jinian | take all of us

The day before yesterday, during lunch, I got sunburned. I only spent half an hour out on the deck at work, for heaven's sake. But my shoulders hadn't seen much daylight recently, so the reflection off the narrow strip of water between boats plus the reflection off the office windows plus the actual sun was enough to mildly toast them. Large amounts of aloe later, they are now fine.

The day before yesterday, after work, I took the bus home. But not just any bus. It was the geek bus.

About halfway home, people in the back started talking about language fluency, and said something about knowing thirty verbs. "I know thirty verbs in English!" said someone who sounded like a native speaker, and proceeded to list some. That's when I started paying attention. It was a wonderful example of word association. He started with movement words, and took sideways leaps to other verbs that sounded similar. It all reminded me of the horseshoe questions from Huggermugger, but from a completely different angle. Memorable quote: "'Stick'! It's a verb! I stick, you stick... he or she sticks..." (Okay, so it was the tone -- theatrically faltering, trying to justify himself -- I identified with and laughed at.)

There was me, reading my Vorkosigan book. (I think I was up to Brothers in Arms.)

One woman, proving that you never can tell who's a fan, was reading a Star Trek Communicator with Scott Bakula on the front.

But the thing that made me sure it was The Geek Bus was the woman sitting across the aisle from me and a little forward. She was reading printed out Buffy/Spike fanfic. Best 74 ride ever.