Stirred

A funny thing happened today as I was riding home on the Metro. Very ... odd.

After the Grosvenor-Strathmore station, the train goes into the underground tunnel on its way towards downtown. It honked the horn, which is not abnormal, and honked a lot, which is a little abnormal but not terribly strange. I was reading made-up case law for mock trial and wasn't paying attention when the train came to a dead stop in the middle of the tunnel. Not terribly unusual.

I did pay attention when half of the door (only half) nearest me opened, and two Metro employees climbed in with flashlights and bright yellow vests and what looked like purple gas masks? One of the guys banged on the conductor's compartment and said "THANKS HAPPY NEW YEAR MAN" and then the train kept going. The two Metro dudes stood around reading newspapers that they picked up from the floor of the train.

Then, one of them said "we're in Bethesda," talked to the conductor for like 10 seconds, and went back to reading the paper. Between Bethesda and Friendship Heights, the train stopped again in the middle of nowhere, the shrimpy white pasty dude got out his keys, crouched down and opened the door, and the two Metro dudes jumped down and disappeared.