Forgive me for complaining about a disabled person.
Picked up at a hotel, going about a mile. Nice gentleman in a wheel chair, along with his wife. It took more than five minutes to load them and stow the chair in the trunk.
As soon as I started driving the lady informed me she has an account with our company. Naturally I'm out of forms for recording the transaction. Almost immediately the old guy farts. As soon as the noxious fumes fill the car, the lady asks me to put the windows up, which I can't do. She wants to argue, so I laid down the law: "The windows will remain down until the man's fart has left the car."
She just didn't get it. She wanted to argue the entire way. I ignored her.
After getting stiffed on the tip, I opened the trunk to get the wheel chair. The lady watched me from near the back of the car.
"Oh my god, what is that?" she asked. She was looking at the wheel chair like it was a snake ready to attack.
"It looks sort of like a wheelchair," I said.
"Well, it's not ours," she said.
"Who's is it?" I asked.
"I don't know, it must be the hotel's."
Idiocy. Idiocy. Idiocy.
Nobody thought to mention the wheel chair wasn't theirs when I was opening my trunk at the hotel and loading it in. Plus, no name appears on the chair.
Since I was so nice and helpful, the lady asked my name so she could ask for me the next time. Was she joking? Am I a masochist? Just get out the cat-o-nine tails now, honey, and start whipping. I gave the name of one of my taxi enemies. The guy will refuse the "personal", as we call such a ride, so it won't cost him any money, but he'll know somebody is messing with him.
I had to go back to the hotel and unload the chair. The doorman was amused, as he didn't know it was their chair, either. He told me to bring it in to the concierge. I said "no". He tried to cop an attitude; I left.
I deserve a medal for not telling several people to fuck themselves.
4 comments:
Heh. I've had nights like that. At least you don't wear your nametag and badge number on the front of your shirt for all to see.
I can only imagine how stressful it must be for police officers. My job is tough enough, at times, and I'm just driving people around.
Stopped a guy last night who was roaring along way over the speed limit in a 35k lb hazmat truck.
"What's the hurry?" I asked.
"I'm on an EMERGENCY call," the driver responded. I looked at the truck. No light bar. No siren. Nothing to make this an emergency vehicle.
Further checking revealed that he's just going to an accident scene to pick up hazardous materials dumped after a wreck. No, it wasn't on the road. No, there was no blockage. No, there was no public safety issue. But he was going to "an emergency."
When I was running his plate, I found that I couldn't find it on the back of the truck. "Where's your plate?" I asked.
"It passed inspection! That's the only place to put it!" He yelled at me. He pointed to a dirt-caked plate that was obliquely displayed to the rear, but which was illegible, under the bed of the truck.
I made sure that my body mic was on. "Sir, these are traffic infractions, and I had originally planned to issue a warning for them. But if you plan to take issue with my simple inquiry as to where your plate was on the back, which I cannot see to copy, then I will be happy to issue you a citation so that you will have something to take to your company to have the plate moved..."
"Oh, no... no need to do that...." he began to back off the attitude.
I try not to write citations just because someone is rude to me.
Surprise, surprise, he had an answer for everything.
If there's one thing I've learned since I started working on the streets, it's that people are capable of absolutely anything.
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