Tag Archives: long fares

Marin County Thrill Ride

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During last call on Friday nights, I usually wait out the shit show in some dark recess of The City. A few weeks ago, though, trying to escape the sloshed fields of the Mission, I was driving past the Armory Club when a guy jumped in front of my cab.

“Will you take five of us?” he asks.

While it’s not exactly legal to transport more people than there are seatbelts, what are laws in San Francisco anymore but mere suggestions?

As three women and one dude pile into the backseat, laughing and grunting as they position themselves in a tight mass, the first guy holds the door open like he’s directing traffic, then jumps in the front seat.

“83 Elaine Ave.,” he says. “We’re going to my place. I have plenty of booze, so we can keep this party going. Right?”

Everyone cheers.

“Where?” I ask.

“Mill Valley,” he tells me.

“To the bridge!” the guy in back yells. “Take us to the bridge!”

Read the rest here.

[photo by Christian Lewis]

Welcome to Pleasanton

Always get the money up front…

My column this week is about deserting a regular fare for a meter-and-a-half ride that goes horribly wrong. I guess you can say I got my just deserts.

“Alright,” the guy says, getting out of the cab. “Thanks for the ride.”

“Wait a second!”

The woman gets out of the cab slowly. I watch as she teeters on the high heels and careens toward a parked car, bounces off the trunk and falls to the ground. Just as quickly, though, she’s back on her feet.

“Who’s going to pay me?” I demand.

She wrinkles her face and stumbles away.

I get out of the cab and follow her to the door of her apartment. As she goes in, the guy emerges with a bunch of stuff that he loads into the back of a Corolla. On the windshield, there’s an Uber placard.

“I really need to get paid,” I tell him, feeling like the paperboy from the movie “Better off Dead.”

“I told you, I’m not paying. She’s a whore. Get her to pay.”

“Come on, man. I don’t want to get into the middle of this …”

“Be a man! Go get your money!” He drives away.

I knock on the door. No answer. I knock again.

Goddamn it.

I return to my cab and Google the Pleasanton Police Department. An operator picks up on the second ring.

“I don’t know if this is something you can help me with …”

Read the rest of the column here.

[photo by Trevor Johnson]

Good Fortune is Right Around the Corner

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Now that I think of it, if I could do it over again, the last line of this week’s column for the S.F. Examiner would have read:

“Oh great,” she mumbles snidely as she reaches into her purse. “Lucky me.”

So as to emphasize her visible disdain at having ended up in a taxi.

In fact, the few minutes I interacted with her, when she was conscious, were more noteworthy than I realized last Wednesday afternoon, when I was putting the finishing touches on this column, already an hour and a half past my deadline.

What she actually told me after her address was, “I’ll do whatever you tell me, but I have to sleep now.” Which seemed implausible and surreal at the time. I wasn’t even sure if I heard her correctly.

When she paid me, she dropped her credit card and her wallet, spilling change onto the floorboard, which she never picked up, as well as her phone and her phone charger. I had to get her attention several times to not leave anything behind. Except the coins.

She tipped me 20% and I added the bridge toll. Plus a couple bucks in change -totaled out at a $75 ride. Her Uber probably would have cost a third of that.

I waited until she made it through a wooden gate with a “Beware of Dog” sign. Which seemed odd. Who has a dog you have to be wary of?

Marin County is weird.

Anyway, read the column here.

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