Get On The Bus
I feel I should take a second to complain about the busses.
No, not about how they’re always late when you need them to be early and always early when you need them to be late. Or how they’re too expensive. Or how people talk loudly on their cell phones or listen to music without regards for their fellow passengers.
Just the busses in general. Literally. They have completely revamped the bus system in Århus. Starting this week. They say it’s a really good thing and that it will offer better service to the passengers. Can you guess whether I agree or not?
It has nothing to with improving service. It’s all about cutting costs and making a profit. Which is not in and of itself a bad goal. But I get a little tired of hearing how it’s an improvement when they have in fact totally destroyed things for me. I usually used two bus lines. One of them is now gone. The other is redirected and close to useless, for my purposes. So it’s really rather problematic for a visually impaired person like myself.
I used to be able to take the bus in a straight line from the shopping center around the block to my place to my parents’ place to the playground. I used that bus line several times a week. Now it has been redirected. It no longer goes near the shopping center or my parents. Not really the playground either. If I take the bus now then I’ll have to get out and walk through the park to get to the playground. Plus they have changed the frequency of the line. It used to go every 15-20 minutes. Now it goes every 30 minues. While the ‘major’ bus lines go every 7-8 minutes. You only have to wait 7-8 minutes for a bus?! What a great improvement! If you live in central Århus where all the major bus lines go to and fro, that is. Too bad if you live out in the suburbs…
It’s not really a giant problem for me right now. The weather is nice and my back exercises have helped so much that I can walk from my apartment to the playground without being in too much pain. It’s worse when I have to go back. I used to be able to take the bus straight from the playground to the shopping center so I could do some shopping after having spent time with the goats. Now I’ll have to walk through the park, take a short bus ride, walk past my apartment to the shopping center and walk back. After having been out and about for hours that’s not going to be good for my back, especially not when carrying goods from the shopping. So that’s annoying. But it will be even worse when winter comes. That’s already bad because I can’t stand the cold with my poor blood circulation. And of course when the snow and ice comes… well I probably won’t be going to the playground as much when conditions get bad. Stumbling blindly along on ice is not fun. And I’ll have to do a lot more of that with this bus system. It’s like they looked at that plans and thought to themselves “how can we make things as bad as possible for Plume?”. I’m sure that’s how it went down.
It’s also a bother for my dad, who’s always happy to come over and help me with things. Good thing they live so close by.
But it really does suck and it’s a major, major bother and a decrease in quality for me. So if they could shut up about what a big improvement it is, I’d be happy. ier.
I could also complain about the computer, but I won’t. So…
The End.
August 11th, 2011 at 3:37
If you want my advice, you can either fuss and fume or you can complain to the bus people. Or contact your low-vision helpful advocate person to get advice on changing buses or tell them how difficult it’s making it to be independent.
Things are hard enough for you as it is, they (the transportation people and the low-vision advocates) need to realize just how inconvenient it is for you and maybe there are other people just like you that don’t like it either.
I know you won’t complain, but even if you write a letter to your local newspaper, you might feel better. I’m sorry you’re having to deal with these changes. I don’t take to big changes very well myself either.
And then there are those Zombie Goats on the loose again . . .
August 13th, 2011 at 20:48
Debster – But I like to moan and complain about things!
Writing a letter to the bus company isn’t a bad idea. Although they’ll hardly change things just for my sake. But hopefully there are lots of other people inconvienenced by this. ‘We shall see.
It’s not the end of the world though. I’ll survive. Maybe it’ll finally push me to move to the apartment block up by the playground.
August 14th, 2011 at 0:03
Yes, I think you could write a very good letter to the bus company. You could say how you feel about the changes and also compliment them (if you can) about some of the good things about riding the bus – friendly drivers, etc.
Do you have an opportunity to move? That’s great that you have some options. You could move or not move, but you still have a choice.
I’ve been saving money for an appointment to the eye doctor and to get new glasses. I found out I might get a discount since we belong to AARP. It took some doing, but I found out my regular eye doctor participates so I will get somewhere between 30 – 40% discount on my lenses and frames.
My doctor didn’t know about the AARP discount, but when I looked it up online again, I made some copies and mailed it to them. They were then able to see that yes, they do honor the discount if you are a member.
So I go to the eye doctor on August 25th. It’s been about 4 years and my lenses are starting to get scratched along with my sunglasses. I wonder if the goats and donkey will notice when I get new frames? They seem to notice everything else. Hee, hee
We did some hoof trimming on the goats this afternoon before supper. It went really well considering we haven’t had rain and their hooves are super dry and hard. We haven’t been able to convince the goats to stand in a bucket of water for a manicure/pedicure to soften their hooves.
Next time I will feed the cats first as they wanted to be right under my nose as I’m trimming hooves. My husband had hold of the boys’ horns while I trimmed and shooed cats away. At least Snickers didn’t come up. She’d be worse than the cats if she got in the way!
August 14th, 2011 at 7:34
Hiya Plume! How annoying with the busses! In Norway it is possible to get free transportation for neccesary errands if you are handicapped, you might want to check that out in your neck of the woods for when winter comes…at least you’d be able to get to Føtex without freezing your toes off!
August 17th, 2011 at 22:14
Debster – Well I’m still on the waiting list for a new place. Haven’t had any offers in a long time though. And I’m not sure I want to move after all. But we’ll see how I cope with the busses and other things. Maybe if something opens up in the goat pen…
Good luck with the glasses! I’m sure the goats will think you look even better than usual. My goats seem to have adjusted to the filter glasses I now wear. Sometimes I wonder if they can see my eyes through the filters or if they’re too dark. But they seem to have adjusted and don’t seem to think I’m some stranger behind the new glasses. So that’s good.
I didn’t know cats eat goat hooves!
Katrine – yes, we have something similar in Denmark. Unfortunately I don’t think going to see goats is considered an necessary errand. CRAZY I know! And luckily Føtex is just around the corner so even during winter it shouldn’t be too hard for me to go shopping there. It’s more getting to and from the playground that’s a problem. But I’ll manage, it’s not like 80 days around the world or anything!