Snubbed or Why I Should Go to an Optician's

I've had glasses since I was about 14, but I very rarely wear them. In fact, there are only 2 reasons I do have them – firstly, because I'm just below the legal level of eyesight for driving in the UK, and secondly ... well, actually, there isn't a secondly.

Or at least, there wasn't until I moved to Melbourne.

Melbourne has a rather excellent tram system. It's similar to the Tube in London, but there are many more lines (I count at least 40), it's quite a bit cheaper, and they run to a proper timetable, which means you can plan your stumbling out of bed in the morning to perfection.

What's not so great is when you're waiting for a specific tram. They don't stop at every stop – they only stop on request. If you're on the tram, that's fine – there's a button on the more modern ones, or a funny pull-cord thing on the old ones. Off the tram, and you need to make it obvious to the driver that you'd like to get on. That's also fine – step out of the shelter, or wave your hand, or pick up your bags and look intentful (which may be a word I've just invented – so sue me, I'm feeling inventful at the moment).

If you know it's your tram that's coming.

And that's where reason 2 comes in. I can't actually see the line number on the tram until it's too close for it to stop, so 2 sailed past me yesterday, and I'd have missed another one this lunchtime if it weren't for the pedestrian crossing 50m further down the road meaning I had time to run to the next stop up. As there are 6 different lines running through the stop outside work, this could start to become a problem.

I will probably soon be able to pick out the destinations more easily than the line numbers, but as I haven't got my head round all of those yet (some trams don't go all the way along the lines, so there are 2 different destinations that I've seen on the best homewards tram for me), I'm stuck for the time being with snubbing by the tram drivers.