Daylight Limo Rides

Alfa pic credit.

Daytime limousine rides are a rare but sweet kind of fruit. Obvious advantages over night-time runs are the fact that it's light (yes, obviously, but very importantly) that you generally feel better (not exhausted by being awake when the body says go to sleep) and that they finish at a reasonable hour (therefore I can get to bed at the same time as regular people.)

The people who book a stretched limousine from noon until 10:00 pm are different from the night-time crowd too. They tend to be older, richer and happier. Often, the booking is made months in advance.

A recent run was representative. I was to meet eight folks in the parking lot of a local restaurant in The Boss's super stretched SUV. Naturally, he has given me NO details...no idea of who the customers are, where we are going, nor if it's a special occasion. All I have is a time and a place.

But experience told me the people would be fine, as indeed they were. As is usual, the organizer introduced himself to me, and gave me the outline of the day. His friends all arrived, and they're loaded with food and booze and in very high spirits. That's good. Happiness breeds happiness. When I see bottles of champagne, I too am happy.

But not everything is rosy. The airconditioning in this machine works satisfactorily, but not brilliantly. It's a constant refrain from the back, asking that the a/c be turned up. All I can do is to tell them that it will cool down as we get under way, and that it's a big volume of air to cool on a hot Florida day. They don't care. If the least thing is wrong, people bitch. Sigh.

Another pending problem is that I have a navigator on board. A navigator is someone, almost always a guy, who wants to know every turn you plan to make. If you don't describe precisely the route, they'll pick it up and correct it. Unfortunately, this turkey is sitting right at my shoulder...which leads me to raise the divider. Thank goodness for the divider.

The plan was a common one: to Tampa for a matinee live performance (The Jersey Boys) then to an early dinner at a fancy steak house, and then home. That part was easy, and almost quite fun. I had time to read three newspapers, finish my book, make a few calls, spruce up the interior of the limo and take a half-decent lunch. (The latter's not always easy, given how tricky it can be to find a park for the beast.)

After dinner, I was looking forward to dropping off these people and getting home. After all, I'd not finished until 4:00 am the morning before. (More bullshit scheduling from The Boss.) And then came the kiss of death...they wanted to stop for ice-cream. Oh, great. No-one can agree on where to go, and everyone's tired, so they're not communicating. The difficulty for me at a time like this is that I hear three different instructions from the back, but when I try to clarify which ONE I should follow, no-one speaks. It's like I have to play the parent to a bunch of nine-year-olds.

Mr Navigator then springs into action. Okay, if you just make a U-Turn here, he says, pointing hopefully at a break in the median. My eyes roll in their sockets. This thing takes about TEN lanes to make a U-Turn, and gently suggest that another, wider intersection a little up the road will work better. He starts questioning me, asking what I'm doing...

...until he observes for himself PRECISELY how much real estate this damned machine needs for a U-ey.

But it all worked out. And it turns out that they were all real estate agents, on a pep-up trip, hoping and talking themselves into a better year ahead. Good luck with that, guys and girls.

And for a bunch of people who LIVE AND DIE on percentage sales commissions, the tip was abysmal. But I didn't care. I was home in bed before midnight.

On Tiredness

For two days I have not driven further than the grocery store and the beach. There's not much driving work at The Boss's shop anyway at the moment (surprise) but sometimes I need concentrated down-time.

To the untutored eye, the life of the limo driver looks to be a lot about doing nothing. As I say to passersby and other people I talk to whilst on the job, my life is all about waiting. We wait for flights to arrive, we wait for people to emerge from their house, we wait for concerts to finish, we wait for strippers to take the last dollar from the bachelors. Lack of motion defines us.

Except that waiting is not the same as doing nothing, nor is it the same as hanging around at home. Waiting creates a sub-species of stress, based around being ready to spring into action at very short notice. Think of fighter pilots sitting in their jets at the end of the runway waiting for the call to scramble - sure, they're idling, but relaxed they're not.

Not that waiting for an arriving flight is the same as defending the country, although if we fail to find our customer at the airport some of them are prone to starting WW III. That's the stress. It is fear of something going wrong, for which we are blamed. Most people are pretty quick off the mark with a phone call to The Boss if something goes wrong. That tees him up ready to take a swing at us, notwithstanding that we've done everything right.

If the customer takes the wrong escalator to the wrong arrivals hall, it's not my fault. If the customer fails to meet the limo at the previously decided corner, it's not my fault. If the customer fails to tell me that it's not THEM travelling, but their daughter and her boyfriend, it's not my fault if I don't recognize them.

But it ends up that I get heaped upon, because the driver is at the end of the power line, and at the head of the blame line.

So much of my time is spent out-thinking customers. I'll pre-call to confirm arrangements. I'll draw maps and make drive-bys to point out a place I can safely stop. I'll even park up the limo and follow people so I know where they are - drunks are prone to foxing innocent drivers by claiming to not know where they are.

It's all part of being a driver, but with all the sleuthing and figuring out human nature, I sometimes I think I should start a private detective agency.

Haves and Have-Nots

Insane political definitions aside, I have one simple test for defining whether a customer is rich or not. Ahem:

Those who fly in private jets* are rich. Those who fly on airlines are not.

Pretty simple isn't it? The reason I like it is because it is so clear-cut, eg:

Rich people don't mix with poor people at airports - they have their own terminals.

Rich people leave when they are ready, not when the airline says it's okay.

Rich people are orders of magnitude more wealthy than everyone else - to afford that fancy chunk of aerospace magic requires it.


So that's settled then. But that leaves a fair number of The Boss's customers who would disagree with my description. They would - I'm sure - say that they only travel first-class, that they are Diamond-Edged members of such-and-such an airline's Blah Blah club. All well and good, I would say as I drive them to the airport in a Town Car with crappy brakes and 300,000 miles on the clock. (Rich people use rich-people limo companies.)

But the litmus test is this: from a first class seat with an airline, can you stride to the cockpit and tell the pilot that you have changed your mind? That you just don't feel like Vail today, and that you'd rather go to Taos, where you've just heard the snow is perfect? And if you did manage to do that on your airline flight without being shot, gang-tackled, or generally beat-up by everyone on board, would the pilot actually do it?

No. Of course not. Rich people get to change their minds in-flight. The rest of us do not.









[*For consistency I include turboprops in the 'private jet' category, but not piston-powered planes.]

Miss Apprehension

All I'm saying is, if the person blocking everyone at the gas station sports a long blonde ponytail, don't assume it's a woman. Sixties relics can be deceiving from behind.

How about moving your truck and getting outta the way, Miss?!


D'oh.

Majority

One fact about the limo game - there's always something unexpected in the wind. The Boss graciously assigned me a small-stretched run a couple of Fridays ago, six passengers for a local night out, pick-up time 23:30. Twenty-three thirty, that's thirty minutes before midnight.

It's not that unusual, the late-night start. The under-thirty crowd is aggressively nocturnal, apparently, and arriving at a bar close to midnight is cool. By necessity that usually means being there for closing, often a messy thing. Most places in our neck of the woods have a 2:00 am close.

So I resigned myself to another back-of-the-clock night working for peanuts. I had an airport run late-afternoon, so I tried to nap for a while before heading off to prep the vehicle.

Although I'm used to this kind of weird working schedule, a small knot of dread accompanies me with late-night gigs. There's no way to avoid the fact of circadian rhythm, which for most people means slowed thinking processes, tardy reaction times and skewed decision-making. It's the reason pilots must have certain periods of rest between duties, and why the accident rate skyrockets for shift workers. In a potential bomb like a fully-laden limousine, mistakes can be fatal, and with lots of drunk passengers, it's easy to go wrong too.

I began the usual routine, around 9:00 pm. Shower and shave, dress, drive to The Boss's warehouse; check out the car, load the ice, inspect for cleanliness; make sure of the address, lock up and head out, allowing plenty of time to get to the customer's place. I'll need caffeination, so there's a mandatory stop for coffee.

All the time, the start time is bugging me. The Boss, of course, imparts no extra information. All I know is an address, a time, and a total of six people. Nothing more.

Oh, and a cell-phone number. Approaching the condo, I call. The woman on the other end tells me the gate code, and that 'he' will be down shortly. Who is 'he'? Where are the others? How come you're not coming? All questions I want to ask, but cannot.

Travis looked eighteen years old, but was polite and chatty. We were to head off to another address to collect five of his friends. About half-way there he moved forward to talk through the divider. Turns out that he was recently back from Iraq, serving with the US Army. Tonight's limo ride was a gift from his mother...because at midnight he would turn twenty-one.

Click. He was planning his first legal drink as soon as possible. Now I understood.

Good guy. He was the perfect client, the best and brightest indeed, a tribute to his unit. His friends, however, could have done with some of the civility that army life apparently imbues.

But that's another story.

Familiarity Breeds Happiness

1941 Town Car Pic Credit

The essence of happiness for a driver is knowing the future - when going on a run holds few mysteries or potential surprises. That (mostly) means that we know the client and where they are planning to go, or likely to go.

The best example is collecting a regular client from the airport. In our case, that means one of the airports more than an hour away from home base, to make it worth our while in terms of what The Boss pays. The local airport is (fortunately for us) poorly served. That means anyone looking to travel without connection is forced into using a Town Car service for the first or last hour of their journey. It's our bread and butter.

I know that Doctor S likes newspapers, I'll happily buy a handful to keep him happy. He often travels with a checked bag, and so prefers to meet his driver in the airport in baggage claim. And so it happens. We both know each other, and it works. Once in the car, he immerses himself in the papers, emerging only when I tell him he's home.

Guaranteed low-stress trip.

Max W, a super-busy business guy hasn't time for checked bags, so he will always meet curbside. I'll wait until his flight is a little distance from landing, text AND voicemail him with my exact position, and he'll appear there. Sometimes we even meet at departures, or at a less busy airline's baggage area. He likes to outwit convention, even if it only saves .04 seconds. He'll be on the phone when he emerges, so he'll look up at me, say "Hi Wombat" while I grab his roller bag. I put that in the left rear seat while he's getting in the right, and I melt rubber screaming out of there. Metaphorically of course. Max just likes the idea that we're hustling all the way. And he likes Coca-Cola, so of course I have some on ice already.

It's a well practised, predictable operation.

Mr and Mrs B are wealthy-ish older family folks who turned a Snowbird habit into permanent Floridian life. She's a bit wobbly on the pins, so definitely needs meeting in the baggage claim, as well as me carrying all her bags. They love to chat, starting at the point of us finding each other, ending only when I finish complimenting her on her beautiful garden. It's ninety minutes of more or less non-stop banter. They sit in the back of the Town Car, telling me what they've been up to inbetween calling ALL their VERY LARGE family informing them they're off the plane and in the car, on the way home.

Mr B wants nothing more than some ice-cold water and the local newspaper, so he can catch up on what little occurred while he was away.

It's another well-rehearsed and happy groove.

If only all jobs were as calm.

Season

First Minivan Fiat pic credit.

I'm contemplating wacking a bumper sticker on my car:

Welcome to Florida - Don't Forget to Leave.

Jaded, you say? Well, pretty much. Our yearly influx of Snowbirds is currently augmented by Spring Breakers, meaning that my small Gulf Coast town more than doubles in size. And by the Wombat Traffic Theorem, traffic idiocy is proportional to the cube of car numbers, expressed thusly:

I(t) kinda = (C*M*S)

Where I(t) is traffic idiocy, C is total cars, M is total minivans, and S is total SUVs.

If you sense my Road Karma Reservoir is running low, you would be right.

Too Much

Porsche Panamera interior pic credit.

Some people tip too much. I know, it's antithetical for someone like me to say, but it's true nonetheless, that some people are overly generous with the gratuities.

The gentleman I have in mind is an interesting study. Not the most charismatic guy, he's obviously set on looking after all of the drivers slaving for The Boss. Upon his insistence, we automatically add thirty percent to all of his invoices as a standard gratuity, but he also oftentimes palms us a note as well...and not a twenty, either.

Oddly, all this money makes me uncomfortable. There are two reasons for this. One is that while Mr Tipper is always polite and never demanding, I have no connection with him. We talk only perfunctorily, and never with humor. His wife, more friendly and outgoing, is kinda the same. Secondly, I really never feel like I've earned the tip. A lot of his jobs are very simple local limousine runs, collecting a couple or a couple of couples around five in the afternoon, and driving them to his house. They have dinner and a few drinks, and then I drive them back. It's so easy.

The only downside is that we have to sit in his underground garage for the three hours in which they're eating and socializing, but that's no imposition if one is prepared with books, newspapers and a nosebag. All in all, he's the ideal customer, but still there's something that makes me feel guilty about accepting such amounts for so little input.

The Boss's angle on all this reveals much about him. He is mostly pissed off with Mr Tipper for this reason: with that thirty percent tip, we drivers often net more money from the run than he does.

This makes him angry, which tells you all you need to know.

Overheard

Rods and pistons picture credit

Yes, it's true. The partition is not soundproof, and pretty much everything that goes on back there is audible to the chauffeur.

Saturday night provided a prime example. My charges were a bunch of working folks on a night out to a sporting event. I think their boss had somehow subsidised the trip, because the hourly rate was well below that which The Boss customarily charges for the giant stretched SUV. Sigh. Who knows how these things work, but from my point of view, 15% of a smaller than usual number is a smaller number than otherwise. If you get my drift.

It's always interesting noting how people react to a limousine if it's their first time. It actually DOES make them feel important. A few elements contribute. There's the fact that I open and close the door, call them Sir and Madam; there are the tinted windows, and the general feeling that they might be famous; and there's that idea that everyone feels like they are SPECIAL for the night. Alcohol heightens all these emotions.

Along with the usual drinking/socializing banter, it became clear to me that the folks planned on smoking a little weed at some point. The partition was up, so they don't know that I could hear all this. The argument ran along two lines; they could blow the doobie now and be stoned for the game, or they could wait until the ride home and party on afterwards.

Fortunately they decided that walking into the game reeking of high-grade Chihuahuan Mind-Bender might not be good form. After the game it was to be.

Insert three hours.

At that point, once all the photos had been taken and everyone was on board, I quietly suggested to the group leader that there was no smoking in the limo. But if they wanted, we could stop at a nice rest-area a few miles down the road, and everyone could stretch their legs and take a comfort stop. Wink wink. The message got through.

Better than that, once at the rest area, all but two of the twelve disappeared out of view for fifteen minutes or so, thereby giving me at least some kind of deniability. It's a dumb move, really, because if Johnny Law stopped us and made the people for moronic dope fiends, I'm not totally out of the frame.

But that's a story for another time.

The lesson here is that sound-transparent partitions are a good thing, if it helps keep us all out of trouble. Only the stuff that affects me sticks in my head.

Partition

VW interior photo credit

All of The Boss's limousines are equipped with partitions. The partition is an electrically operated barrier that isolates the passenger compartment from the driver. In essence, we're already in a separate space - the partition just fills in the hole.

My attitude towards the partition changed a while back. As a rookie driver, I took the view that customers preferred a more open interior - the ability to look forward through the partition cut-out and so through the windscreen - and easier communication with their faithful servant up front. In the smaller limousines it can be a little claustrophobic back there.

Here's my routine thesedays: with new customers, when I show them the controls (lighting, heating, sound) I make a point of demonstrating the partition up/down switch, by saying:


...and here's how you ditch me...

at which point I raise the partition and leave it up.

With regular customers, I often start with the partition up, or, if not, use this lame line:


...so I'll just give you folks some privacy now...

whilst I roll that thing up.

Remember, I have a switch for the partition too. It's important to tell me NOT to use it ahead of time if you don't want me to surprise you.

I'm reminded of the way fancy hotels do this. When the customer service person escorts you to the room, they show you important features you might need immediately. Then they leave, close the door, and allow you to explore your room on your own.

People behave differently if they think they're being watched. Oh, and if they think they can't be heard.

Early Shift

Daimler Motorcycle pic credit

My resolution to take greater control of my life by no longer accepting morning jobs is sorta working out. My work has declined by, oh, about two-thirds. Not only is The Boss not assigning me morning jobs, he's not assigning me afternoon or evening jobs either.

For a couple of weeks there I was doing two late-night airport runs per week.

You see when we drivers show signs of non-compliance with Boss's wishes, he punishes us in the way he knows best, by withholding work.

When I first began in this game, he told me how he likes his drivers: desperate and compliant. That tells you everything you need to know about how he views the limousine business - it's all about making life as easy as possible for him, and nothing about finding the right people to provide the best service.

Frankly, I find this kind of commercial horror encouraging. If someone so out of tune with people can still make a living, the opportunity for anyone with a modicum of common sense is huge. This is still the land of success built on hard work and fair dealing.

What's interesting is the way in which regular customers are revealing to me how The Boss treats them on the phone. Some are shocked at how brusque he's become; others say outright that the only reason they stay is because they like we drivers. There are lots of those kind of folks.

Notwithstanding, business is slow during the week, and moderately busy on weekends. And gradually I'm moving out of the bad books. This last weekend was crazy busy, a situation that causes His Lordship to forget about keeping me down in order to get me out there on the road.

Perspective

Duesenberg at what looks like Pebble Beach GC

Adding up all the pluses and minuses of a driving job, it's easy to come up with a negative number. Horrible hours, low pay, idiotic bosses, capricious passengers, dopey cops and crap cars make for pretty big number less than zero.

On the flip side, there's one biggie which will stick with me for the reminder of my days - a better understanding.

I'm not certain what other work puts one as close to a lot of different people in situations where their vulnerabilities are on show. We see people under stress (when travelling) pushed to the limit (in business situations) behaving excruciatingly well (in public group outings) and behaving excruciatingly poorly (on those same public group outings, often on the same night.) Yes, many service industry folks see folks untied, but not in quite the same way as we do.

Partly this is because drivers are both close and invisible. We're robots who drive, and therefore of limited utility when that's all we do. But when the customer needs a resource, we are immediately elevated to equality, and sometimes higher. The alchemy of human emotion can change the way we're viewed in an instant, depending upon the need of the person paying the tab.

What's clear to me is that people are all incredibly flawed. I, of course, am no exception. However, witnessing so many individuals allowing their emotions to rule their outlook gives me understanding that perspective is in short supply. Just as most people driving cars at 80 mph are unable to think more than one lane stripe ahead, so they can't see more than one lane stripe ahead in their lives, whether we're measuring by time or distance.

Distance - that's what a few years of observing people has given me, or more accurately detachment. It's the reason long-time drivers have a zen-calm surrounding them. They KNOW that good replaces bad, which is replaced by good; lean times swap with plenty; and human nature never changes. For that exact reason, you'll rarely see a chauffeur giving in to road-rage. We understand that cutting into a line or ridiculous tail-gating saves precisely .002 seconds on the journey...and that kharma is a more powerful force than even the biggest engine.

Calm and perspective, the most important unknown elements.

Elder Bullets

Chrysler Photo Credit

It's Florida here, as far as the eye can see. That means there are oldsters, as far as the eye can see, although most of them aren't actually visible because they're warehoused in "Senior Housing Facilities".

We have occasional jobs originating at these places, but they're less frequent than I think they should be. Whether that's because the inmates - sorry, residents - are careful with their pennies or The Boss doesn't market to the elder community I don't know. Oh, well, actually, I do. It's the latter.

Sunday afternoon saw me booted and spurred at one of these places. Oftentimes all we have is a time, an address and a name. The Boss can't be arsed giving us more background, using the catch-all "As Directed" on the dispatch ticket.

I parked close to the reception area, did a final check to make sure the Town Car was presentable, and went in search of my customers. The receptionist (a relatively spritely ninety-year-old) pointed me back out to where I'd come from: my clients were sitting outside under the porte cochere waiting for me, fifteen minutes before time. I'd walked straight past them.

Interesting, this phenomenon. Wouldn't you think that, watching me park the car and walk past them in dark suit and tie, they'd click that I was there for them? * shakes head *

In any case, my two nice ladies were being treated to an afternoon out, courtesy of a generous nephew many states distant. First, to a matinee, then to dinner, then home.

Actually, before going anywhere, we had to negotiate getting into the car. Both had walkers and inflexible bodies, so each ingress and egress was like the docking of a Carnival Cruise liner...without the cocktails - slow, choreographed and ever-so-clumsy.

But I'm making it sound worse than it was. They were both in pretty good spirits, enthused at the idea of having a chauffeur, interested in me - my marital status, which church I attend - for a while, quickly becoming bored with a topic like old people do.

The only spark of discontent came from the horror that sometimes one of them had to walk slightly further (around the car) to access the door on the other side. I failed in the quest to make each side of the car equidistant for each of them.

Of such small snits is old-age full I imagine, although I worked as hard as I could to make their day as easy as possible.

For some people, enough is never enough, although I shall record that they both gave me a cash tip - an unexpected bonus given my knowledge of how old ladies operate.

Afternoons and Evenings

Cord cockpit photo source

Finally, I got around to telling The Boss that I'm off mornings. What a relief. I should know by now that the time between 4:00 am and 7:00 am is critical - not sleeping in the hours encompassing that span wrecks my day.

It also wrecks my health, albeit at a slower rate. I've been reading lately where the average American's average night's sleep has declined from nine to seven hours in the course of the last few decades. Sleep deficit is allegedly responsible for lots of medical problems, from weight gain to cancer. I believe all of that.

Naturally, The Boss has seen fit to punish me. He's not a subtle man. After I explained that working any time after noon is fine, he called me - three days later - asking if I could make a 9:00 pm airport pickup. There's no sarcasm in his voice, but the intent is clear; he wants us all to be his 24/7 lapdogs. Breaking with his desire will not be rewarded.

As I explained in a previous post, I didn't have much choice. I'd allowed him to assume that I'd work very late finishes followed by very early starts. My fault really, but the occasional overnight turned into more than a few. And he's not the type with whom I can logically explain my reasoning. Upon receiving a booking, he'll look to fill the driver slot with the least work possible on his behalf. Until now, that meant calling me.

So I suffer with his displeasure for the moment. Frankly, I'm happy. I'm feeling better, and his business is collapsing so fast, there's more or less no work anyway.

Humour Me

Fabulous Ferrari picture from here.

You've seen me, or one of my colleagues.

We're waiting on the baggage claim level, or where you emerge from the satellite shuttle. Or we're at the exit from the customs hall. Most often we're formally dressed, often inappropriately so.

We carry a sign, which we hold up for all to see. A name appears on that sign. I like to create a handsome hand-drawn sign, but sometimes The Boss creates one via the computer.

His say "Smith"

Mine say "Welcome, Monica Smith."

If you're NOT Monica Smith, do me a favour. Do not walk up to me and say:

"That's Me"

or

"Hi, I'm Smith."

Your brilliant, original wit is wasted (for the one-hundredth time) on the likes of me. Take your act to the people...at the cab rank.

Inconsiderate, Inc

Early morning pickups are fraught with danger.

Everyone (in general ) has cut the timing right to the bone, so every minute counts. One particular job comes to mind, a 3:30 am collection time, although I must say that there are plenty just like it. For a start, the customer's house was in a fancy gated community, which all take an age to navigate.

What's with the endlessly winding streets spread out over thousands of acres, guys? There's nowhere to walk. There are no sidewalks. There are no shops. There's nowhere to go and nothing to do. Unless you are endlessly entertained by golf what the hell is there to do in these places? And if golf does entertain you 24/7, there's no saving you. And neither should there be.

I'm there, early as usual, at this guy's mock Italiante Villa on a golf course in Florida. The time is 3:15 am. I've been up since 2:00 am. I'm ready to drive this dude to Tampa, and go home and go back to bed.

It's not reasonable to knock or ring the doorbell that early. Maybe there are kids, maybe there are relatives. I reverse the Town Car into the driveway and wait. The hope is that the customer will walk out the door, luggage in hand, and be ready to go.

Fat chance.

At 3:30 I rang the bell.

A minute later the wife opened the door and scampered down the faux granite steps to explain to me that her husband had overslept, and that he'd be out momentarily. Sure. Whatever. Like my time's worth nothing, because dopey forgot to set his alarm.

Thirty minutes later, Mr Business appears at the doorway, grip in hand, freshly showered, ready to go. Excellent! Good-morning sir, may I take your luggage? Please, take a seat here, we'll be under way as soon as I can.

Sorry, he says, the alarm didn't go off.

And you know, I believe him. He was completely apologetic, and an interesting guy to boot. And I feel bad that his company, which trades on the Pink Sheets OTC is not doing so well.

We all screw up. But at 4:00 am, it seems that much worse.

Sleepless in Florida

Bugatti picture credit

As the saying goes, I made this rod for my own back.

Back when I was less cynical about the driving game, I'd take on pretty much anything The Boss had to offer. I was - in his words - available and willing, just the way he likes his vassals. There was nothing I'd turn down.

That works for a while, until late night jobs blend into early morning jobs. The way that happens is that on Friday he would allocate everyone's limousine and Town Car runs for the weekend, through until Monday. Then on Saturday morning he would take a booking for an early Sunday morning airport run, despite the full roster.

Let's examine this for a moment. Back in the good old days, limousine runs rarely finished before bar closing, which is 2:00 am around here. By the time everyone's been dropped off, I've driven the limo back to base and cleaned everything up, there's not much change out of 4:00 am, or even later. I've seen quite a few sunrises.

But The Boss only acknowledges the dispatch ticket with the 2:00 am finish time. He sees that, then is perfectly happy expecting one of us to be ready for that 6:00 am run to Fort Myers airport that he's just taken.

Seriously, he has NO ability to understand that:

a) the customer might go over the stated time,

b) the driver's night doesn't end with the last drop-off, and

c) we are human and therefore suffer fatigue.

But here's where I am to blame.

In my race to make some decent money, I would take the extra morning run, and talk myself into thinking it's just the same as doing a night shift. I know, I know, it's crazy, especially given the absolute pittance that these things pay. But there you have it. Often I would have been up for more than thirty hours, picking up some unsuspecting person on their way to an airport somewhere.

When business fell off a cliff two years ago, for the most part that kind of thing stopped, replaced with something even worse. Now The Boss is happy awarding me late night airport pickups, which can often extend to 2:00 am, followed by those horrid 5:00 am jobs. Not only do I lose a night's sleep, I don't even have the benefit of the money from a limo job.

The worst of all worlds.

And it's all my fault.

Twisty Ending

Jaguar XK140

In marked contrast to the trend of 2010, the last two nights of the year were surprisingly sweet.

After some problems with The Boss during the week whereby he screwed a fellow driver, I wasn't pre-disposed to long drunken stretched limousine jobs. He's becoming a capricious prick.

I am tired, too, after a couple of weeks of late finishes and early starts.

Thursday, the second-to-last day of the year, was slated as a 2100 start for ten in our giant stretched SUV. Experience tells me (even if The Boss doesn't) that with a pickup at that time the clients are young. By extension, that means:

* drunkenness
* loutishness
* messiness
* meanness
* tiplessness

Two good signs upon arrival: the kids waiting for the birthday girl (the limo was a surprise for her 21st) are standing around quietly having a couple of drinks, and actually talk coherently to me when I introduce myself. The other is that the parents came out of their suburban house to take a look at the limo.

Interesting social dynamic here. If a twenty-one year old woman's parents are still sufficiently involved in her life to join in (at least a little) the probability is that she is relatively civilized. Innocence is a much under-rated quality; growing up quickly is over-rated. I liked that the oldsters were impressed with the ride. That spoke of a kind of quiet normalcy which (I hoped) found its way into the daughter and her friends.

I have learned to find one person in a party to act as the Captain, my point of reference. It's not always easy to tell, but in general, the biggest guy is the one I want on my side. Makes sense, right? Talking to them all is impossible (do these kids NEVER listen up?) so I rely on peer pressure.

He received my little talk about under-aged drinking, puking, puke clean-up charge, heads out windows, blowing up speakers, and communicating clearly with me.

It's never a waste, I find, this chat, even though there's no telling whether it makes any difference. In this case, these folks were a dream. Sure, the idea of a 21st party is to get the celebrant to puke (apparently.) We can count that as a success, but she managed it cleanly into a garbage bag without spillage. Top points.

The ride was as simple as it gets. We went to one bar, where I dropped everyone. Four hours later I received the call to pick them up, and drove them home. It doesn't get any better, especially as they were minimally messy. Including the aforementioned rite of passage puke. (Which they left for me in the garbage bag neatly tied up and in an empty beer box.)

Then they tipped 20%, and I was in bed by 2:30. Like I said it was a sweet night, and I hope for them, too. The boyfriend (who paid and organized) although drunk and looking after his girl, took the time out to come up and expressly thank me.

Maybe there is hope for future generations.