Am I the only one that got in trouble for going up the down escalator?
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June 26th, 2008 at 12:01 am
Seriously, they put those big huge step machines on display, and people just stand on them. What the hell, man?
The Duck Has Spoken.
June 26th, 2008 at 12:03 am
When I do that, even more than security staff on malls, I get yelled at by mothers whose kids try to do the same I’m doing.
June 26th, 2008 at 12:04 am
Are you saying that’s not what they’re for?!
June 26th, 2008 at 12:04 am
I did that once and got almost up it, but somebody wanted to come down, so I had to ride back down with him.
June 26th, 2008 at 12:07 am
You know, I think Biff is one of the very few people smart enough to use those stairclimbers as they were intended. So, of course, the mental midgets toss him out of the mall. Why’d they bother building them in the first place, eh?
OK, only slightly more seriously - that’s actually practical. That’s almost un-Bifflike! Heresy!
June 26th, 2008 at 12:30 am
I used to work in the mall. One of my favorite things to do was slide down the escalator rails after closing time. Almost slid into a guard once. They just laughed and told me it would be my own fault if I got hurt.
June 26th, 2008 at 12:44 am
I always wanted to exercise using the down escalator and go up it. Or down the up escalator…
June 26th, 2008 at 12:44 am
I never got in trouble, the mall was never crowded. This one time in a theater, I rode to two feet off the ground by clinging to the rail and hanging off the side. Likely the most dangerous thing I ever did. I would do it again in a second if I did not develop a fear of heights later.
June 26th, 2008 at 1:00 am
A friend of mine got all the way to the top of one of those repeatedly once. I myself get vertigo even going the right direction, I wouldn’t risk doing it backwards. I also get vertigo on regular stairs, but in no other situations (maybe the top of an unsupported ladder).
June 26th, 2008 at 1:06 am
I ran up the down escalator at the Los Angeles Convention Center to get rid of the jitters before my Academic Decathlon Competition. It was really fun, but it made my stomach hurt. That thing was huge.
June 26th, 2008 at 1:42 am
I always wanted to slide down the space between two escalators, that seems much more fun to me.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:33 am
All this talk about going up the down escalator, But none of you have ever experienced the pain (and humiliation) of tumbling down the up escalator for 6 minutes before someone helps you. I didn’t break anything but I bruised pretty badly and not prefer stairs that don’t move.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:33 am
When I was much younger, I stepped onto the down escalator, and realized the rest of my family wasn’t coming with, so I tried running back up (I tended to get separated fairly easily, but they never put a leash on me that I heard about or remember). I never ran up the whole thing, though that sounds like something I might try nowadays if the crowd was thin enough–I haven’t seen an escalator for a few years now, though, but I really like climbing up stairs.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:51 am
Damnit Torg, I was going to say that. I actually did this yesterday. I still think it’s exercise week. That’s exercise. It so is.
June 26th, 2008 at 4:10 am
I don’t see the point in Biff working out if hes just going to lose his arms and legs again eventually… Speaking of escalators I’ve always wanted to just sit on that black rail thing and ride that up lol
June 26th, 2008 at 4:13 am
I actually did that once, people coming down got mad at me, especially that guy with the crutches.:(
June 26th, 2008 at 4:25 am
Riding the handrail up makes me think of Mary Poppins… but then it is 3:30 AM and I need sleep. I’ve seen that movie again too recently to not remember it. I saw it this year. Tap Dancing Penguins!
June 26th, 2008 at 4:28 am
i’ve been to this place that has these things that are a cross between escalators and conveyor belts - like conveyor belts at an angle. a guy i know went down the up on his skateboard.
i’ve always wanted to hang onto the outside of a railing for an up escalator, but i haven’t wanted to deal with people trying to enforce the taboo. damn taboos. ):
June 26th, 2008 at 4:30 am
Biff’s trackies are ace… custom yellow Addidas? That’s very ‘on trend’.
June 26th, 2008 at 5:50 am
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a down escalator that moves fast enough to use as a climbing machine. Unless you have really short legs. Or have only one leg. Or are in a wheelchair. In which case you should stick with the elevator. Or the jetpacks hidden behind their seats that they CLAIM don’t exist but we know they’re there. Darned cripples. I’ll show them. They wake up one morning and they are like “Whoa! I have two legs again!” They probably won’t even think too hard about where the other one(s) came from, either. They can’t use their wheelchairs or their canes or walkers anymore because of the combination of societal pressure and restless leg syndrome. I’ll get to them eventually. They may get home after a long day and watch some infomercial about Rascal scooters then dig through their attics to find it: their chair. It’s no La-Z-Boy, but it’s their chair. Then they accidentally hit the ignition switch. My point is that escalators are slow.
June 26th, 2008 at 6:03 am
we (my boyfriend and me) do this sometimes when we’re bored. we climb up the descending stairs and then run down the ascending ones. and agian. and once more. people think we’re crazy and sometimes the lazy ladies using elevators to spare some steps get irritated :P. but biff is right - it’s a great excercise :)!
June 26th, 2008 at 7:52 am
I did this once with my brother when I was maybe thirteen. When we reached the top, there was a security guard who escorted us out of the mall. We of course snuck right back in through a Hornes department store.
June 26th, 2008 at 8:41 am
me and my freiend used to do that all the time, until we did it in front of a security guard and got ourselves a call home and a free escort out. seriously, i don’t know what the problem is, it’s not like it’s somthing hugely dangerous, or even slightly dangerous.
June 26th, 2008 at 9:01 am
I’ve never gotten in trouble for running the wrong direction on an escalator (great workout though). I HAVE gotten in trouble for putting a slinky on the up escalator though… (it’s very hard to get the timing/spacing right). I probably wouldn’t have gotten in trouble if it wasn’t in the middle of the holiday shopping rush. >:)
June 26th, 2008 at 9:15 am
I’ve never been able to do it, the only escalator we see are the really crowded ones. I’ve never wanted to ride up the banister either, because the ones awhere we are have glass walls at the top and there’d be no way to get over the banister from hanging off the side before you fell two storeys.
I have always wanted to go sliding down the shiny bit between the escalators at the tube station though.
Great comic as usual Chris.
June 26th, 2008 at 9:28 am
HAHA! Biff with Striped Pants Week lives on! Is anybody with me on this theory, or am I standing alone?
June 26th, 2008 at 10:36 am
@Dustin- Did you get the thing about falling down an escalator from Demitri Martin?
June 26th, 2008 at 10:56 am
I too have attempted a bold run up the escalator. All was going well, the wind was in my hair as i tore up at unimaginably low speeds. Then, as i reached the top i was going too fast and the loss of resistance caused me to totally wipe out. Suffice to say my friends found it humuorous. <-(You can tell I’m Canadian from all the U’s in that word)
June 26th, 2008 at 11:20 am
My friends and I tried to go up the down escalator when we were on our eight grade field trip to a dam. Security was not amused.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
I did it twice, once going upstairs and once downstairs, which I found a bit more difficult. Years ago. Recently I did it again, but…
It was funnier at 16. Heh.
BTW, I found your strip in a webcomic a couple of months ago and have been reading them all before commenting. Biff is great, keep on. Also, ¿have you thought on making more shirt designs or such?
June 26th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
@JAD - Hey thanks for reading.
Yeah, I do have a couple concepts for new shirts. Nothing is finalized yet. I will PROBABLY release one of them in the next few months. Especially if people keep asking questions like this.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
I’ve always wanted to do that, so it’s not really as funny to me, as it is…well, true doesn’t seem like the right word.
June 26th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
@Brokenbridge- No, I seriously fell down the up escalator. I’ve always been accident prone. Have you ever seen those round pedestal things at grocery store that are covered in potted plants? When I was eight I wasn’t watching where I was going and hit one of those… covered in potted Cacti… while running.
June 26th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
I used to love doing this when I was a kid. I sometimes did get in trouble, though. =)
June 26th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
I happened to find this on CNN. More stuff you can do with escalators. http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2008/06/26/ac.360.shot.wednesday.cnn
June 26th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
Has anyone seen those videos of people lying on the railings and spinning?
June 26th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
I have often wondered how much more damaging a fall would be to fall down an up escalator than to really try to run down one… Though I did go up a down escalator at one point when I was half-way down and realized that my family wasn’t going down with me. It also irks me when people go on the escalator and just stand there, no motion what-so-ever. For me, the escalator is not a restful climb or decent… Its a time saver machine that shortens the distance I actually have to travel to get from the first floor to the second floor. If you want to stand still, go in an elevator.
June 28th, 2008 at 5:49 am
A friend and I did this at a mall, except it was down the up escalator. He joked to me about running down them and there was nobody around as far as we could see. I said “Oh man, when are we ever going to get this chance again?” and we started off down the escalator. Somehow, defying all physics, a security guard appeared at the bottom of the escalator to meet us. He said to us something along the lines of “You guys know what you just did wrong, right?” We said we knew exactly what we did, won’t happen again, nobody was around to see us or anything. The security guard let us go, but not without asking us if we ever saw anybody lose a finger in an escalator. My friend had, apparently, since he said to the guard that he did. I wasn’t there for that one!
I forgot to mention that this was last year. We were both 24 when we did this, which is probably why the security guard guy didn’t call our parents or anything.
July 1st, 2008 at 11:12 am
@ No Name: You’re standin alone dude
July 8th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
When I was seven, my brother, my friend and I were shopping with my mother. She had to go into some store and told us to wait by the benches, which were right next to an elevator. Of course we start zipping up and down the wrong sides and a security guard catches us, asks us where our parents are. We’re seven and six and we’re freaking out because it’s a security guard, so we don’t say anything. He sighs and kicks us out of the mall. Ten minutes later my mom finds us outside after having a complete panic attack. We told her what happened and she tore a strip off the guard for kicking us out, and threatened to have him fired! We never did tell her about the escalator part. It was a good day for children everywhere.
July 19th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
Reminds me of this http://xkcd.com/252/
September 13th, 2008 at 8:26 am
I once got kicked out of Reno Casino for letting slinkies loose on an escalator. Surprisingly alcohol was involved in the incident.