stand to the right, you escalump

so if by some chance you haven't noticed it yet - tourist season is upon us. is it just me or do they seem to get worse and worse every year? i feel like they're purposely moving as slow as possible in order to annoy every last commuter. also, do they not notice that NO ONE else is talking in the morning? there is most definitely an unwritten rule that you don't talk on the morning commute - and every last one of them breaks it. ugh.

and then there's the escalators. where do i even begin? if you have no idea what i'm talking about go check out this classic wapo article on the subject. this woman nailed the subject. and she got some killer quotes in the process. the last line of the article is by far my favorite: She expertly insinuated herself into an empty space to her right, then to her left, weaving around them, like a running back. "I've become quite an expert," she said. "I'm just very fleet of foot. Sometimes I say, 'Stand to the right.' Sometimes I just charge."

smack dab in the middle of the article there's a link to what might be the best site ever. standtotheright.com. some geniuses have made t-shirts on the subject. and my theory on tshirts is you really can never have too many (this coming from the girl who legitimately - logistically? - has over two hundred t-shirts).

and then she goes into some escalator trivia. ooooh my favorite! now seeing as i'm so well versed in random tidbits (well that or i took the sunday source's history of dc quiz back in the fall) i already knew that the escalator at wheaton is the longest escalator of any metro station. now i've never been to wheaton (thank god) but i have been to rosslyn and dupont, so i can only imagine how long wheaton's escalator is. especially when i found out that it is the longest escalator in the entire western hemisphere. that's probably the most useless information i will ever discover, but i love it.

but at least most metro stations have working escalators (or do they?). us lucky ones out at dunn loring have been stuck w/ an up escalator and a set of stairs (and the mysterious, oh so slow elevator) since the winter when they decided it would be a great idea to renovate the down escalator for SIX MONTHS. but hey, at least they didn't take away the up escalator. otherwise what would we have done on st. patrick's day when we had to wait twenty minutes for our train? [note: there are videos out there of that - i need to track them down.]

so, happy (good) friday! try not to run over any tourists today.