forced off the beltline

I remember so many of these rookie moments with a small smile and say to myself that the other guy was really lucky I was a green horn.

It was just before sunrise on the south beltline. I was westbound, and I'm thinking it was somewhere around John Nolan Drive. I had no one in the cab, and I don't recall if I was going to get a call or not, it doesn't matter anyway.

A guy started honking his horn behind me. I changed lanes, and he changed lanes, he stayed right behind me no matter what I did, flashing his head lights and blasting his horn. Finally, I pulled over on the median to see what his problem was. This little black guy wearing pajama's got out of his car and started screaming at me. He screamed that I'd cut him off or something, and since there was almost no traffic on the highway, I couldn't figgure out for the life of me what he was talking about.

In his screaming, he screamed that I was lucky he didn't get his gun out of his glove box and shoot me. That was the freebie he got from me. If it ever came up again, I'd have the cops involved immediately. The guy claims he's got a gun and ammunition in his glove compartment, uncased undoubtedly. A bad day almost beyond his wildest dreams. I don't give out to many freebies anymore.

It may be obvious that I haven't been posting much lately. I'm back to driving 5 days a week. I've retired from the University, recovered from the injury I had at the beginning of December, and I'm glad to be back driving. I've been driving a couple of day shifts and 3 or 4 night shifts a week, the odd combination of hours is hard. Why? I need to get my edge back for the city, 24 hours a day. I'd like to drive days for about 8 weeks sometime say in April and May, but if I don't know what's going on, I'd be showing up for little or no money. Stone-Eye was in the drivers room at 3:30 am on a Sunday morning. Stone-Eye!?!?? In over 20 years that I've known the guy, he's never driven a Sunday before (he's a day guy, starts at 3 or 4). Needless to say, it's bad for everyone driving a cab, probably everywhere, people just aren't spending and going out. Driving when the money's poor takes more out of you than driving when it's good. I just haven't felt like writing after work like I did.

I did figgure out how I'll compose the first chapter of the actual book. Part of it is sitting on my desktop, it's carefully complying with the guidelines set down by the authors I'm reading who teach writing. It includes my best friend getting murdered by a fare in April of '92, they say gore sells well, I know Jim would want me to sell the book. The part of it that will be submitted to agents will live on a web site, and I'll put a single link to that website in a post as soon as Chapter 1 is finished and polished. The actual book chapters will live on the web until I am able to sell the book.