One Crazy Night on the Metro

I don't know why it has taken me a few months to actually post this, but I feel this adventurous night on the Metro is worth sharing. I love experiencing such delightful evenings on the Metro, and I know you do too.

Let's start off by talking about my favorite thing in the whole wide world (it is opposite day, obviously): Waiting 15 minutes for a train at night. I was in the Rosslyn station heading west on the Orange line for Ballston. It was about 11pm on a Wednesday night. And 15 minutes was what the sign said, but I'm pretty sure they were delayed beyond that. When the train finally came, all of us on the platform excitedly made our push for the opening doors. To our not so pleasant surprise, the train was packed. A train packed during rush hour is just the way it is - but a train packed late at night never makes for a good ride home. Strangely enough, nobody would move within a few feet of the opposite side door, creating a bit of a jam trying to get in. We are all used to tourists and stubborn locals alike refusing to spread out, but this wasn't quite the same.

As I squirmed my way through the late night, mostly drunk and boisterous crowd, I suddenly figured out why nobody was over by the other door. Somebody had puked, thrown up, upchucked, spewed all over the floor! How excellent. The next few stops, the doors opened on the puke side and every single person coming and going had choice words to share with the rest of us. Most people getting on pointed at the closest person and accused them of making the mess...but most likely, the perp was long gone. But the most fun part of this evening, which included long waits, sardine can like train cars and awesome puke on the floor, was yet to come.

When the train got to Ballston, just about everyone in the car got off and headed for the lone working UP escalator (surprise, surprise). Everyone except one man, that is. One very, very drunk homeless-esque man with a long scraggly beard and tattered clothes. In his highly intoxicated state, he started walking up the DOWN escalator. Now kids do this crap all the time to be funny, but I don't think this guy was out to get laughs. I don't think he had any clue that he was even "out". He made it about 4 steps up the escalator and then BAM. He fell backwards down the escalator, which of course was going down. His drunkenness and desire to walk up the wrong way combined with a working down escalator lead to one of the saddest yet secretly hilarious things I have ever seen. Am I going to hell? (Don't answer that)

He proceeded to roll into a ball at the bottom of the escalator and started rolling over and over again at the bottom. There were literally hundreds of people around who were just frozen in awe at what was happening, but after a few bounces of the human ball, a good samaritan reached his hand out to help up the man. Somehow this woke up the bouncer and he let out a hellish sound at the guy trying to help while he jumped to his feet and pushed aside the onlookers. He wanted no help and he wasn't about to be grateful. He made a dash for the closing doors on the Metro car (of which I'm pretty sure he had gotten off of before this all happened) and got stuck in between the doors. Some more good samartians on the train did their best to pull open the doors to let the guy in and then the train took off down the orange line. The crazy bouncy man never to be seen again.

All of that in one short Metro ride = One Crazy Night on the Metro. And to think, I probably could have walked in less time...