Now, you're on a bus in Manhattan traffic and the bus driver is darting in between cars and other buses, honking loudly, coming to hard stops, and scaring the holy hell out of you. You happen to notice that the driver is not wearing a seatbelt.

Am I supposed to feel safe because the driver obviously thinks that he's driving safely enough not to warrant a seatbelt?

Yeah, that's what I thought.

I had no choice. I needed to get to 91st between 2nd and 1st and the subway stop as 96th and Lexington - a full five blocks and two avenue blocks away from my destination.

I thought about transferring buses, but then I stopped.

The point of this? I don't know. Other than the fact that if people thought subways were scary - oh no, try the bus.

And if you are about to get on the bus or the subway - please, dear God, please - have your metrocard ready. It's a freakin' pain in the ass to either have to wait for you to swipe or drop the card. For chrissakes, the rest of us do it.

Oh, and if you're leaving the subway and you see someone trying to swipe their metrocard before the train leaves - let them through. They gotta get to where they are going, too.

Sorry. Bad commute today. Oy.

REDEMPTION!

Just a quick update on the "Doggie Doo" bit - yesterday, I was walking Lola (the doggie) and as I proceeded down the street, I noticed an elderly gentleman walking his dog without a leash. As he saw me approaching, he opened his gate and prodded the dog back in the gate to wait for me as I passed. I thanked him and went on my merry way to Lola's favorite spot when I noticed that he was still standing at the gate, urging the dog to stay inside and watching me with a weary eye. Undaunted, we continued. When I got halfway down the street, Lola started to do her business. As she was doing it, I grabbed the plastic bag in my pocket and proceeded to clean up after the dog. As I started, I heard the old man behind me clapping and yelling, "Thank you!" I turned around halfway to see him put both hands up in the air and say again, "Thank you!"

I smiled and replied, "No problem." After all, he was a cute little pooter.

Picking up poop has never been more fun or rewarding.

Now that I have lived in this city for a while and am currently fostering a dog, I have noticed a few things.

For starters, lemme explain fostering a dog 'cause people don't really seem to understand. There are many organizations in NYC that save stray animals. One certain organization allows people to foster the dogs until they find an adoptive home - meaning that the dogs get to leave the kennel and live in a real house while the organization tries to find the dog a full-time home. It gives the dog a chance to get out of jail, have a nice vacation, and live in a house with some love and affection.

So, being the nice person that I am (and actually, because I want a dog but am moving apartments soon), I decided to give this temporary pooch a try. I have only had her for about two weeks now, but I've noticed something strange.

When you have a dog, people talk to you. And they don't just talk to you, they talk in baby talk to the dog first, then you. I have talked to so many people in my neighborhood in the past two weeks - people who always see me around and have never said shit to me - and suddenly, i've got a canine and everyone's my friend.

What the hell is that all about?

I mean, I was living here first, right? And the conversation always goes like this:

neighbor: (in babytalk) "Hi there, little one. You're a good dog, aren't you? He or she?"

me: "She."

neighbor: (back to the babytalk) "Oh, you're such a good girl! You're such a good girl! And a pretty girl, too. (back to me and normal voice) You live around here?"

I'm thinking: no, shithead, I'm just walking the dog in your neighborhood. What the hell do you think?

What I actually say: "Yeah, I live right over there" (point to the building)

neighbor: "Oh."

And while I'm on the subject, can someone please tell me why people don't clean up after their dogs? I mean, it's nasty. Here, in East Harlem, we play "Dodge the Doggie Doo" every time we step out of our building. C'mon people. I clean up after mine, clean up after yours so I don't have to clean up my shoes later. It makes the neighborhood stink and it's just an all around pain in the ass.

Of course, it's not as bad as I make it out to be, it just happens to be nasty and disgusting, that's all.

That takes care of that one.

I'm highly annoyed. Peeved, if you will.

Let's just stop a moment and think about the cars we own (if we do own one). I, for one, own a reliable and friendly Subaru Impreza renamed "The Return of the Donkey". The original was a craptastic 1986 Mazda 626 warwagon that died on me. I'm fairly certain that I'm running my current one into the ground.

Granted, I live in NYC. I really don't need a car. But since I can actually have it for now, there's no reason for me not to, right? I live in a mostly residential neighborhood in Manhattan and there's plenty of alternate-side-of-the-street parking for me. For those of you not on the East Coast, that means that you cannot park one one side of the street on certain days for certain amounts of time so that they can clean the street. Apparently, they've never heard of it on the West Coast. How do you clean the streets?

Anyway, I digress.

So this car of yours. You love it, right? You treat it well, you love it. I love my damn car and it has been broken into five times in the course of two years. I assume it's because I have Delaware plates. Either way, I treat it very well and there's no stopping thug monkeys when they get the urge.

But what I'm pondering is this: if your car has an alarm and it goes off when you are in the vicinity, how long do you wait before turning it off?

Or: if your car has an alarm and you are gone, what happens when it goes off for two hours at 6am, waking up all your neighbors, keeping them awake for two hours, and you are nowhere to be found to turn it off?

The second question is the one that I happen to be obessesed with since I find myself the unwitting and unwilling victim of a car alarm wake up. I mean, someone in my neighborhood has a rooster (don't ask, I can't explain it) and while it cock-a-doodle-doos in the morning, it was nowhere near as bad as this car alarm.

This car alarm was the kind that goes through six (yes, I counted) different sounds in a cycle and repeats itself over and over very loudly. I could probably even mimic the noise at this point. I think it was right outside my window.

And you know the worse part? No one was taking the car. No one was trying to break in, either. Nope. This alarm was probably set off by a pigeon or a school kid on their way to school. That's right, no break-in, no grand auto theft, just something that triggered the alarm to go off.

Oh, and P.S., it would go through about three cycles and stop in the middle of the cycle, right in the middle of one of the six sounds it made. And I would be lying there in bed thinking to myself, "Ah! Finally!"

And then it would pick up three seconds later right where it left off.

Oy.

Which leads me to an important query: do you really need a car alarm if you aren't going to be anywhere in the vicinity to either: a. turn it off or b. stop someone from stealing your car? Because if you aren't going to be around where you park it, does it really matter that you have an alarm or not? I mean, if it's a really determined thug monkey, they would have picked up that you are nowhere around to turn it off. And they might steal the car from your ass, anyway.

So do you and your neighbors a favor. If you aren't going to be home and you leave your car in a residential neighborhood where there is even the remote possibility of your car alarm going off, think about it. Because it's a major pain in the ass for those of us who just live there.

And I'm freakin' exhausted because of it. If I find out who owns that car (which was a 1980's model Tercel painted two different colors - you have got to be kidding me, we don't even have a car alarm on our Mercedes), they are getting an earful from me. Maybe I'll mimic the sounds outside their window at 6am tommorow morning.

Ah, who's kidding. Hopefully, I'll be in bed at 6am tommorow morning, catching up on the lost sleep I got today.

Damnhellass.

Um, okay. Can we please talk about this "American Idol" stuff?

I admit, I got sucked in. Completely. And I don't know how I feel about it. The entertainment industry is a difficult place. And it should come as no surprise that feelings will be hurt. So I found it amusing. Completely. I think it's good to see so many people with potential and the balls to actually do what they did.

But what I want to talk about is Paula Abdul.

I loved her. Loved. And, no kidding, just a week ago or so, my roommate and I were talking about "the good 'ol days" (something that a number of us in our early 20's are eager to do because we suddenly feel old - poor us, I know). And I was wondering what the hell happened to her. I was reminiscing about the video she did with McScatCat and suddenly, she shows up on "American Idol".

If that's what happened to Paula Abdul, what the hell happened to Tiffani? Or Martika?

And people wonder why I drink.

I think that I can die now. I just saw a mullet walking down Park Avenue South. Spikey hair on top, shaved above the ears. I shall call this particular mullet "Vanilla Ice Mullet" since he had lines above his ears, a la Vanilla Ice back in the day. How fabulous is that?

Hello all. Welcome to the Monkeehaus. It is here that I intend to let you take a trip through my mind, air out frustrations, and various and sundry things of that nature. I hope you will find your stay well.