Paradise Driver

Friday, November 10, 2006

11 NOVEMBER - VETERAN'S DAY

Here Rests In Honored Glory An American Soldier Known But To God

No Matter What The Year
The Sentiment ALWAYS Holds True

All of the following are patriotic in nature but not necessarily related to Veteran's Day.

Please save to your picture storage and use as needed.

"Let's all be careful out there!"

AS IT GETS

A fantastic shift last night. 23 runs. Two OGG trips. Only a couple of frugal Canadian tippers, which is getting rarer as parity between the two different dollars gets closer. Only one slightly irritating drunk, and I was taking him and two others to a bar from one of the hotels.

TMR had the phone and we started the night with 6 cabs, 2 "days" and 4 "nights". We all stayed busy. Very, VERY busy. Though it turns out that I didn't miss much on my 2 days of unscheduled "R&R". If I would have worked those nights, nobody would have earned even $100.

Tonight is my night with the phone and hopefully last night's trend will continue.

Being a "WORLD CLASS PROCRASTINATOR", I thought I would go down and renew my drivers license today. Forgot that tomorrow was Veterans Day and that all Federal, State & County Offices are closed. The banks will be open today but closed on Saturday.

Monday is the last day to get that license renewal. Just have to read the eye chart

EXAMINER: Just read line number five, please.
ME: There are five lines?
EXAMINER: Okay, what line can you read?
ME: Uh, I think the first one is and "E".

and hand over some money.

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PET PEEVES

Bicycle, moped and scooter drivers who have no lights on their bikes, are dressed in dark clothing (usually black) and they get very angry because they aren't seen by automobile drivers. None of these people seem to understand that they are also subject to all traffic laws. They run red lights. They are constantly alternating from the bike path to the roadway and back. Two were hit by drivers tonight. None of them were wearing helmets. Both were transported to the hospital.

I have come extremely close to nailing a few myself. During my shift, I work under the premise that I am the ONLY sober person on the road. I drive very defensively.

My other peeve is the drunks wondering around the "Triangle". They cross the road against the light. They "Jay-walk" anywhere along the street. They even deliberately step directly into vehicle's paths without a care or second glance. Once I saw one walk out in front of me. I came to a stop and he then proceeded to walk right into the front of my cab. Like a deer, he must have been blinded by the headlights.

My one interesting fare was at 3:00am. Picked up a woman and a man at the Kukui Mall. She was being a good samaritan. assisting a lost and confused tourist. He was going to the far noth end of Kihei and I dropped her off just two blocks from the mall.

Now, his story was that he decided to go for a walk on the beach in the dark. He had gotten lost and fell in the ocean a couple of times. During one of those dunks, he claimed to have lost his shoes. After hours of wondering he met the lady, talked and eventually I was called. I know the woman on a very casual basis, she is a semi-regular night person and very caring. After I had dropped her at home I asked the guy where he had started walking from. He said FoodLand.

"Mister, that is only 1/2 block from where I picked you up."
"It is?"
"Yup and which direction were you walking?"
"I don't know" he whimpered in a very mehu voice.

Folks, you've seen the aerial shots of the coast near Foodland. There is no beach to be walked on. Hell, there aren't even any rocks that could be negotiated in the dark. Also, the ocean is never more than 50 yards from Kihei Road, so its not like you could not find your way back to "civilization". A two year old toddler would have walked towards all the lights. He paid the fare with no tip. Unbeknownst to him, he dropped 5 $1 bills on the floor. I knew they were his when I found them later. They were wet and covered in sand.

Have a great day. I am off to bed.

THE PICTURE GALLERY

The Whales Are Coming
The Whales Are Coming

Tropical Flowers

No Rain
No Waterfalls

Diving Molokini

The World Gets Ready To Slumber

"Let's all be careful out there!"

Thursday, November 09, 2006

I LEARN SOMETHING NEW

EVERYDAY.

As I mentioned before, I create, and save as drafts, my posts a couple of days in advance. This way all I need to do is just come home and then add the shift details and stories. Blogger uses the original draft time and date as the posting time and date. So, I must cc&p the completed draft to a newly created post on both Blogger and Blogger-Beta. Thats easily done. Afterwards I go back in and delete the original draft. Since Blogger-Beta has a faster and more reliable picture upload, thats where I do the original creations. Well, it turns out that when I delete the draft, I lose the links to the enlarged images. And you folks click on an image and get a 404 file error. This didn't happen with the original Blogger. Now I have learned how to prevent this from occurring in the future. Turns out that in the "Beta" I must remove little "check-marks" from each image. Then the draft will go bye-bye and the images will remain in the Blogger photofile repository.

*** *** ***

I think I am just tired of people at the moment. Decided to stay home a second night, order in some pizza and chill. Between brain dead "talking head" newscasters and zombie political spin doctors, I have never heard so much useless babble spewed from my TV in my life, excluding Bush's last 6 State Of The Union speeches. TV has to be better tonight than last night, no election coverage. Right? Wrong! I see that by working nights I am not missing much of anything.

I have to go back to work tonight (Thursday). If I watch one more night of the boob-tube I might just consider drastic action. Think I'll see if my VHS copy of TAXIDRIVER still plays. Need something to lighten the mood.

THE PICTURE GALLERY

Protea