The Bus Doctor

Monica Hesse (thanks, Mara): The buses are upon us. The height of summer is the height of bus season; they come in droves, beasts of chrome and reclining plush seats, swarming the city streets like some 11th biblical plague, whatever would come after locusts and frogs. During peak months, as many as a thousand tourist buses are in Washington on a given day, says the American Bus Association, which tracks this sort of thing.

The buses break down. There are a million and one things that can go wrong with a bus. You got your dead batteries, busted water hoses, busted belts, busted starters. Tires go. Alternators go. Air conditioners go, and that's a bigger problem than it once was.