Tag Archives: uber

danielle in san diego asks

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my love,

Why do churches have so many white vans? What are they for? Why white and completely non descript.

It’s suspect.

To say the least.

lovely danielle,

theres an office building on sunset near the beverly hills line in west hollywood. it overlooks bootsy bellows.

i got a ping today and the passenger was in front and i tried to make a u-turn but i ended up being forced to go into the parking structure, getting a little ticket but then making the u-turn and hoping that there would be no charge, there wasn’t, and finally exiting and seeing her there.

she was in her 60s, platinum hair. law professor out here on vacation.

as she talked i thought i heard something.

do i detect a midwest accent? i asked.

i’m from chicago, she said. i turned around my cap and said, did you see this?

she laughed. no, i missed that. and we were off.

i asked her if she went to the cubs victory parade, she said, not only that but my husband and i went to a world series game.

it was hot today. 85 or so. the AC was on and when she said that i turned it down one tick so i could hear her clearly.

he said, im gonna do it. i said if you do don’t tell me any of the details, she said.

i said, tickets were four thousand dollars. each.

she said, i told him and now i will tell you, do not tell me the details.

she laughed.

later i asked her something about her husband and she paused and said, he’s passed now.

but he had a long life and got to see the Cubs win the world series after all.

churches have white vans so they can go to baseball games undercover when they should be doing something dumb like buying wholesale incense.

are you good at anything? im not

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imagine you were good at something. like really good.

imagine you found out you were and someone who mattered said holy crap look at you.

then imagine you got to do it.

thats how i feel about uber and lyft.

i used to think that if i was a great guitar player id be the biggest dick.

id wear flashy clothes and adopt a british accent and surround myself with weirdos.

so when i couldnt barely play any chords i was happy.

because i would never want to be a dick to someone.

even when people are being mean to me i try to chill for a while

put myself in their shoes, think about it, look at all the angles.

when i was a kid i loved art. loved it. every semester of high school i took an art class.

one of the teachers showed us cubism one day and she said here picassos trying to show you all the sides at the same time. the front the back the left side the right side.

then in college i had a teacher showing us Tolstoy and she said here he is showing you the fight from the wife’s point of view, then the husbands, then the maids and then God’s

so i enjoy seeing all the sides and when i drive i try to think, if i was in the backseat of the Benz of the worlds greatest uber driver what would i want?

the answer usually starts with a clean car that smells fresh, not perfumed, but faintly of orange peels.

miles davis should be playing softly and the route should be quick and confident.

if the passengers wanna know some facts about the neighborhoods we are passing by, the driver should not only be able to tell you whats there

but what used to be there.

there should be water, mints, napkins, phone chargers, cup holders,

and wisdom.

fucking wisdom for days.

the other day i got my first 3-star rating (out of 5) in over 500 trips. i couldn’t believe it.

because life isn’t fair i don’t know who gave it to me or why.

which is sad because im dying to know. not because i wanna fight. but because if there is some feedback that would truly make me the worlds greatest uber driver, i would love to know.

for example, perhaps they wanted mozart.

picked up this guy in West LA on a sunny day

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it was beautiful, no traffic, i was feeling great.

picked him up near Bundy, over by The Park Nobody Is Allowed To Use.

his wife had driven his car to a repair shop that previous night and asked if they could remove the smell of 47 year-old asshole

when he returned from work later that night, they argued, again, a nightly occurrence, and she finally admitted to him where his car could be found.

so i was taking him to the shop in Santa Monica.

it wasn’t a long drive, but in it he told me how they had met in their early 20s, had a beautiful marriage and produced two great kids.

but over the last 4-5 years she has been unbearable, always snapping at the kids, yelling at him. Doing the weirdest things.

he thinks she’s bipolar. he’s moved out of the house. but the hardest thing on him is what to tell his teenage kids.

he was damn near crying in my backseat.

i said, this is what id say to the kids

say, you know how when your computer has a virus and the cursor jumps all over the place and the sound won’t work?

it’s still Your computer, the one that you love, the one that showed you all the cool things

it’s just sick and needs to get fixed.

your mom really does love you and always will. she just has to go into the shop.

and then he really started crying.

picked up a guy from what looked like a party

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i was all were you dudes raging over there?

he was like, no, im sober, in fact you’re taking me to my halfway house.

i said, wow, good for you. what was your poison?

heroin.

damn bro!

yeah i know.

were you guys watching the world series?

no. fuck Houston!

let me guess, you’re a Yankee fan?

Boogie Down Bronx, ride or die.

dude appeared to be from India but he had a thick East Coast bias.

do people rehabbing from heroin often come to Los Angeles?

long story, but sometimes it’s smart to go somewhere that’s less easy to score.

bro i could drive you somewhere right now…

oh i know, but it’s not like being in NY and one of my friends coming by with an 8-ball.

you guys snort H out there?

in a heartbeat. we get our shit from Bolivia, Colombia, Honduras. it’s the genuine article. LA has the worst heroin, it’s from Mexico. That stuff will kill you.

well im very proud of you. i can only imagine how hard it was to kick.

it was a nightmare.

on Howard Stern, Artie would talk about using some medicine that helped him.

yeah Subutex. But that was awhile ago. that shit was just as addictive as heroin. it was legal heroin. and getting off that shit was harder than kicking the real thing.

say whaaaat?

yeah so theres new stuff now that will make you really sick if you mix it with heroin. 

we drove through Beverly Hills past Century City. i changed the subject back to the Yankees and filled him in on the game, which was now tied in the 10th.

i asked him if he had ever read the Basketball Diaries.

he said, no but he watched some of the movie but nodded off.

i was all, maybe you’re better off.

dropped him off in front of a $3 million home, which he swore was his halfway house.

i said, that looks like a Completely Full House and he laughed.

then coughed.

then laughed again.

the good thing about uber and lyft is

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let’s say you get popped by a damn red light camera not coming to a full stop

and let’s say that the fine is $500

you really can go out into the world at all hours

and you can make that $500 in a week, or a week and-a-half

i went to court on Friday at like 8:30am and paid the $10 cash to park in the court basement

it was cash only.

and i wondered why does the beverly hills court want cash so badly?

aren’t all-cash operations only doing that because they wanna dodge some taxes?

so why is a city doing that?

is there graft in the poshest city in LA?

and i went to the cour room and there were a couple dozen of us there.

and we read our names on the print out and the balif said some funny jokes, one of them directed at our dear president.

and we plead guilty, not guilty or no contest.

it was a judge pro-tem so he was extra careful to explain everything beautifully.

and along the way i overheard someone say there was video on the website, not just still pictures.

and i was all uh oh. because all i had seen were the still pictures and those didn’t really prove anything. well today i saw the video and i wish i had seen it before i plead not guilty because after further review im so guilty they should impeach me from office.

cubs lost today too.

but they were supposed to.

tomorrow im pretty sure they will win. mostly because they played well today even though they were tired AF.

and it was hot.

and sometimes the stars are conspiring against you.

and i should slow down anyways.

lifes a cabaret, old chum.

the libras biggest struggle is to truly let go

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im not a control freak. i swear.

i feel like im the best team player because i know what its like to be the leader, the quasi leader, and the not leader.

these people get in the uber and theyre so used to being the leader that they think they gotta tell me how to get to the airport

and im all, negro, do you know how many times ive gotten someone to the airport

in rush hour traffic, on the 405?

and youd think if you have a benz and its clean and theres a liscense plate that says

xbi

and the license plate holder that says 2016 world series champs

and miles davis is playing

and ive got water, mints, and a super long cord

that id be trusted.

but no.

some people think they have to do it all and im all sit back and let me do

what im best at.

what if it turns out that i was never meant to be a writer or a director or a baseball manager

but i was meant to be the worlds greatest uber driver.

would that be so bad?

theres some people who will never be the worlds greatest anything.

i appreciate people so much. i see them. i know they see me see them.

people should try to be the worlds greatest something.

they should strive.

i strive like crazy.

im over here striving my head off.

but ok mr advertising exec tell me how to drive on the 405.

the jungle i was sent to this planet to traverse across.

cop shows up in my uber backseat, an undercover one

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he has a beautiful wife.

but as i have told many before, i can find out everything about my passengers within the first 5 minutes of the ride as long as they talk to me.

it’s like that weird 20 Questions game you can get at the drug store as a stocking stuffer.

whenever i pick up someone from a hotel i ask them if theyre in from outta town and usually they are. so i ask them where and they tell me.

this pair was from Denver. they seemed rich. it was a fancy hotel. Uber Select. going to a fancy restaurant. so i say, may i ask you a question about where youre from?

they straightened up with excitement.

i said, LA will soon have legal weed. your state has had it and has made a billion in tax revenue in less than a year. that seems like a lot of pot. has it negatively affected your city at all? has anything drastically changed?

then he revealed to me that he was a cop. he said that the only thing that has changed is more tourists come to town. other than that crime is neither up nor down. all is well. then he added this:

“the sheriff and i sit on his porch and pass a joint back and forth. it’s nice.”

he did say this interesting fact… that emergency room visits are up, usually from hotels, of tourists who buy edibles and eat too many of them and freak out. they get rushed to the hospital where they just have to wait for the THC to get through their system.

i said, so if LA was to learn anything from Colorado it would be to pay great care to edibles?

he said yes. make sure they are clearly marked with the dosage and each cookie or brownie or whatever should be equal to ONE DOSE.

it was a very pleasant conversation and he gave me a $5 tip and then said

I’d give you $4.20 but you were superb.

i think about my cat Prince a lot

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he does things and he cant help it.

im the same way.

if you throw his favorite little bell-ball he will run after it like a dog. eventually you will find it near my bed. a weird, slow, game of fetch, even though he’s a cat.

me, i drive uber and lyft as often as i can, even though i have a perfectly good normal job.

even though the roads are dangerous, the traffic is heinous and letting strangers in my Benz isn’t the wisest move deep down.

but i am addicted to learning about and helping people. ive got a friend Ben who works at a Catholic soup kitchen. they lure Catholics to skid row, murder them, and make soup out of them. the poor are nourished and Ben feels good about himself, which is crazy because Ben is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet.

got another friend, Steve, who writes novels and interviews other authors about their process. i almost wanna write another book just so Steve will interview me about it.

some nights i will drive and drive and drive for eight hours straight. peeing just once or twice. usually mcdonalds but today i peed in a bowling alley bathroom. what a great place.

my problem is i love people for about 25 minutes. i wanna know everything about them. and then they’re gone. no fuss no muss. am i a commitment-phobe? probably. who cares. we live such short lives why are we trying to box ourselves in? why can’t we just enjoy a bite-sized conversation, especially if it goes into a deeper truth.

the problem though with driving for 8 hours is somewhere along the way you get tired so you eat something and drink a giant Coke. then you get home totally frazzled and you can’t get to sleep.

luckily for me, theres a long legged blonde girl who dresses sexy and helps me get my Zzzs. and she has a key to my castle.

do i wanna write novels? yes. do i wanna have a great podcast? yes. would i love to build a house one day and shove a Conversation Pit in there? of course.

but i am currently addicted to lifestyle choices that keep me a mild mannered apartment dweller with no hope for advancement.

except in my heart.

where all my little conversations with the good people of this city live forever.

occasionally i will let you in for a peek.

which is how Prince would do it too.

(my Prince, not yrs.)

i did a lot and i did nothing, then i got rest, now im tired

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amber wanted to go to a porn star party and i said have fun!

she said you dont wanna meet the girls? i said ive met everyone.

she said you wont get jealous if i have tons of fun?

i said life is short, always have tons of fun

and i watched the following films:

the bellboy, king of comedy, nocturnal animals

and the day before we watched a clockwork orange.

saturday i drove and drove and drove. it was a flashback to yesteryear.

i wish uber would realize that there are beautiful feelings that drivers get when you give us a goal and a proper prize

and then we reach said goal.

it makes us feel amazing and wonderful and all along the way we are counting down and

when we hit it we wanna dance around.

surely theres a way that we can capture this feeling and share it with other drivers

and inspire them too.

but  im not sure uber is ready for that jelly.

tonight im eating steak with my man chris.

drove 100 miles yesterday for Lyft n Uber

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first ride was right close to my work. two hollywood producers from up north. they didn’t know movies. it was weird.

the one guy kept asking the other guy “who is that?” and they were talking about Famous people!

we were speeding across town to go from one fancy hotel to another.

i mighta blown my tip when, while driving north on La Brea, one of the dudes asks, “so we’re taking side streets?”

i said, “gotta take them to get to the freeway, but yes.”

it came across snotty i think. am i defensive about my routes? maybe. sometimes.

but i did follow up by asking, “is there a way you wanna go?” he said no. he was just asking.

after that i saw that i was in an area that Uber was giving us a 1.7x bonus.

i was downtown where you have to be careful because a lot of times people are just going 5-6 blocks and its annoying because you have to wait for them and the roads are packed and youre double parked and ughhh.

but at 1.7x i figured i would head over to the train station and see if i could get a long ride from there because often people get off the train and have to go to places where there isnt a train station like Santa Monica or Manhattan Beach or Pasadena.

got over there and immediately got a ping. and whattya know it was a Select ride! thank you Lord!

ended up being a really good kid who had some birth defect or learning disability. he sounded like Rain Man a little.

he sat in the front seat which is extremely rare for Uber Select. i hit the app and saw he was going way out over to the Wesssside. $40 ride at least for me, probably $60 for him.

i said, this is Select, you know that right? he said yep.

and we were off.

while talking it became obvious that his parents were very rich doctors and he regularily takes the train East to volunteer at a hospital.

which ward did you work at today? i asked

The Burn Unit he said.

dude, youre going straight to Heaven.

i know, he laughed.

i was all, do you go there often? he said every Monday Wednesday and Fridays. so i told him i would see him on Wednesday at the same time.

he was all, ok!

my goal every week is $200 as that is what my car costs when all is said and done. if i could make $120 of that on one passenger, i could probably hit $300 every week.

best laid plans tho so relax.

so there i was at UCLA pretty happy with myself. i texted amber to see what she had planned for the night. maybe we would get some grub somewhere.

when ping i got a call from the center of UCLA. usually i would cancel that because those rides are shorter than DTLA ones.

turned out this woman wanted to go to Rancho PV, which is damn near long beach. 22 mile ride.

but it was Uber X at only 1.3. I told amber i wouldnt be home till 10pm and id be exhausted from doing the 10 twice and now the 405 there and the 110 to get home.

she is always a good sport so she said there will be food when i got home.

for some reason traffic was a dream and i did the whole thing in no time and got home at 9:30p

amber had told me not to go to fast food, that there would be food waiting so when i got home and there wasnt

i was mad.

here i had this super profitable day driving, traffic was amazing, a half naked babe was cooking for me and all i could feel was unfulfilled entitlement.

it made me upset that i was mad because it reminded me of people who would get mad even though others were doing nice things for them.

i dont wanna be that guy.

so i took a walk to get her some milk that she needed for the mashed potatoes and apologized profusely for being a jerk.

its weird how automatic emotions can filter up.

i got emotional thinking about how i am not 100 per cent in control of my feelings all the time and sometimes they are dark.

she said you are super kind, you were not mean, you have nothing to apologize about.

but i knew what was inside and it reminded me of fellow Libra Jimmy Carter who told Playboy that a sin in your heart is just as bad as a sin you take action on.

and of course i agree with the president.