Metro Bus Dashing

Our apartment workout room had a water leak problem and is shut down indefinitely, but have no fear, DC has its very own athletic training program!  It involves such activities as heavy lifting:

His & Hers

balancing acts:

and my personal favorite... the Metro Bus Dash!

Thanks to my class schedule and work schedule, I get double the opportunity to participate in the Bus Dash, and today I was 3 for 3 on dashing to catch the bus! 

Me and the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority  (or as I affectionately call it, WMATA. That's sounded out like Wuh-mod-uh) have been on great terms these past few days. This is in part due to the fact that Smartrip cards can be reloaded online now! This is simply terrific. I can pay with my credit card instead of carrying cash, and I can buy bus passes ahead of time! WHOO HOO! 

 Furthermore, and this is huge, WMATA's website (did you say wuh-mod-uh or did you spell out the letters? If you spelt out the letters, go back and read it again! Wuh-mod-uh is much more fun and DC-hip as I learned on this trip over a year ago) now has a Next Bus function that tracks the buses coming to your stop with a GPS and gives you a countdown on how long you have until the bus gets there! I TOLD YOU THIS IS HUGE, PEOPLE! 

Gone are the days of waiting patiently... and then unpatiently... and then seething in anger... at the bus stop!

Patiently..............................................Unpatiently.......................................Seething in Anger

Unfortunately, sometimes the buses still outrun me. I give you two stories. One turns out successfully and the other, in a roundabout way, also turns out successfully!

Story 1:

It's early morning, and I am coralling my various books and cords and snacks into my backpack. I check my phone for the lastest countdown on bus arrivals and I see... 5 MINUTES... I packed with lightening speed! I fastwalked to the elevator! I mashed the elevator button extra hard!  I alighted at lobby level with determination in my step!

And there I saw the bus arriving at my stop.  This is when the dash began! In my dress clothes and heavy backpack and with coffee cup securely in hand, I sprinted outside and across two streets when I didn't have a light but no cars were coming! I dashed across the gas station, and I knocked on the bus doors right before the driver pulled away! SUCCESS!  I then set down and caught my breath for the remainder of the trip, hahah. It was quite classy.

Story 2:

My class ends and I check my trusty Next Bus app for bus arrivals and I see... de ja vu! 5 minutes! Except this time, my school was quite a distance from the bus stop.  It was a sad day as I watched, detained on the other side of the street, as the bus pulled up and pulled away. I still dashed, don't get me wrong, but it was insufficient.  I said this was a success though, and it is! It was a beautiful day in DC -- crisp fall chill in the air, not too sunny, not too cloudy -- and another bus was not coming for 20 minutes, so I decided to walk along my bus route and catch the bus later on!

Great decision! I saw all sorts of pretty buildings that I usually don't pay too much attention to because I am reading for class!  I passed the International Monetary Fund and the Chamber of Commerce:

Please be prophetic, oh sign on the government building!

I saw this pretty church that reminds me of the Dominican Republic

And I saw this building. Lots of people were there, but I have no clue what it is.

Just kidding! Ha ha I crack myself up. It's weird how close the White House is to my school, but I haven't walked down to it since moving here .  I am sure if I had asked, President Obama or the First Lady would have invited me up for tea, but I was in a rush. Maybe next time, First Family!

In front of the White House.

 In the end, I enjoyed the pretty fall day and took in the pretty DC sights, and waited at the bus stop a grand total of 2 minutes!  AND... I got to work with one minute to spare.

SUCCESS.

--Catie