Days 25 and 26: The Bus Graces Greyhound

The last few days for the bus have been some of remedy and repair: fortifying ourselves from a recent boisterous phenomenon in the Dallas-Fort Worth Area, bus tipping. A slight deviation from cow tipping, which has always long been regarded as a mythical activity without any scientific validity, bus tipping has become an all too real occupational hazard for our crew. Our fearless commander-in-chief Maya has been enduring several traumatic aftereffects, some of which involve hostile wakeup reactions. Some positive effects have included Kate’s newfound skill of spring-roll wrapping. We’ll see what other fruits come to bear of this mystical development. The important takeaway: the bus survived its checkup at the Greyhound maintenance department in Dallas.

In other news, the crew enjoyed some true Dartmouth alum generosity from ‘99s David and Adrienne Wagner. They welcomed us into their beautiful home with genuine excitement and hospitality. Additionally, we had the privilege of visiting the Trinity River Audubon Center and working with Cease the Grease to collaborate about recycling waste veg. They’ve jumpstarted a program to eventually tailor their entire public school bus fleet to run on biodiesel and have already saved a whopping $500k from making the transfer on just 10% of their buses over the past year. After our event with Cease the Grease, the crew toured the Audubon Conservancy with director Ben Jones and observed a portion of the last 1% of prairie intact in America. The conservancy has restored the native landscape after conducting a dramatic cleanup of what once had been an unofficial, yet expansive dump for nearby low-income neighborhoods. Now whittled down to a landfill, the scenery echoes more of its original foliage, allowing the habitat to slowly return to its true form.