Kick Butt, Route #7!

My title, alas, has nothing to do with Route 7 itself, which is about as normal as bus routes get, but rather about a coffee shop along the way: I thought Kick Butt Coffee must have about a dozen locations in Austin, because I feel like I see them everywhere, but it turns out that they just have two locations, and I go past those places often enough for it to seem like there are a lot more of them. There's probably some deep meaning in that. The original Kick Butt is on the #7 route, though, and so I made a note of it when we went by.

See? Vintage. It says so right on
the shop.

So! Another route, another ulterior motive; there are shops along North Loop Boulevard that I've wanted to peek into for a while now, and this route goes right by them. Brilliant! There were a lot fewer shops, though, once we got there and started looking around, than I had thought there were when I went by on my bicycle. Among them were a bunch of vintage shops, an anarchist bookstore, and a place that declared itself to be "Austin Chronicle's Best Naughty Store 2010". We did not go in to investigate.

After a hop back on the bus (which involved some sprinting in 100+ heat, but the driver was nice enough to wait for us), we zoomed through campus and downtown-- well, as much zooming as one can do on public transportation. South of the river, there are a bunch of houses that are so high up off the street that the sidewalk leading to the front door is actually a staircase. Presumably, this is to ensure their view of the river, although I don't really know. Further down, the houses become apartments, just like everywhere else in the city. And when I read about this bit of the journey in my notes, it reads, "I wonder how close the sa". I have no idea what that means, nor did I know on that day when Chad nudged me awake. Yes, this route put me to sleep. Not a good sign.

I think this was outside the anarchist
bookstore.

Further south, there were some hills and trees to ooh and aah over, and then... The End. This is the first time we've ridden a route straight from one end to another (we usually get them somewhere in the middle), which was kind of nice because at the southern end we were able to get a flyer bus back to downtown and save some time over taking a regular bus.

Something I thought about while riding: A few years ago, the Lubbock buses started a route that went from the mall to the newest Target, which is in the middle of a nice shopping centre. Unfortunately, the route had to run through a neighbourhood that was filled with car-owning, public transport-disliking, letter-writing people, who lobbied the city until the route was discontinued. And I thought of that because there was quite a stretch of this route where we didn't pick up any passengers, and I wondered if this is another neighbourhood where no one who lives there needs the bus, but the route runs through it to get to the transport-needy people on the other side. Whatever it is, in Austin the bus is more of a part of life than a nuisance to be expelled, for which I am very thankful.

Have you ever been to an anarchist bookstore? Would you fall asleep on the bus? Do you prefer to get to a bus stop on time to avoid the sprinting?