Junior, aka The Minus

I had fun with The Minus when I ran into him at a wedding a couple of years ago. He got banished from cab driving for failing to pay his cab rent many years ago, but aside from being grayer, he looked like the same old Minus. So, I walked up to him, threw my arms around him like a long lost friend, and exclaimed "Minus!!"

He looked at me puzzled, and said, "Yeah, I know, I've got one tattooed on my forehead. Who the hell are you anyway?"

I smiled and said, "You haven't changed much, it's good to see you." Then I went on my way. He spent the rest of the afternoon asking people who I was, and of course nobody remembered what my name was when he knew me and I do look a little different, it just made no sense what so ever to him.

I will always remember him as he was one night with Pin Head, they were both trashed and he was kind of singing, "A Minus and a Pin."

His official nickname at the cab company was Junior. He's Fast Eddies little brother, so Fast Eddie got called Senior, and Minus got called Junior, over the radio.

The absolute, classic, Minus antic dote happened one Sunday morning at The Union House. A bunch of drivers went for a few after work beverages, and he was sifting through his cash and saying, "This one's for me, this ones for THM, this one's for me....." And finally said, "The hell with THM.", and bought the house a round of drinks. According to Fast Eddie, he hadn't even made check in that day.

My classic Minus memory was a call at the bus. I was in the back lot, he was next to the window, we were both standing next to the dispatcher in the office when the call came in. The back lot smoked the window by 50 yards, so I knew I was up, he was closer to his cab, but running through the shop doesn't take much time. Dispatcher asked me where I was, Ingersol and Wash, asked Junior and he said his cab was broke down. What he'd done was floor it backing out of the lot, and thrown it into drive with it floored, which is a really good way to spread pieces of transmission all over the pavement under the car, which is precisely what happened.

But he is definitely part of the family. How could a guy who talked of spanking dead presidents (laying a bill down on the bar), and cold cracklers (bottles of beer for after work), not be loved by all, even if he couldn't drive a cab?