"You rule! That is so awesome!"

A line out of chapter 13 of HACK. Hmmmmm........... Did I ever get such praise in a similar situation? Well sort of.......

What's up for consideration here is, did I ever do something I should be denying that I did, and get applause for doing it from my passengers? The thing that always pops out in my mind happened on a chilly, rainy night. It was a Friday or Saturday night. I had a load going from the Regent st. neighborhood to State st. This is a short ride, about 12 blocks long.

What makes such a ride attractive is the charge for the extra passengers. The ride itself costs either $2.75 or $4.00 depending on exactly where they got in, the higher price is west of Orchard st. The $3.00 for the extra 3 people takes it up to $5.75 plus tippage, which isn't bad for a quick little 12 block ride. Do 7 or 8 of those rides in an hour and you can make out pretty good.

The route I like best is Spring to Park, Park to Dayton, Dayton to Lake or Francis (depending on exactly where the ride goes) and on to the destination. This mostly avoids corners where I may get stuck at a light. This route takes you under the Park st. viaduct.

The modern Park st. viaduct was built a few years ago and has a very nice, blemish free, concrete surface under it, for your driving pleasure. For most of my driving career, we had the old Park st. viaduct. It funnelled to a single lane in each direction, which caused accidents. It was a low bridge, so frequently trucks would get stuck under it. And finally, the pavement under it was a real mess, with a massive pot hole that would never hold cold patch on the northbound side.

On this particular night, since it had been raining, that pot hole was full of water. There were 2 girls walking right next to that huge puddle. This was back in the days when we had crank windows, so the kids in the cab had all the windows cranked down. When the cab hit that water puddle, a wall of water went up and over the 2 girls walking on the sidewalk. The let out a cry in unison, "Eeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwww............................"

The kids in the cab went wild, "YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Sorry bout that. The tip was good.


Now, as I read on past the quote in the title, I guess I will share something about myself that you, the reader may wonder about or perhaps will wonder about. She describes flying into a rage and going off on some guy on the street, which culminates with her going and giving him not one, but 2 shoves from behind. I couldn't do that. She doesn't comprehend the consequences of winning. Most street fights don't involve the cops. Most street fights are 2 guys swinging like buzz saws, they land a couple of shots, one guy goes down perhaps, gets kicked a few times, and the winner takes off running. In order to do this, you have to be wild and crazy enough to risk serious jail time to win. Most people, like her, fly into a blind rage, and they don't think at all. If you engage someone like that and there is no one available to hold them after they've lost, they'll keep coming at you until you hurt them to keep them down, or the cops show up and take both of you to jail. It's a lose - lose situation.

Certainly, I do get bent out of shape on occasion, but be advised, that's disorderly behaviour and you can get hauled in for it.

When the situation goes to dire, I change, all of a sudden I'm perfictly calm. In the face of someone in a blind rage, this only fuels the rage more. I'm not sure how it comes off on the other side of it, perhaps as cowardice, perhaps as insult, I just don't know. I do know this, if you ever swing at someone 3 times and don't connect, the wisest course of action is to say, "Ah excuse me, I was just leaving", and slowly back away.