Just Plain Thick

There are two bus stops located along a stretch of road I was driving along today. The first is at a memorial and the second is by a school. They're around 0.25 miles apart. A woman flagged me down right in the middle of the two stops today. I stopped and let her board and after she paid I asked her to wait at either the memorial or school bus next time. She said she'd phoned my company before venturing out (sensible!) and that they'd told her there was a bus stop located by the school (all correct). The punch line, if that's what you call it, was not what I was expecting:

"I wasn't sure how near the school they meant so I thought I'd just stand outside my front gate to make sure."

Bullshit. Complete and utter fucking arse. The lazy cow couldn't be bothered walking to the bus stop - clearly sited outside the frigging school - and so thought she'd flag me down outside her house. She also dropped into the conversation that she wasn't used to catching buses. It shows.

You see buses stop at these things called bus stops. This way, it ensures everyone is treated fairly and that the bus isn't unnecessarily delayed by stopping too often, for example, for the idle wankers who want a personal taxi service at a fraction of the cost.

She asked for the suburb I was heading for he city centre.

The city centre most of my services call at has two major bus stops. On the way in is a row of stops at the far end of the pedestrianised area and beyond that is the second and final stop in the bus station. As I approached the centre, most alighted at the first stop, outside, by the pedestrianised area. She and a couple remained on for the bus station.

Mid-way between the two points, the idle woman got up, strolled to the front and said: "Here please!" Ha! Yeah, right. Now it was pay back time. I tried the old faithful at first, ignoring her completely, in the hope she thought I simply hadn't heard her, but this woman was having none of it. "I said HERE please!"

"I'm sorry, the next stop is the bus station. We only call at the bus stops I'm afraid!"

"Well I want to be at that shop there!" she said, as we whizzed past it at a very satisfying 30mph.

I told her that as it was mid-way between the two stops (a bit like her house) she had to walk regardless of which stop she chose to leave.

Then she started moaning very loudly about how dire the service was and how glad she doesn't have to rely on buses and how rude and ignorant the drivers are. I then lost it. I slammed the brakes on and shouted. JUST SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP AS I COULD CRASH THE BLOODY BUS WITH YOU GOING OFF ON ONE!

All that investment in my Driver CPC and NVQ going right out the window. She sat down and shut up. Perhaps I should mention that at my next training course, that it could be an effective way in which to deal with dickhead passengers?

The sensible thing to do now is back-track, but in such a way that the passenger doesn't know you're doing it. She'd plonked her fat arse down directly behind my cab, so I said fairly loudly that there was CCTV fitted throughout the bus and that my boss takes a personal dislike to passengers distracting the driver and stopping between bus stops and it can compromise safety. I also added that I'd already broken the rules by picking her up in between stops earlier in the route.

The plan was to make her sufficiently aware of how her actions would not be condoned by the depot and so she wouldn't dare phone in to report the incident as her story would effectively drop herself in it.

Needless to say, I've now got a mental image of her and shall be driving past the next time if she flags me down in between stops.

Common Sense Solution: Exactly what I did. Initially point the error out to the passenger (as I did) and hope they learn from it. Many will and many won't, usually in equal measure. If you should find you have a thicko who doesn't quite understand anything you're telling them, you may need to re-emphasise the point in another way, if this presents itself - luckily for me it did when she wanted me to drop her off in between stops. Yes, you'll get hassle but at the same time you're investing in a trouble-free life for the journeys to come as she won't dare recreate the situation. Probably.