apostrophe sulk.

Of course, at the stations, some “token booth” clerks tried to help, but sometimes it didn’t work; one would-be straphanger told the Times:

“This morning at the Astor Place station, I had two clerks who told me to insert my card differently, even though customer after customer was stuck with the same problem,” said Torrey Whitman, an administrator at New York University School of Law. “One of the clerks took the card out of my hand, put it into the slot in the machine and let it sit there, as if that would work. Of course, we all know that you dip your card, and what more or less that dipping action involves.”