People I See On A Near-Daily Basis & Have Never Met

1. Shuffles McPimp. (See previous entry)

2. Girl, late teens. Curly blonde hair. She has walked past me since October every Tuesday and Thursday and has yet to acknowledge me, which makes me stare even harder at her. Why would you willfully ignore me?

3. Woman, early 30s. She looks like a Spanish Tori Amos. She watches me out of the corner of her eyes.

4. Boy, early teens. Reads a book EVERY SINGLE DAY, waiting for his schoolbus and sitting on the steps of the dry cleaners.

5. Child, 9 or 10 & Woman, late 20s. The South American nanny waits at the same bus stop with the little white boy. He is abnormally excited at 7:45 a.m. and #4 sometimes gives him dirty glances.

6. Woman, early 20s. Most likely an American. At 8:30 a.m., she is the height of fashion. She alternates her Dior bag with her Vuitton, her giant bug-eye sunglasses always matching. Where does she go so early in the morning? Is there any way that she's going to teach English like that?

7. Man, 40s. Scary. Long hair, multiple piercings, and sometimes with a cut-off T-shirt. He always has on sunglasses.

8. Man, 40s. Handing out small flyers for a restaurant I will never go to. I have received approximately 800 of these flyers and immediately throw them away. Stop giving them to me, do you really think I'm going to eat falafel at 9:30 in the morning?

9. Woman, early 20s. Again, I assume she's American. With me as we attempt to swim through the soul-sucking crowd to get onto a bus to take us to company classes in the outskirts of Madrid. She always seems just a little sad and tired.