I used to love standing on the footplate of a Routemaster Bus. I trained myself to jump on and off them at high speed. One way or another, what with me getting MS at around the time when they began to disappear from the streets of London, route by route, those days are over.
In August 2003 the skill came in very handy. A power cut had left most of London without electricity for a day and, of course, consequently without tube trains. At rush hour I was trying to get a bus from Liverpool Street Station to the centre to meet Lisa. Bus after bus came and went, they were all absolutely packed and there were hundreds of people clamouring to get on them. In time I jumped onto a Routemaster bus and hung from the pole. It was unbearably crowded. A businessman kept complaining to himself, slightly drunk as he was he thought that commenting on the unpleasantness of the situation and on the people around him was amusing. He was a nasty piece of work. I told him to be quiet when he began to pick on a lady who he described as 'little miss fatty' and, in response, he pushed me off the bus, which was travelling at quite a pace. My feet touched the ground running and I didn't break my neck.
I got to the centre eventually, drenched by the pouring rain, and Lisa and I dined at some restaurant on Villiers Street. I had pasta with mussels (I ate fish and seafood in those days, I was only half a vegetarian I'm sorry to say) and we argued (which wasn't unusual).
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