Today on my way to the last lecture of this semester, I noticed that catching a tramway is kind of like a Hit Jump and Run computergame. Now, I’m a rather convenient person, meaning I’m lazier than you and probably lazier than anyone you know, so running to catch a tram is normally out of the question. Well, today I was late, and I really wanted to catch that tram. So when I noticed it speeding past me, heading to the stop where I was supposed to get in, I knew I’d have a chance if I started into a full-blown sprint. So I did. Well, it wasn’t exactly a full-blown sprint. It was more like gentle running. Actually, it was a bit more than a quick stroll. But that’s not the point. The point is, when I started to quicken my pace, suddenly there were obstacles everywhere. Imagine your favourite Hit Jump and Run, like Supermario or what’s that hedgehog thing rolling around a 2-D screen, and you’ll have a vague idea what it was like to catch that tram.
First of all, there’s frozen snow covering each side of the sidewalk, forcing me to run on a strip about as wide as a Number 2 pencil. Then there’s people who suddenly decide that walking a straight line is dull, so they start walking in serpentines, almost pushing me into a guy unloading crates from a truck. Crates which he then pushes into my path, giving me the options of either crashing into them or doing a deadly swerve, which will most definitely cause me to land face down in a dirty pool of molten snow. I swerve and somehow avoid falling, only to realize that the woman now in front of me is approximately 200 years old, and the stick she’s using is not mere decoration, but the only thing separating her from the cold, wet, hard concrete. I don’t know how she’s managed to be in front of me, as walking doesn’t seem to be on her mind at the moment. I don’t have time to investigate that matter any further, because the tram is now at my stop, people getting out and in, and if I don’t circle that woman NOW it’ll be gone when I get there. So I do circle her, carefully avoiding even the lightest of touches, lest she falls and breaks both her legs (not to mention the stick), and prepare for the last few meters.
Just when I think everything’s going to be fine, a truck the size of Liechtenstein appears from the right, threatening to crush me under one of its house-sized tires if I don’t come to a halt. So I do, and after a split-second of pondering what to do next, I opt for something absolutely insane: I circle the truck as well! It turns out to have been one good choice, because now there’s just me and that tram, and I notice the small button attached to the sliding doors flashing its green lights, inviting me to just push it so the doors will open and envelope me into its warmth. A few steps and I’m there, and I know it would be really tragic if the doors didn’t open up anymore and the tram drove off, but since I’m devoted to the truth here, I’ll have to disappoint you. In a nice and clean Hit Jump and Run manner, I hit that final button, ending the level called “Catch the Tram” and the doors open up. I’m in.
So, that’s what it’s like to chatch a tram.
***Edit: *** And that’s what it’s like to make an ass of oneself…of course it’s not Hit and Run, but Jump and Run. Maybe if that truck had been a bit quicker, it would have been.