Excerpt: work in progress

7:15am I have arrived at the predetermined site to begin what is sure to be an interesting study. My arrival was timed to be 15 minutes early as per stated on my digital boarding pass for the Greyhound #0000 bus for a one hour and twenty-five minute trip to Denver, CO. The Tejón Park-n-Ride in Colorado Springs, Colorado is where my collection of data will begin.

7:19am Having parked my silver 2021 Toyota Corolla in the Tejón Park-n-Ride parking lot, I double and then triple check that my silver 2021 Toyota Corolla is locked and secured in a well-lit and easily observable parking spot in hopes of giving pause to the local population of feral vagrant (H. sapiens coloradus) from mucking about my silver 2021 Toyota Corolla.

7:21am After observing the nature of the Tejón Park-n-Ride, I quadruple check that I've locked my silver 2021 Toyota Corolla.

7:23am Parked directly to the SE of my silver 2021 Toyota Corolla stands bus #0000 destined for Denver, Colorado. A small group of the local fauna has already arrived and is waiting in a disorganized group of 8-10 individuals dressed in their Tuesday morning finest. Cautiously, I approach the proud Vanhool CX45 motorcoach in all her American diesel glory. My heart is filled with excitement and my lungs with carbon monoxide.

7:23am I begin to shuffle across the parking lot towards bus #0000 with my eyes looking firmly down at my intelligent cellular telephone whilst simultaneously averting direct eye contact with my subjects so as to not arouse suspicion of my scientific intentions. Averting direct eye contact also provides me with true American "street cred" (bonafides) and cultural authenticity to help me blend in with the local population of preoccupied people. I do fear that my decision to forego application of a temporary facial tattoo prosthetic might raise some (tattooed) eyebrows amongst the subjects of my study. I take personal responsibility for this unfortunate oversight and have taken myself down another peg.

7:25am I have managed to infiltrate the dissociated group of locals by carefully choosing a random spot on the north side of the congregation. I use my peripherals to observe the crowd while pretending to be "doom-scrolling" the maniacal morning utterances of the tribal chief who the masses unwisely reelected after running on a campaign primarily focused on his first term accomplishments of throwing his turds at the White House Press Corps whilst blowing his own horn for passing a test designed for the mentally defective. My rouse has thus far gone unnoticed and I am beginning to feel more confident in my subterfuge. While not an excuse for my prior folly regarding my non-adoption of local facial tattoo customs, I am pleased with my garment choice—a T-shirt with one word of text on the front showing my resigned tolerance of existence using the American colloquialism of "meh".

7:30am The bus Captain opens the bus door and declares that boarding has begun in a stern yet understated call of "all-aboard!". In a moment of weakness, I forget myself and regrettably compromise my guise by allowing a small grin to appear on my face due to the realization that my ears bore witness to a real-life bus Captain yell of "all-aboard!" as if I was in one of those old documentaries about traversing the country in what locals call the "good ol' days".

Upon hearing the boarding call, the scraggly crowd of travelers rushes forward towards the now-open portal into the diesel leviathan that is the Van Hool CX45 Motorcoach. The vehicle assigned to whisk us away on our journey north is the Van Hool CX45 Motorcoach which proudly measures in at a length of 13.8 meters and which has a wheelbase of 7.7 meters. The Van Hool CX45 Motorcoach has a capacity of 56 passengers which makes the crowd's fight for their desired seats seem strange given the fact that there are only 11 of us. Whether this is a result of subpar mathematical abilities, a penchant for confrontation due to the ingestion of methamphetamines or some potentially heritable gene for an underdeveloped posterior parietal cortex is a question for a future time and perhaps a different researcher.