Week of March 11-17, 2012

Riders this week: 8,312

Rider miles this week: 81,412

DOWN IN THE TUBE

The person riding the Subway last week who we thought was Jeremy Lin, the basketball player, wasn’t. He is the same height, weight and ethic background as Jeremy Linn, but he is a professional electrician who works for one of the local companies and has asked that, since he is not famous, we not publish his name here. We will defer to the request of this man, Don Jong Hu. Also it was Don Jong Hu who was in that house in Southampton that is for sale for $12 million, but he was just there to install pool lights.

      NEW MARKETING DIRECTOR CELEBRATES ANNIVERSARY

Gladys Ferguson, the new marketing director we hired last week, had her first big event for the Subway on Monday with a big wedding anniversary party for herself and her husband at the Seasons Catering Hall in Southampton. Tom and Gladys and nearly 140 friends and family of the Fergusons came to the party, attesting to the power that Gladys brings to her new job in packing places with upcoming events. A second wedding anniversary will take place this coming Saturday afternoon catered by Gurney’s Inn, this time at the Hampton Subway cafeteria in the Hampton Bays center in Hampton Bays. The Fergusons were married twice, once in a religious ceremony, and then this second time with the state license ceremony. Three cheers for Gladys and What’s-his-name Ferguson.

NEW SLOGAN

The new Hampton Subway slogan that reads THANKS FOR COMING was put on all signage on the subway system. Some riders were confused by it however. As they had come down the escalator to just begin their ride somewhere, how could they be thanked for coming? Ferguson says the new slogan, which she thought up, stays. She says it means thanks for coming to the Subway. Most any boob can figure that out.

SUBWAY POLICE SWEEPS 

THE PLATFORMS

Last Saturday night, the Hampton Subway police gave out 10 tickets to various performers who were down on the platforms doing their thing, but without a license. Rounded up were a juggler, a man with a soapbox promoting Communism, a hip-hop band, a group of Arabian Acrobats, a Polish Polka Band, a string quartet, a trapeze troupe, a folk singer, a flea circus and a break dancing performance group. All were taken off to jail charged with failure to obey the subway law that requires the purchasing of an annual permit. They were arraigned the following morning. The only four groups who had the proper licenses were a conga line on the Amagansett platform, the drumming marching band called Saba Boom on the Sag Harbor platform, a Portuguese fado singer on the Southampton platform and a graffiti artist on the Quogue platform.

In the morning, all 10 groups arrested played short five-minute performances for the judge who got into some serious toe tapping and then ordered them all released on their own recognizance.

NEW SUBWAY HORNS

All subway trains now have auto horns in the lead car. If you hear it honking, try to find a seat or hold on tight.

COMMISSIONER ASPINALL’S MESSAGE

Hampton Subway is now the proud owner of the New York City Subway system. The papers were signed at City Hall in Manhattan where, in exchange for the ceremonial dollar, the deeds were signed. Mayor Bloomberg is a very generous man. He has allowed that, though the small amount of money in the accounts passes to us, the enormous payroll that has bedeviled the New York Subway System will be delayed one further week to be four weeks past the last Friday that everybody worked. This will give us the breathing room to come up with the $42 million weekly payroll that the New York Subway system has obligated itself for which, I will say, is going to be the first thing that I attend to now that the MTA is in private hands. This purchase is a great triumph for Hampton Subway. Imagine this. We’re the little tiny subway system. They’re the great big subway system. We’re like the little engine that could. Or Jonah being swallowed by the whale, only backwards.