a barney fife sense of security

So there i am this morning, sitting on the #18 bus east into Downtown LA, for 40 minutes in heavy traffic stuck on a bridge over the freeway, only 2 blocks from my train stop. The driver cannot open the doors to let us out because on this bridge there is no real sidewalk to deposit us onto, so all of the passengers are trapped.

This leg of my commute (the bus part) is usually a 2 or 3 minute ride, so at this point I know that I'm already late for work.

And this being LA, at 8:30 am the temperature outside already 65, but the bus, with no windows that open has, of course, no AC, and the ambiance is that of an overheated boy's locker room, so the misery and anger quotient just gets higher...

I make my way to the driver, just to try yo overhear what he may know:

"...%$#@*&^! film shoot, I think. Dispatcher wont tell. And I gotta go, man..."

Passenger: "It's not a shoot, that's way too much cops and shit."

I don't bother them further...

Suddenly, a break appears in the traffic and we move to the intersection, so he let's us out, and I walk over to the train stop, only to find a mini-police state, full of LAPD upstairs, Sheriffs down below, and a couple of squads of roaming ill-defined security types.

Let's just say I didn't want to be in the metro underground right then.

After a few transit-pass checks I make it to my train, where we promptly sit for another 10 minutes. Rumors pass amongst the passengers, as well as discussions of earthquakes,film shoots, bombs, and riots.

Nice.

Right as the train lurches to a start, two of the stranger uniformed cops come in and stand at the front of the train car. They're both wearing sunglasses, both male and Caucasian, one is 6 foot 3 or 4, the other almost a foot shorter, and both look like musclebound goons ready to split the ugly brown polyester uniforms they've been poured into.

So I ask the shorter one "What's all the fuss?"

And he looks around nervously and says "A suspicious package-"

Beefy Tall interrupts: "It's a film shoot."

Beefy short stammers: "We were told to-"

Tall: "Film shoot."

I thank them as we pull out of the underground tunnel, into the light rail right of way, and into the sunshine of the morning.