Somehow, though, it doesn’t seem so bad.

It’s brutally cold, sure, but I’m not finding it too bad. Even as I was waiting for the bus this morning, the cold wasn’t bothering me too much.

As long as you dress properly and don’t have to walk too far to get where you’re going, it really is OK. And it’s kind of nice to finally have some snow (even if shovelling it sucks).

On the negative side of things, colder weather means more people jam-packed into the buses (and in puffier jackets). I do not like being on overstuffed buses. I especially don’t like it when I end up sitting next to a guy who smells like boiled cabbage and body odour. But, at least I had a seat. Usually, at this time of year, the bus is standing room only by the time it arrives at my stop.

Small blessings. Without small blessings, we would not survive these Edmonton winters.

I'll be living just off of this Avenue this summer. Photo credit: GigCity

In the summer, I will be moving out of the apartment that has been my home for nearly 4 years (6 years if you count the fact that I’d previously lived in a different unit in the same building). Not only will I be leaving the building, I’ll be leaving the neighbourhood.

I will not be sad to leave the building. Between the increasingly sketchy neighbours, the occasional bed bug outbreak, and the occasionally bizarre noises coming from the suite upstairs, getting out of that building will be a blessing.

I will miss the neighbourhood, though. It’s not the most central place to live, but it is within walking distance of pretty much everything that I need: a grocery store, the bank, a drug store, a bakery, a liquor store, a pub, and several restaurants.

When I move, I’ll be moving “home.” Northeast Edmonton is where I grew up, so moving back to that area seems weirdly like a homecoming. I won’t be moving to Northmount (the neighbourhood of my first twenty-odd years), though. I wouldn’t want to, frankly. Instead, I’ll be moving just east of Alberta Avenue — smack-dab between Alberta Avenue and Beverly — with very loose plans to move into the heart of Alberta Avenue a few years later.

What’s the point of this post?

I’d like to learn more about the neighbourhood that I’ll eventually be calling home. What are the cool places to go? What are the places to avoid? Should I make Duster’s Pub my local haunt or will I get stabbed when I leave at the end of the night? Is Green Frogs a decent pub or am I better off hopping a train downtown? (The lone review on Yelp suggests the latter.)

I am somewhat familiar with the area in question, but I’d love to hear from people who live in the area (or who just know it well). I’m not moving until the summer, but I’m pretty eager and so I’m looking forward to hearing about any neighbourhood gems in the area of Norwood/Highlands/Alberta Avenue/Beverly.

Every morning I catch a bus going down Jasper Avenue for the final leg of my commute to work. It doesn’t really matter which bus I catch. All of the buses that hit my stop also hit the stop I need to get off at in the morning. This is convenient because often the buses are very full and so I’ll wait for the next one in order to avoid feeling claustrophobic.

I didn’t do this today. I just jumped on the first bus that came by. At the next stop, the bus was full and the driver actually had to turn away one of the people waiting. He did let the guy know that another bus was about two minutes behind him that runs essentially the same route.

After that, the driver skipped every stop until he arrived at my destination (a lot of people exit the bus at this stop everyday).

Now, he only skipped two or three stops, and he didn’t really have a choice, but the looks of confusion and anger on the faces of those he drove by were pretty apparent. If I’d been skipped over (as, in fact, I have been in the past), I’d be pretty pissed off too.

Realizing that a driver simply cannot take new passengers once his bus is full, I think ETS should program a new feature into the LED display that shows the route number for each bus. Already they’ve got things such as “GO ESKS GO” and “LEST WE FORGET” programming in for display on the appropriate days. Why not add “BUS FULL” or something similar, that the driver can turn on when the bus is filled to capacity?

People would probably still be pissed off to get passed over in the morning, but at least they’d know why. I’d much rather see a sign saying “BUS FULL” approaching from down the block than to think that the driver is just an asshole.

Surely, ETS could add this simple message to their buses. It wouldn’t eliminate anger, but it would mitigate it a bit.