Adventures in public transportation

I decided to do my part to pressure the gas companies and reduce my fuel useage by taking the bus instead of driving to work. I looked up the SunTran's bus schedule and a bus is supposed to show up every 10 minutes.

Easy.

Well, walked out the door at 7:50AM. A bit later than usual, I was dead tired and had slept in a bit. Waited 11 minutes for a bus by reading a book. Halfway to work, I realize that I had left my ID card in my car. Decided that by the time I'd get to work, someone in the office can let me in. Walked into the lab at 8:42AM.

Left the lab at 3:43PM because I wasn't feeling good. Waited only 4 minutes for a bus. But I only paid attention to the route number. I need the #4 bus to take me along Speedway. So there's a #4 Golf Links, and a #4 Harrison. Great.

This bus turns south at Kolb to go to Golf Links. WTF? So I get off at Kolb and wait 18 minutes for a #4 Harrison bus to take me the rest of the way home. Finally walk in the front door at 4:45PM.

Total cost: $3. However, in time I wasted, it wasn't worth it. I'll elaborate:

It takes me 11-15 minutes to drive myself to work. When the students and the last of the snowbirds depart in the next three weeks, I can probably do that in 10 minutes. What my hourly salary is, this already isn't a cost saving measure.

For whatever reason, it takes 15-25 minutes to get home. Afternoon traffic no matter what time I leave sucks worse than the drive into work. But then if I decide to stop by Target, it's only 1 mile out of my way. But since it took an hour to take the bus home with no errand running afterwards, I'm wasting even more time to walk to my car and drive back the way I came to Target.

I tried. It isn't worth it. I won't even go into details of the conditions on the bus....