Wednesday...
-Alex Farr

    It's a funny thing, driving a cab.  You do it, but you don't think about it.  You're better off if you don't think about it too much.  But people keep asking... "I bet you've got a lot of stories...".

    Well, not at first I didn't.  I drive in Oakland, CA.  The dayshift is largely old ladies... going to the beauty shops, and the doctor's offices... but there're plenty of lunatics that slip through... Yeah, I guess I've collected some stories over the years.  But, is it anything that the public wants to hear?  It's not usually Hollywood style happy endings... It's usually gritty bits of weirdness... and if people really enjoyed that sort of stuff, then we'd all be down in the trenches, rolling along the avenues in cabs, risking our lives in search of amusing anecdotes... despite the fact that any city police force's Intro. Course for a new cab driver points out that it is the most dangerous job in the country.  Period.  More dangerous than being a cop, or a fireman, or even a fucking 7-11 night manager.  It is the most dangerous job in the country.

    That's not to say it doesn't have its share of amusements.
 
   
    One day a call came up for someone at Highland Hospital.  Highland is the local county hospital, and since I was something like 50 blocks away at the time I wouldn't ordinarily have done anything more than laugh at the poor schmuck looking for a cab from there.  On this particular day though, it was really slow.

    Not to say that a slow day would usually drag a cabbie 50 plus blocks to pick up a fare from a place like a county hospital... but on this particular day I had just been hassled by the Oakland Police Taxi Detail, who'd basically kicked me off the cabstand I was sitting at...   So I had nothing to lose.

    Now, I realize that most people aren't aware of the details of the trade.  Most people don't realize that in a city like Oakland each and every driver takes at least 2, sometimes 5, sometimes as many as 10, bad call-in orders... trips to addresses where the people are gone by the time the driver can get there.  Maybe it's not like that on the East Coast.  Maybe East Coast drivers aren't forced to rely as heavily on called in orders as us West Coast cabbies... I don't know. In any case, taking a call-in order from a dispatcher that's over 50 blocks away is usually sheer stupidity, and a complete waste of time.  Only thing was, I was parked 2 cars out from a BART train station cab stand... and the Oakland Taxi Detail felt like enforcing the letter of the law that day.

    After 5 minutes of standing around waiting for the mighty man-in-blue's decision as to whether or not he was gonna lay a $150-ish fine on me for parking outside of a cab stand, I was suddenly willing to waste as much gas as it took to get out of there.  I knew the odds were slim that there'd still be anyone waiting there when I got to the hospital... and that more than likely, assuming there was someone there, that they'd be going maybe a mile, and I'd wind up making maybe $4 for nearly 30 minutes driving, which... subtracting out the $3.25 the company was charging me for the time, not to mention the $2 worth of San Francisco Bay Area gas I'd be burning up... would have me losing money while working my ass off... I knew all that... but that's the way the city wanted it, and I was just another nearly human resource to them.

    Besides, I'd managed to get out of getting a ticket by insisting that I was willing to run for whatever business might come along.  It was time to put my bullshit where my mouth was. I suppose.

    I'll never forgive OPD for putting me in that position.  This whole story is really their fault.  Not that they give a shit. It's not like I can challenge that cop to a duel at 50 paces for wronging me...

    So, anyway... I madly drove from 66^th Ave and San Leandro St. to 14^th Ave and E. 31^st St., 52 blocks West, and another 21 North... and let me tell you, if you ever wonder about the cabs cutting you off in traffic, most times it's because some stupid shit like this is going on... Cutting across town some insane distance where every minute, and I do mean every single fucking minute, makes a difference.   And somehow, I fucking made it!

    There was some ugly ghetto looking broad there waiting for me... and she stumbled up and fell into my back seat.

    "So, where to?" I asked.

    "Douglas St." she answered.

    Now, it's gotta be realized that Oakland ain't London.  There's no study of the 'knowledge' here.  We learn shit by on the job training... and Douglas ain't no big ass street that you know of except by happening to live nearby.

    "Douglas..." I answered.

    "Yeah, off 98^th Ave." she answered back.

    "Ok," I said, feeling casual enough... "I'll get us to 98^th, and you can direct me from there..."

    What the hell, it was a long enough run to make up for some of the dead time I'd had over the course of the hour, waiting until the cops hassled me.

    So I commenced to driving, catching the freeway to make things easy.  Meanwhile this chick fell over and started snoring in the back.

    What the hell, I figured.  She'd just come out of the hospital... she could probably use some rest... Only once I got off the MacArthur freeway at 98^th Ave, well she was snoring.

    'Ok' I figured... 'no sweat... I'll just look it up in my mapbook... and leave the meter running while I did so'

    I'm one of those weird, over-educated cabbies who can actually read a map, you see.

    It turned out to not be so very complicated.  On the other side of the city along 98^th Ave, but not too hard to find.

    She woke up as I started moving again, asking where we were...

    "Yeah, we're on 98^th. I looked up Douglas... no sweat, we'll be there in 10 minutes, tops." I assured her.

    "Oh, ok." she mumbled, and fell back asleep.

    I couldn't help wondering what she was on, and whether she'd give me a couple of pills as a tip.

    So I drove, and I got her there... and by the time I pulled up in front of the section-8 housing complex, the meter was at $22 bucks.

    In case you're wondering, anyone who's been driving a cab for more than 4 months can tell a section 8/ HUD building as soon as they spot the driveway.  There's never more than a 22 second period of doubt.  Never.

    So I pull up in front, and I let her know its $22.

    "Uhh..." she says "I only got $2 on me." and, handing them both over to me, she lets me know "I'll have to go inside to get the rest."

    Now, the first rule of cab driving, is that you never let anyone out and into an apartment, house or any other structure, without first getting a deposit.  I've occasionally broken this rule, and I've been burned about 63% of the times that I have.  If there's one thing that cab driving teaches you, it's that people suck, and that you should never give them a break, unless you're in the mood to write off your workday as charity, except that you can't actually 'write it off' in the tax sense of it...

    On the other hand... most people who're planning on stiffing you won't give you anything at all... they wanna get away clean.  Most people who're willing to leave anything at all are meaning to come back.  So, when she gave me $2, even though it wasn't shit... it made me feel like giving her the benefit of the doubt.

    So she got out, and went upstairs... and suddenly, some little bit of paranoia made me get out and watch which apartment she went into.

    And then I waited.  I lit a cigarette, and I waited.  There were guys, and chicks, hanging out all over the place.

    I smoked, and I waited, and I watched as people came around the front upstairs apartment, talked to dude, went around the corner... and then dude went back in, and his friends went back to their cars and went on about their business.

    'Marvelous,' I thought to myself, 'I'm hanging out here in front of some dealer's place of business.'

    Of course, that's just an 'assumption'. If I had any real 'knowledge' I might be obliged to report it to the cops. The ones who'd just been hassling me something like 20-30 minutes ago... and I wasn't sure enough to do anything that silly.

    So I waited patiently.

    A few minutes later, some fuck who was hanging around the place, sitting on a bicycle with a flat back tire, came up and bummed a cigarette.

    "Sure, enjoy..."

    "Thanks partner..." he answered, and, once I'd given him a light, he sort of pedalled off half a block.

    By the time I was done with my cigarette though, I knew something was up.  So, I went upstairs, and looked for some sort of doorbell.  There wasn't any, and the door was covered by a metal security gate.  The thing looked pretty shoddy, but unless I wanted to go downstairs and pop the trunk and see if I could find my tire iron and jack the thing off its hinges before somebody gave me some shit for fucking with their neighbor...

    Anyway, I found a likely looking window and started knocking on that.  No answer.

    "Fuck."

    So I went back and rattled the door.

    No answer.

    "Come on, at least answer the door!" I yelled.

    No answer.

    "Fuck." I mumbled.

    "You really want me to call the cops!" I yelled.

    Still, no answer.

    "Fuck..."

    And, hell, if they were so bored they were hassling cabbies for parking outside cabstands... they shouldn't be long... Right?

    So, I whipped out the ubiquitous cell phone and dialed 911.  I hung out in front of the house, watching the lady's neighbor deal, as I gave the police the address, my cab number, the city... and all the rest of the shit she asked.  I was just glad I wasn't trying to call for help with a gun being aimed at the back of my head... Not many gunmen would give a man 2 minutes to explain to the emergency operator all the details of his situation.

    I remember thinking 'Maybe I will start carrying a gun.  Odds are slim that any traffic cop's gonna frisk me when they pull me over for doing 38 in a 25 zone downtown.  And, now that we've got a Texas Governor taking over as president, maybe using a gun you're not supposed to be carrying in self-defense won't be such a big deal. Who knows, there might be a bright side to the Florida shenanigans...'

    In any case, I made the call, and then I proceeded to camp out in front of the ghetto there. After a few minutes, a couple of girls, kind of cute girls really, they wandered by, looking lost, or at least like they were looking for someone, asked me "Who are you here to see?"

    I could tell they were looking for reassurance that they were in the right place.  I didn't really care all that much though.

    "Me, I'm waiting for the lady hiding out in the back apartment.  She owes me $20, so I called the cops.  They're on their way."

    They just stared at me for a hot second... drawing on toward a full minute.  They looked at me like I'd just drowned an infant in a Chevron bathroom sink.

    "You called the cops?"

    "Yeah", I assured them with a smile. "They should be here any minute."

    They stared at me for another second, and then just nodded.  I watched as they looked around the block kind of furtively, trying to play it cool.  I just shrugged though, I couldn't've cared less who all got busted for what, I was having a bad day.

    Soon the upstairs front dude was back, and the girls rushed him, and around the corner the three of them went.

    While I watched to see who would be back first, another couple, an Asian guy and girl, rolled up, parked, and was soon upstairs knocking on dude's door.  When there was no answer, they started looking around like rats in a maze... looking for where the cheese's been hidden this time.

    Meanwhile, the guy with the flat tired bicycle rode by, slowly, chatting with a friend.  After a quick second his friend came over and tried to bum a cigarette from me too.

    I just stared him in the eyes, and told him straight out "Look, I got a fare trying to hide out on me upstairs. I've called the cops, and they're on the way... and I really ain't in no kind of giving mood no more..."

    "Yeah," he muttered "but that ain't got nothing to do with me... I just wanted a cigarette."

    I just stared back at him for a minute, wondering just how stupid and/or high he was, and then I said  "No. No cigarette for you, unless you wanna give me the $20 that this broad owes me."

    "Yeah, " he said again, "but that ain't got nothing to do with me."

    "Yeah," I answered, "and neither do my cigarettes."

    He just stared at me for another several seconds, like he probably had at the tests in whatever grade he'd last attended at school... before he finally got the clue and fucked off.

    I didn't have to wait but another minute or two before the man himself, the guy from the front apartment with all the 'friends' came by.

    "So, who you waiting for?" he asked me.

    "Me? I'm waiting for the lady I brought from the hospital, the one who went into the back upstairs apartment.    The silly bitch seems to think she can just hide from me and ditch on her taxi fare... so I called the cops.  They're on their way."

    He just stared for a few seconds.

    "You called the cops?" he eventually asked.

    "Yup. They're on their way." I answered, trying to sound positive of the fact.  I'd seen maybe four patrol cars along 98^th Ave on the way down... and then there was the fuckers that'd had nothing better to do than hassle me off 66^th Ave not more than an hour before... surely, somebody had to have a couple of minutes free to do their job. After all, what else were all the taxi permit fees for than to help offset these kinds of response expenses... right?

    "Yo man, you didn't have to call no cops..." he tried to explain to me.

    I waited for the rest of the elegant explanation, but no more ever came.

    "Yo, tell you what... how much she owe you?"

    "$20."

    "$20?" he answered, like it was the kind of sum that would've made or broken Social Security or something, "You know man, this ain't got nothing to do with me."

    "I didn't say it did..." I answered, feeling cool once I'd reassured myself that my pepperspray was handy.

    "Yo, tell you what..." suggested dude, in the kindest hearted sounding of tones that I figured he knew how to make, "I'll give you $10, if you just forget about the whole thing."

    I stared at him for a second and a half.  I'd be lying if I said it never crossed my mind to take him up on the offer... I'd never gotten anything out of calling the cops before but wasted time... and $10 was better than nothing... But, this time I was certain of where the bitch had gone... and I was in a pissy mood after having the cops hassle me... and I wanted them to do something for me for once, instead of to me... and, more than anything... I could just see taking dude up on his offer, and finding myself back at the same BART train cab stand as before, and winding up with a ticket this time...

    "Tell you what, make it $18, and you got a deal." I offered.

    It seemed worth a try.

    "I ain't got no $18. I just got $10..." he responded, trying to cut some sort of hard bargain.

    I just shrugged. "Ok, nevermind then.  I'll just wait for the cops."

    He didn't look happy.  I couldn't believe it when he just shrugged though, and walked off.  Did he really think 8 bucks was worth writing off all the business that he'd lose while the cops were around?  Or was he just that cheap?  Desperate?  What the hell was he thinking?

    There wasn't anything to do though.  He'd called my bluff... he wasn't even gonna try to haggle.  Maybe I had things wrong.  Maybe he was just making a living giving psychic advice, tarot readings in a nearby carport, or psychotherapy while he walked.

    I doubted it though.  Even if he was doing any of the above, I doubted he had a business permit.

    "Fine, fucker... you don't wanna play ball, I'll make a point of narcing your ass out to the cops..." I told myself.

    Of course, what I knew he was betting on, and I was praying against, was that the cops wouldn't ever bother to show up.

    It was an altogether too real possibility.  Of course, if I waited more than an hour and the cops never showed up to deal with a legitimate fraud complaint from a member of the city's business community... well then I knew I could swing by some night with my personal car and my personal 9mm and deliver a little personal justice...

    The saddest part of this whole story is that police response time puts independent contractors in a position where they start to think this way...

    It was while I was working out the drive-by route that I would take that the guy on the flat tired bicycle rolled by again.  This time he had another friend with him.  I just watched coolly, trying to fight the urge to just pepperspray the both of them if they came anywhere near me.  As they rolled up, and just started chatting at the foot of the stairs to the apartment building, another couple of chicks walked up, and asked me who I was waiting for.

    "I'm waiting for some stupid bitch..." I explained, "who's trying to hide out upstairs and dodge her fare. The cops'll be here any minute."

    These two didn't seem to like the idea of that at all.  They walked just out of earshot, and started conferring.  As I watched, the business man from the front room came by and said hello to the two of them.  They seemed friendly, and they smiled, but they couldn't be bothered to wait around... they went back to their car and got the hell out of there.

    I just smiled.

    "Are you sure you don't want the $10?" said dude as he walked past on his way to the stairs.

    I just shook my head, "Naah, I'll just wait for the cops. They'll be here any minute."

    He just shrugged, and walked on.  I tried not to think about the fact that he had about as much confidence in their willingness to make time for a ripped off cabbie as I had.  I tried not to think about the pair of Oakland cops whose sole job was apparently to hassle cabbies, but who apparently couldn't be bothered to respond to a call from a cabbie who'd been ripped off.   Taxi Detail my ass!... was all I could think.

    I was thinking that, trying to look cool, wondering if maybe I shouldn't make a point of cleaning my 9mm before making a quickie drive-by, there's really nothing more embarrassing than having your gun jam when your trying to make a retaliatory drive-    by... when dude walked to the stairs.

    There was a short conference between the flat tire man, the business man, and the new guy.  They looked back at me a couple of times, talked some more, looked back at me, and talked some more... it went on like that, in hushed tones, for maybe a long minute.

    Finally the new guy came over.

    "You call the cops man?"

    I just looked at him for a second.

    "Yeah."

    "You didn' have to call no cops, man."

    I looked at him for another second.   I wanted to dismiss him as a moron, but I fought the urge.

    "Well..." I tried to explain, "She owes me $20, and she won't open the door, let alone pay... I don't see as I had any other choice."

    He just stared at me and shrugged, like he couldn't believe he had to deal with such a moron, "Yeah, but you didn't have to call no cops, man."

    I just nodded. "Yeah, apparently I did. You wanna pay me, and I'll call them off... otherwise, well, they should be here any minute."

    I could tell he didn't really believe that any more than I did... but at the same time, we both knew it was at least theoretically true.  There was the possibility that they might roll up any moment... kind of like the fact that every time you buy a lottery ticket there's the possibility that you might win.

    Then again, there're enough people willing to gamble that they might win that the states make millions, billions... a hell of a lot more than you or I... and by the same token, there're plenty of people who don't want to bet against long odds, not when losing means... well I'm guessing a prison sentence in this case.

    "Man, you didn' have to call no cops...." he repeated again.

    I just shrugged. "I did though. They'll be here any minute, unless you wanna give me my money."

    He shook his head like a man looking up at Mount Vesuvius on one of its bad days.  He shook his head again, and he went back to talk to the bicycle guy and the business man.

    I just shrugged.  By this time I'd wasted so much time I didn't give a fuck.  My day was fucked.  And, if my day was gonna be fucked, I had no problem with seeing other people's day fucked too.

    After a minute of discussion, the new guy came back over.

    "Look man, you didn' have to call no cops..."

    "Yeah, well, I didn' see no one trying to work things out here until after I called 'em, so I'm thinking I did..."  I answered, feeling some courage from the fact that I had my pepper spray handy, not to mention the fact that if anything happened to me while I was waiting out front of a crack house for the cops to show up... well at least there'd be hell to pay.

    Even I knew that the cops would investigate something like that.  Even the Oakland cops wouldn't have a choice in the matter.  Once you're dead, they have to do something about it, or at least come up with an explanation for why they can't... It's only while you're still alive that you can't expect them to do anything for you.

    "Yeah, well, you didn' have to call no cops.  She was gonna pay... How much was the fare anyway?..."

    I had to admit, dude had a way of making it sound like I was the one being petty.  Calling the cops over a mere $20 like that... what an asshole...

    "It was $20."

    "Ok, no problem." he answered, like he was a big enough man to where $20 wasn't any big deal.

    I almost admired him... at least, until I realized it really wasn't any big deal.  But I was still way too pissed off to let it slide.  It was one of those things... if I wasn't on the job, if it'd been a friend, I wouldn't've given a shit... but there was something about that broad thinking she could play me for a dumbass that pissed me way the hell too far off...

    He turned back, and walked back toward his friends like he was gonna go upstairs and just get the money from the broad... but, then he suddenly turned back, and just produced the money from his pocket.

    Wow, a man with $20 to his name.  I was impressed.

    Ok, the fact that it seemed to be such a big deal was pretty sad.

    He handed me 2 of the most beaten up 5s, and 10 of the limpest, most hard ridden 1s I've ever seen in my life... and the look in his eyes as he handed the wad of limp bills over made me think of Achilleus handing over that broad to Agamemnon... with that look of having been wronged in his eyes...

    I just shrugged, and hopped back in the taxi to get the hell out of there while the getting was good.  I didn't even bother to worry about the 15 minutes of my time that these fucks had wasted.

    "You gonna call the cops right? You gonna tell them they don't gotta come?"

    "Yeah, no sweat, big guy..." I assured him.

    As I pulled away from the curb I lit a cigarette to celebrate, and I actually called 911 back.  I was still thinking about whether to cancel my call, or to just change it to a report of narcotics trafficking... just to fuck with the assholes... when the emergency hotline answering machine came on.

    "Bitch, what the fuck you thinking bringing a cab man back here when you ain't got no money to pay him!?... You bringing the cops down on us?  What the fuck you thinking, bitch!?"  I heard from up the block, as I left a message to cancel my call.

    I'd made it about 2 blocks, thinking wonderful thoughts about the anti-neighborhood watch smacking that stupid bitch around for being... a stupid bitch, when my cell phone rang.

    "Hello, 911." came a voice as I answered.

    "Yeah?"

    "We got a message saying you'd canceled your call..."

    "Uhh, yeah... I worked it out for myself..."

    "Ok. Glad to be of assistance." said the broad, before hanging up.

    I just laughed... and then I saved the number for direct Oakland Police dispatch in my cell phone book list. Hopefully I'd be able to cut 2 minutes off the response time the next time.

    2 minutes off of a 3 hour response time... I just laughed again, and headed for the freeway. It was time to work downtown for a while.

 The Old Waybills

 there's No Place Like Home...

You gotta be shitting me Alex