Trying Times

In a stroke of good fortune, I wasn't the only limousine that our Country-Club Rappers had engaged for the night. There were two of us, from different companies. And the really good news was that the other driver was a very cool dude, an older guy who'd been around the business for way longer than me.

Guys like Robert have seen it all. Nothing gets to them. A few punk-arsed show-offs trying to impress the girls make no impression whatsoever, and neither do the girls. Watching him operate was a thing of beauty. When someone put their drink on the trunk he was there lifting it off - not saying anything, but reprimanding with his action. If one of the guys started doing something truly stupid, you could feel Robert's power from a distance, and the kid would stop. He was a kind of bouncer/enforcer...but one who magically acted from a distance, like he had a magnetic super-power that alerted dumb drunks that they were behaving like jackarses.

Eventually we went in convoy to Ybor City, to the most popular club there. Two stretched limousines stopped on 7th Ave will block traffic, so we tried to get the drunks out and ourselves moving as quickly as possible. But no, these dopey kids literally stopped as a group in the middle of the road, lighting cigarettes, flipping cars the bird, resisting all opportunities to exhibit civilized behaviour. The cops had seen enough of this after a few minutes and moved everyone on - including Robert and me - much to my relief.

By now it's 11:30 pm, but there's not time to slack. Instead, it's time to clean. Of course these numbskulls have made a maximum amount of mess in the back of the limo. I often wonder why it is that people so often feel the need to do this. They wouldn't do it in their own home, or their own car...or perhaps they would. Apparently part of the stretched limo experience is to create and wallow in a dumpster. I look at the soaked napkins, spilled drinks, trash everywhere, bottle-tops inserted all-over and wonder why they do this kind of willful destruction.

It takes me an hour to clean up.

I buy us some coffee and a sandwich from the gas station in which we're parked.

We chat.

Another limo comes along, but the driver's not as nice company as Robert, so I withdraw to the airconditioned car for a while.

Around 1:30 I get a phone call, and it's not my people. It's The Boss.



Havana pic from here [link]

Ugly

It should have been the simplest of runs. Collect two "ladies" from one address, then one more at a second address, and drive them to the Port of Tampa. Yep, they were off on a cruise.

I have never cruised, unless you count the odd day trip along the Rhine or the Mosel. The phenomenon of modern cruising appears to be a sea-borne religion of gluttony, a cult of conspicuous consumption beyond that which any reasonable person would want. It looks ugly to me.

And so, indeed were these ladies. It turned out they were sisters on some kind of sibling satiation sabbatical. It all started happily enough. They were, after all, going on what should have been a happy vacation.

I was early, with my usual happy "chauffeur face" on, and it was a beautiful Sunday morning. The downhill slide started while navigating to the second pick-up. No, I don't know your sister's condo complex by name, there are quite a few in Florida. (Der. Me rolling eyes.) An address would make things much easier.

They didn't know the address. Fair enough, but if you are directing me in a large beast like a six-passenger Cadillac, turns are easier when pointed out ahead of time. Not as they disappear behind.

But we made it.

Off we went towards the port, along what I knew was the quickest and smoothest route. Mr TomTom agreed with my local knowledge, so it came as a shock when, about ten minutes short, one of them piped up with "Which way are we going?"

It could only have been a rhetorical question. There are only two freeways in our part of the world, and we were on one of them, about eight miles short of downtown Tampa. What could she mean, "Which way are we going?"?

Of course, she added "I think we should have gone via (State Route) 41. It's quicker."

I was silent. We were almost at our destination, and to take the road she described required us to make adjustments forty minutes and the entire Tampa Bay ago. And it wasn't like she was paying by the hour - it was a fixed price trip.

Mindreading isn't a skill I have. Divining which way you want me to drive you is only possible if you open your yap and communicate in the customary way; by speaking. (You stupid bitch.)