AND SO ENDS

ANOTHER WEEK

The next time you find yourself on a plane, sitting next to someone who cannot resist chattering to you endlessly, I urge you to quietly pull your laptop out of your bag, carefully open the screen (ensuring the irritating person next to you can see it), and hit this link.

I have mentioned the problem we have been having with the driver who dispatches on Saturday nights. Last night, Hardin (#25) was holding the phone when the owner transfered the calls. He decided to passively resist turning it over to "The Professor". Amazingly, all of the drivers made money on this shift. The change over was finally made between 10pm 11pm and suddenly "The Professor" started having an influx of personal "specials". Prior to that, he didn't have any. I think the guys on Sunday and Monday, the other two nights that "The Professor" works, are going to work out a method of preventing him from acquiring the phone. None of us want to dispatch but we also don't want to be cheated. It really torques your jaw when you have to work with a cheat and crook. His actions steal money from the rest of us. The alternative plan is to throw him a "blanket party" in some distant cane field one night.

It was a generally slow night. Didn't get my first run until after 8pm. A little pu-pu from The Shops to the Renaissance. As I pulled up to the entry the male passenger asked, "Would you like to take us to the airport?"

"Sure. When would you like to go?"
"Oh, about five minutes from now."
"Not a problem. I'll just wait for you folks right here."

They left to gather their luggage and I let the meter continue to "click".

"ONE-NINE"
"ONE-NINE GO."
"ONE-NINE. THIS RUN WILL BE CONTINUING TO OGG."
"TEN-FOUR, ONE-NINE. WAY TO GO (laughs)"

Now that was a good start, finally.

When I returned to Kihei, I lucked into a long roundtrip run from a residence in central Kihei to Blockbuster and then to a pizza parlor and finally back home. A young couple planning to watch some videos and pig out on pizza. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday night.

Between 7pm and 2am I booked 7 runs. From 2am to 5am I booked another 7. Obviously my solo hours were very busy.

I was looking over my notepad and seeing what business was like last year. Back then a slow night was anything below $200 on the meter and I was usually bordering around $300 on the "clock". This year $200 is a good night and often I barely meter $100. Like I said, business has been really shitty.

Well, today is THE SUPER BOWL. The annual extravaganza of idiocy. I hope your team wins. If I wake up, I will go over to Judy's to watch some of it. I enjoy the spectacle more than the sport. I don't even know which two teams are playing nor do I really care. The outcome of the game will not have a minute effect on my life nor on world events.

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THE PICTURE GALLERY

THE BIG ISLAND

Kiluea Volcano

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"Let's all be careful out there!"