The Garden City Refugee

Over the River CXIV

September 5, 2026

Highlights and lowlights from my 114th two-wheeled trek to the Great State of New York:

1. Instead asking my citizenship, the CBP officer who served me at the Rainbow Bridge asked, “What country are you from?”

2. Oddly, parked just past the customs plaza on the U.S. side was a pickup truck from the New York State Police. Usually, those spots are taken by waiting cabs.

3. Before returning to the counter, the young girl who served me at Panera Bread said to one of her colleagues, “Don’t call me a mouse.” So before giving my order, I said I wouldn’t call her a mouse.

4. After taking a seat, I listened with interest as an older, gray-haired guy was answering questions from a lawyer or a police officer on speakerphone about an accident in which the guy hit a Honda Civic when he was in the far left lane of a roadway. “Was it a broken line or double solid? . . . Was it dark or sunny? . . . Did you have your turn signal on? . . . How far in the lane were you? 25%? 50%? 75%? . . . Did you hit the driver’s side or the passenger’s side? . . . Did you do anything to avoid the accident? . . . Were there any distractions on your end? A cell phone? A radio?”

5. While waiting at the light at Military Road, the driverette of a black Chevy Impala was busy fanning herself. No doubt, her air conditioning wasn’t working.

6. Here I had my heart set on climbing one of the water intakes . . .

7. Or just let the law of natural selection run its course . . .

8. No “trasspassing” . . .

9. Soon to be renamed to “America Avenue” . . .

10. Even though GO bus schedules are plastered all over the walls inside and outside the Niagara Falls (Canada) Bus Terminal, someone went up to the desk and asked when the next bus to Burlington was coming.

11. While I was standing underneath a sign clearly identifying it as the #12 GO bus stop, after blankly staring at the sign for several minutes, someone came up to me and asked if I was waiting for the #12. No, I was there waiting for a pizza delivery.

12. With sucker bus WEGO maps in hand and the clearly marked sucker bus WEGO stops steps away, a trio of lost tourists came on board the GO bus and asked the driver where to catch the sucker bus WEGO. Not more than a minute later, an Asian girl came on board asked the driver if he was going to the city center. Again, she was looking for the sucker bus WEGO. For the record, signs for the sucker bus WEGO are also clearly posted for those disembarking from the train across the street, as they were.