Seattle has a real fall!

I am pleasantly surprised with Seattle and it's fall. I hate to come off as a downer Debbie, but I had the impression that fall in Seattle would be blah filled with rainy, overcast days. But, no sir! The fall here has been great! It cannot compete with Kansas' beautiful display of colors accompanied by wonderfully crisp weather, but it is still allowing fall to be my favorite season away from home. Many of the trees have changed colors and it reminds me of my days on KU's campus. I feel as if it provides me a little chance to sneak away into another world, which is nice when my days have been getting really long and busy. The drive across the 520 floating bridge into Seattle has been even better as well. There's nothing like driving over a beautiful lake and seeing fall colored-trees along the edges. Beautiful I tell ya! (a side note to that bridge--one day it was super windy and water was splashing over the sides...is that scary to anyone else but me? I've seen way too many 20/20s where they show cars being enveloped by water...gulp!)

So, in recent weeks I have developed a love hate relationship with the bus that goes as follows:
Love:

• Convenience of not having to drive. Bonuses for that include: mucho savings on gas and ample opportunities to catch up on school reading, leisure reading, or sudoku playing
• Relaxation times before and after busy days. I have been blessed with the ability to nap in most places and the bus seems to be a good place to utilize these skills.
• I don't have to find a parking spot, pay for a parking spot, and walk far to get to my parking spot.
• My bus picks me up right in front of my apartment and drops me off right in front of my building--so convenient.

Hate:

• The fact that I have to transfer. I have gotten lucky, a whopping let's say two times, to quickly get off one bus to see that my next bus is right behind. Usually I have to wait, anywhere from 10-20 minutes. If I'm waiting for 20 minutes at the end of the day, I am NOT happy.
• The bus drivers always like to go on break right when I'm about to get home. They stop at the transit center and make everyone get off. Grr! Just take me home already!!! Thankfully Jared picks me up to keep me from going completely insane.
• People who stare. A girl the other day looked over at me about every 15 seconds. Yes, I am still sitting on the bench. Yes, I am waiting for a bus just like you. I can be the occasional starer, but people, be discrete!
• People who think their bags need a seat for themselves. Sometimes the number of available seats can be limited and the last time I checked, bags are not considered people and should not require the space of an entire seat to themselves. It's just irritating.
• (One last thing) People who don't move out of your way when you try to get on the bus and it's already packed to the front with people standing. That just happened to me and I'm not exactly sure what the two ladies who didn't move expected me to do. You're not allowed to pass the yellow line that separates the aisle from the driver's space but these ladies didn't move and seemed awfully bothered by me trying to squeeze through. Bizarre and irritating.

I don't mean to come off as someone who whines a lot and complains, but it is nice to release these feelings of dislike for the bus. In a perfect world UW would be in a town like Lawrence but then again, having a campus in such a big city has been really neat. Once you get past the idea of being super scared (during orientation, they talked about safety for quite some time), it's really easy to enjoy. Sometimes I think about how I would have never expected little old Kansas girl me to be living this way. I must say, I am proud of myself. : )