bus, I also had reminders of why I haven’t had a steady job outside the house in nineteen years. Seriously, I had to lie down and let my leg resume normal size and shape for a couple of hours. It took almost as much time for the swelling to go down as it took to get that way. I did manage to spend too much money getting a fountain drink from the restaurant next to the tax place. That’s something I haven’t done much since this time last year. At first that was because Mrs. the Poet was sick and we couldn’t leave the house

It’s true! I honestly didn’t think about any vehicles, much less the Sprint-T, all day during the preparations and trek. I had taxes on my mind for the trip out when I wasn’t cursing DART for being so unreliable, and I still had taxes and DART unreliability on my mind along with how much my leg was hurting from having to stand and wait for the bus. Then I had the mail, and taking care of some social media stuff. I took care of some of the social media stuff while I was letting the swelling go down in my legs, then we had dinner. Then I got caught up on web comics and blogs, started going through my e-mail from the last few days, and posted this blog post.

And now everybody is up to speed and I’m ready to get back to bed.