The man on the number 35 bus looks up from his laptop, rolls his eyes and makes the following announcement, loudly: “Driver, can’t you do something? This is the bus journey from hell”.

We’ve been stuck in traffic for over an hour on a journey that should have taken 10 minutes. My sympathies however lie with the driver. Not only does she have these necessary road works to deal with, now she has a wildly panicking commuter on board too. A host of people with briefcases have already leapt off the bus like characters in a disaster movie, fleeing a burning aeroplane.

I’d like to tell the man to relax. This really isn’t the bus journey from hell. I’m sure a bus journey across Rwanda might be bumpier. And I’ve experienced worse right here in Oxford.

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Take for instance the summer when I worked as a guide on the open top tour buses. This was one of the most enjoyable jobs I’ve ever had.

This particular journey started ordinarily enough. I greeted the driver – a legendary figure I will refer to only as Tony P – and climbed the steps to a sea of brightly-coloured anoraks and backpacks. In this job you got to meet people from all over the world. But occasionally you’d meet the odd nutter.

I hardly noticed him at first. He sat at the front wearing only a pair of khaki shirts and Dr Marten’s boots. The logo of a defunct British manufacturing company was tattooed loudly over his bare torso and head, and he sported a large beard.

While tourists snapped photos he sat swigging heavily from a bottle of super strength cider. By his side a plastic bag full of such bottles clinked away. The idea behind these tours is that visitors can get on and off. Sometimes they’ll make one complete trip. This guy made five.

As we pulled into the railway station for the last trip of the day I’d begun to worry. The regular tourists had all gone home. Tony sat downstairs behind the wheel, nonchalantly smoking a fag. It was just me and the man with the cider.

I tried to make polite conversation. Where was he from? What was his reason for visiting Oxford?

He stared me out with the intense gaze of a Bond villain. Then his right arm went up and, clenching a full bottle of cider, he went to strike me over the head. I dropped my microphone and crashed downstairs to get help from Tony.

“Let’s lock him in – and call the police”.

So the two of us are standing outside a vintage open top tour bus. Tony is heroically trying to lock the door while a bald headed, bearded, half- naked madman hurls bottle after empty cider bottle down on us from above. As we run towards the sanctuary of the station the bottles are still flying, smashing broken glass over the tarmac.

I have no idea whether the police arrested him. And I never did find out why he’d decided to visit Oxford that day.

But any more grumbles from the man on the number 35 bus and I think I’d like to hook the two of them up on a date.

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