While riding the train I always see a lot of people drinking beer after work. I wonder if some people solely ride the train just because they can drink and ride, instead of getting arrested for drinking and driving. I also notice that just about every single person who drinks beer, leaves their empty beer bottles and cans on the train when they get off. You know, just so everyone sees how cool they are that they drink and ride. Everybody know you gotta show off like dat, yo.

Some people get started early…

And others enjoy the beginning of the weekend…

Either way, you’re just not cool if you aren’t drinking beer on the train.

Hey, maybe Metro North could even do a promotion, touting the best reason to ride the train! Completely ignore the fact that the majority of people do actually have to drive their cars home after getting off at the train station. Replace those boring train advertisements, and do a little something like this:

Using a tweezer to trim your nose hairs is best left to at home, not the train waiting room.

It is really annoying when you go through your entire phone’s library of ringtones, playing each as loud as possible in an effort to pick the best one. You may think you look hawt, but you don’t.

If you are not one of the homeless people living in the train station, you probably have enough change to go and buy yourself a dumb newspaper. Picking through the garbage in an effort to find a newspaper suitable to read just makes you look really lame.

If you rode the train yesterday, you may have noticed that it was the distribution day for the June version of Mileposts. The MTA detailed some cost cutting measures, one of which will be the elimination of the 1-800-METRO-INFO telephone number. I did mention in the past that I accidentally called a sex line, when I intended to call that number but instead called 1-800-MTA-INFO. In a couple of months someone else may have purchased 1-800-METRO-INFO. Instead of train schedules, you’ll hear… “Hey there sexy gentleman…”

Thaaaaanks Metro North.

Train stations have lots of people… so I guess if you want to get your message out to people, why not hand out propaganda at a train station? From Jesus literature to politicians, free samples to train maps, with a little bit of fearmongering thrown in, we see it all at White Plains train station. I was delighted to notice this morning that the lovely mustached man that I had seen some months earlier, the one who asked me if the pigeon hanging out in the train station had a ticket. He was promoting for some guy named Dan Schorr. In other news, Dan Schorr is also a pirate, the evidence of which is below.

Now I am real sorry I didn’t take that Jesus literature I was offered the other day to draw on that. Even though Goldens Bridge isn’t too busy of a station (compared to White Plains), people still come to hand things out every once and a while, but mostly to leave posters around. The posters never seem to stay long however. Perhaps MTA employees are removing these posters that shouldn’t be there? In my mind though, I imagine a much more amusing situation… considering that when one poster is removed, another has appeared in its place. Opponents go to the train station, rip down their rival’s posters, and then place their own. Here is a great poster I snapped an image of in the morning. How corny is that tagline? I can imagine that meeting. “We can advertise at the TRAIN STATION! On the right track! THE RIGHT TRACK! You get it?!”

Now free things are always nice, but even free things can be considered propaganda. At least to me. Who wants to give anyone free anything… unless it might convince a few of them to buy something? Vitamin Water 10 tried and failed, at least with me. Nasty shit that was. My favorite free thing though, was a nicely designed map of the MTA railroads. The MTA had a table set up one morning filled with maps and schedules and such. I actually keep this in my bag. I’ll probably never use it, but hey, if I ever happen to get lost on the Long Island Railroad again, I’ll have it!