Never Get a Greyhound bus

So I'm very slowly getting up to speed but I figured, rather than taint the loveliness of my travels, Greyhound can have it's own post, just for a rant. Also I haven't yet got around to writing my complaint, mostly because you don't seem to be able to do it via e-mail and I feel the company is worth neither a stamp nor a phone call.
We got ourselves up bright and early on Wednesday to make sure we were at the station at least an hour before the bus left, which considering the debacle on the way here seemed a great idea. It possibly was, but we had a slightly grotty breakfast at the grim bus station and a whole hour waiting in a queue of 4 people (yes we were half that queue).
The bus actually left on time. 3 minutes early in fact. Somewhere along the route we lost those 3 minutes and a further 55. The unscheduled pizza stop probably had a fair bit to do with it. I was blissfully unaware of this until the last stop before the border brought us a whole host of grumbling passengers. Then I started to be a bit anxious. Nicole and I , when booking our bus tickets, had in fact only left 35 minutes between buses.
Then we stopped for a toilet break (there was a flipping toilet on the bus??) and duty-free. Definitely not on the agenda. Worried about the time, I found 2 men dressed in greyhound uniforms but who weren't the driver. I asked them if they were officials on the journey and they happily said I could ask them questions. I asked why we were so late. The response was pretty snooty and rude. They told me we weren't but were completely on schedule. They said that if anything would make us late it would be customs. I didn't quite believe them since it had taken 45 minutes to get from Montreal to the border at night and we had 50 to reach customs, go through and then crawl through Montreal's rush hour traffic.
Customs took a grand total of 10 minutes. (I probably didn't help by leaving my travel documents on the desk and wandering off causing a the customs officer to chase after me.) Therefore customs did not delay us.
We set off with 25 minutes to be on time.
Not wanting to disturb the driver, I went to ask one of the men in uniforms if they had ID numbers. He got all defensive and had a bit of a go at me saying he had nothing to do with this journey, calling me "lady" and being plain rude. I told him I didn't think he was being very polite to which his response was "yeah maybe am bein' a liddle loud witcha" - loud? the whole bus could hear! He kept telling me that it wasn't his responsibility blah blah blah. He didn't take very kindly to me pointing out that whether he is on duty or not whilst wearing his uniform he is still a representative of his company thus he should not be speaking to a passenger in such a rude way. Nicole couldn't believe the way he'd spoken to me either. Sucks to be him because he was wearing a name badge. Named and shamed Eduardo Lopez, named and shamed.  
Our 35 minutes of overlap were slipping away as we crawled through traffic. By some absolute miracle, Hannah and Victoria had convinced the next bus driver to wait for us. They texted me for regular updates as to our location, which became more and more frustrating the closer we got to the bus station but the slower we went. I actually contemplated getting off the bus and running instead. We pulled into the station more than an hour late, grabbed our bags and literally ran to get on our next bus. I wanted to hug the driver but he might not have appreciated it - hugs from a random stranger, well it's not everyone's cup of tea now is it?
So, if you want a bus that will be on time? Don't pick Greyhound. If you want staff who are polite and helpful? DEFINITELY , whatever you do, do NOT choose greyhound.
If you want a bus that will wait for you when running late and then proceed to make up the lost time and arrive 5 minutes early? Pick Megabus. It's also far cheaper.

it's been a while...

I can't remember the last time I left my blog feeling so unloved. Probably never. I will also start off by saying that there is no way that everything since the 14th is going to be contained in just one blog post. It will have to be in installments. This is partly because I have lots to write, partly because I'm being kept rather busy and lastly, also because I'm just a little bit too lazy to write it all at once.
So, hang on a minute, I have no idea where I was up to....
Ah yes, mid-terms. Thursday's exam proved to suit me a little better than the day before. I worked up until the time limit, but there were no hastily scribbled conclusions that can barely be considered a conclusion at all, and definitely no running after the invigilator. No skipping either for that matter. Walking out of the lecture hall was like a whole weight off my chest - no more cramming or wondering what on earth the crazy shorthand I'd taken down was in fact supposed to mean. Goodness knows how I was intending to reinterpret some of my notes. I was not the only one to finish my exams that day and thus there were a few of us celebrating freedom. Within an hour both Gaston and Vincent had asked me why I no longer spent time with everyone. That's how studious I had been. Who'd have ever thunk it ey! I swiftly promised that I would once again be super sociable starting that night since I would not be holed up in my room revising any more. Good times. A most enjoyable night.
I spent Friday doing goodness knows what amidst packing and buying tickets for Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. As if I wasn't excited enough about going to New York, that just tipped me over the edge.
I feel I should have something to recall about the controle but I have nothing to add. It was far too long ago. After faffing around plenty afterwords, Nicole and I set off in the afternoon, reaching Montreal well in advance of our bus. We double checked the bus stations and times of all buses (not just those for that day) and satisfied we were in the right place, headed off for a gander around the town. We caught the last hour perhaps of shopping time. I used this to replace the boots I was wearing, but which really needed to be disposed of. I walked out of H&M wearing my latest purchase and wandered around with my old boots looking for a bin. I must admit, throwing them away was almost sentimental. Unless I wanted to continue looking like a tramp (not necessarily on my agenda) they had to go.
Time was ticking away and we settled for dinner. A very yummy dinner indeed, even if they did get the pudding order wrong and charge us an extra dollar. Eventually finding that there was not much left for us to do we returned to the bus station almost 4 hours early for our bus. Being there so early did not stop us being one of the last on the bus. We didn't join the queue as there were 2 buses leaving before ours. What we didn't know was that when a bus is full they make the rest of the queue wait for the next one. We ended up half way down the queue once we finally joined it. That wouldn't have been half as annoying except when the buses arrived (they had sent 2 for our departure) the first wasn't quite ready, yet they took the back half of the queue, loaded them onto bus 2 and sent them packing before we boarded the first one. In my eyes that completely defies the object of a queue. Enough of that, there will be more ranting about Greyhound buses at a later date.
Nicole and I secured 2 seats each so at least it was a bit more comfortable and thus should have been easier to sleep. It was not. Between 1 and 2 am we had to get off the bus for customs. USA can take it's declaration of liberty and stick it where the sun doesn't shine. The first woman was quite snappy, asking me if I'd ever been to the States before whilst flicking through my passport and it's variety of stamps and visas, but looking mighty pissed off when I added it was on my old one. She eventually sent me off with a green card to fill in. Once filled in, I rejoined the mostly depleted queue and got a much nicer guy, who didn't seem to mind so much that I hadn't completely filled out the form (sadly when it says sign and date if answering yes, it does not in fact mean you don't have to sign and date there when answering no - making a total of 4 signatures and dates on one piece of green paper). Not having my return ticket on my person didn't seem to bother him either, unlike the grumpy woman who was complaining that immigrants didn't listen. In our defense, they should have specified which ticket they wanted. How was I to know they didn't want to see my ticket to NY?? After that, he took fingerprints and thumbprints and then changed hands and then took my photo (I esperately wanted to o a cheesy grin but thought better of it) before asking for $6. He looked mildly amused when I said my purse was on the bus still. Like I said, they need to give better instructions! Such kerfuffle just to cross the border for a few days.
Back on the bus, I curled myself up on my 2 chairs and attempted to get some sleep. A got a bit of shut eye in. Nicole woke me up around 7am as we crossed the toll bridge into NYC to see the sunrise behind the cityscape. I wish I'd taken photos - it was rather beautiful. I then went back to sleep for the last half an hour of the journey.
This seems like a suitable place to stop. I shall regale all my New York adventures next time.