late night bus rides

Last night after the ICS Christmas party, I had to take the bus home because it was too late for the subway (which is faster). The bus was really full, and I was standing in the aisle. Approaching my stop, I couldn't reach far enough to pull the rope draped above the bus windows to indicate I wanted to stop. There are also stop buttons on some poles, but those, too, were out of my reach. So I asked a man standing in front of me, "Could you please push the stop button for me?" He didn't hear me at first because he was wearing earphones, listening to his iPod. So I repeated, a little louder and more urgently (because we were almost going to fly by my stop), "Could you please push the stop button for me?" He heard me, turned around and looked at me, grinned creepily, pushed the button and said, "Why of course I can push the button for you, girlie."

Creepy.

I was in such a hurry to get off the bus that I fuddled with the doors while trying to open them and looked uncoordinated and silly--but I really didn't care. I just wanted off that bus.