Paradise Driver: 03/25/07

Sunday, March 25, 2007

THE "PROFESSOR"

WAS A "NO SHOW" LAST NIGHT

So, the question then becomes:

Will he show up for his shifts on Sunday and Monday?

Since I don't work those 2 days, I really don't give a shit.
I give the odds at 50/50 that he doesn't want to work with me anymore, after the lambasting I gave him last Sunday morning. Oh, well, as it says in the "footer", "Feces Occurs". Thats the essence of my Philosophy of Life.

TMR is back from vacation and he held the phone last night. The three "day" cabs bailed by 9:00pm leaving him, Hardin and myself to cover a Saturday night. All three of us raked in the cash. Drove 174 miles (280 km) and had 18 fares.

Started the shift with a Grand to OGG. Got another trip to OGG from the Maui Coast 90 minutes later. Also had a short "out-of-towner" from the far north end of Kihei to the nearest edge of Kahului. The other 15 were typical bar runs.

The calls were spaced nicely and getting the opportunity to take restroom breaks was not a problem and even had time to grab some pupus to snack on. But the pacing was such that it took me almost 2 hours to consume what I had purchased.

I have made the decision to not accept any Speedi-Shuttle hand-offs in the future. It has been quite awhile since the last one, so when I got the Coast to OGG dispatch I was hoping for the best. No such luck. The prior 5 times I have dealt with Speedi-Shuttle, getting paid was a problem. The procedure is that we do the run and then go to their counter in Baggage Claim, present a receipt and get our cash. 5 times in a row, NO CASH. "Please come back tomorrow." Last night was the same. TMR is going to stop by there on his way to work, he lives "upcountry", collect my funds and drop it by my place sometime this evening. That made the sixth time in a row and enough is enough. They have very inept dispatching and routing of their shuttle buses doing the returns to the airport.

If you come to Mau'i and don't rent a car, then using Speedi-Shuttle is a very cost effective means of getting to your hotel or condo. Especially if you don't mind taking the long "scenic route". Just don't rely on them to get you back to the airport in a timely manner. I think we covered 5 or 6 of their pickups in Kihei last night.

***

This is a 3-day weekend in Hawai'i. Monday is the annual celebration of Prince Kuhio Day. State and County Offices are closed but Federal Offices are open.

***

I realized tonight that I get kissed a lot in this job. Intoxicated women, young, old, pretty or plain, have this overwhelming desire to give me a peck on the cheek when de-cabbing (I may have just coined a new word). In no way imaginable could you call me attractive. On the 1 to 10 scale, I'd rate myself as somewhere between a 2 and a 3. I guess the kisses are the result of being "blind" drunk.

***

I hauled a "regular" twice last night. His name is Steve and he earns his livelihood off the internet. Google sends him a monthly check in the 5 figure range. They are not the only one. He has read Paradise Driver and offered me some suggestions about increasing my ranking in Google's search engine and some concepts for using this blog to generate some cab-bi$$. So you might notice some subtle changes in the near future.

Hey! Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Right?!

I know my readership drops drastically over the weekends and I want to thank all of you who managed to swing by. It is appreciated.

Mahalo

Aloha

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