Dear Escalator Man

To the dick on the escalator this morning who - when I asked him to move so I could walk up the escalator - responded, "Use the stairs" and refused to let me by ...

Since when did getting on an escalator paralyze you? Are you a cripple?

That's OK, dear cripple. I understand taking your aggressive frustrations out on strangers. It's better than keeping that anger pent up and taking it out on your wife or your kid. And please don't kick the dog, either.

Fuckhead.

So did I say this to Cripple Escalator Man? No - I would have, but what stopped me was my employer. Yup, the job. Every potential person out there is a client or coworker or funder or on the board. So I'm just as passive aggressive in posting this message here instead of letting these words leave my lips and enter his ears.

This incident really makes me so perplexed. In DC - our lovely (and I'm sincere in using that word) capitol - people stand on the right and walk on the left. It's lovely. It's systematic. It's expected. It works!

In NYC, a place with a ba-zillion people, there are no escalator rules. Why? Of any place, NYC needs it the most! How many people are on escalators at any one time? A LOT! Some simple rules, some simple etiquette, would make the whole thing work so well. And not only that, but you'd be able to pick out the tourists from the natives. OK, it's pretty easy to do that already, but there are some cases. In DC, I could always tell the tourists because they didn't know the rules of living and functioning in an urban place.

OK, now I have to work. Good thing I didn't have my knitting needles with me, or I might have stabbed him (that's a joke, internet police).