Oh Grayhound, how I hate thee
 No heat, no space, no light

I wait longingly to be free
 But sit confined through a sleepless night

A sea of hickies and B.O.
 Jerry Springer never seemed so real

The bus crawls along so slow
 And I long for a full meal

Mental hospital in this town
 Next to a prison district

Crazies come aboard by the pound
 Followed by jouvenile convicts

Finally an announcment, light, and then the cold night.

For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to take Grayhound from Memphis to Chapel Hill, NC.  I regretted the decision as soon as I bought my ticket.

The bus to Knoxville was 2 hours late, so I was in the Memphis station until 2am. The Grayhound patrons in Memphis were some of the roughest characters I've ever seen. When the bus finally arrived, it was packed. Eventually we made it into Knoxville.

I changed busses in Knoxville and ended up sitting behind a lady who had two outrageously big hickies on her neck. It almost looked like someone had hit her with a baseball bat. It turns out that she's married, but she met some guy in Knoxville who she's now in love with (the giver of the hickies). So now she's planning on leaving her husband and taking her children to live with her new love. Her new love was also married, but his wife left him when he went to jail for shooting his nephew in rage.

It was almost too absurd to be believable. She was trying to conceal the hickies the whole ride, and we all watched in awe when she got off the bus at her stop and hugged her husband hello. We were all plastered against the window of the bus waiting to see what would happen. "She's caught! Oh holy shit she's caught."

Eventually we stopped in the town of Morganton, where there's a mental hopsital and a corrections facility. So (no joke), four crazies got on the bus followed by (no joke) four just-released convicts. Combine them with the usual cast of Grayhound characters, and you've got trouble.