i drove on halloween. i love the costumes and the people. even though it’s dangerous and could get pukey, i went for it
sergio, at the rideshare guy, was recommending drivers ignore long trips on halloween because we were getting $10-$24 bonuses on each trip regardless of its length
sometimes those bonuses were just $5 and the excursion from mid city to woodland hills was estimated to take 30 minutes and paying $34.
a buck-a-minute is a pretty good rate, so i put on my cap and got out of the house.
the best trip was with an associate at salesforce who had just gone to a birthday party at this place that used to be a classic, old firestone tires, over on la brea.
now it’s a trendy microbrewery with $10 mac n cheese and skee-ball.
he was drunk and happy, but nervous, because he was going on a blind date when he got home. so i tried to build up his self esteem by pretending i knew something about women.
i hear they’re as horny as we are, i said
get out.
thats what they tell me.
dude.
crazy!
he had been in the marines, stationed in some northern island off japan. he said you could get the best sushi meal up there for like $30.
how pretty were the women?
soooo pretty. they didn’t even cost as much as you’d think.
wait wait, dont young women love a man in uniform? didnt you and your buddies walk around in your sunday bests and just rake in the lovelies?
at first i was afraid they would hate us, he said, because we blew them up and whatever. but they don’t. most of them, even the older people, love us because we protect them from north korea. and china. and russia.
ok, so why did you have to go to hookers?
well, i tried not to look like a marine. i never wore my uniform. i want people to treat me normally.
fine, but you look like a grass-fed nebraska man: tall, big-boned, all-american white usa. didn’t some of them want that? i asked.
i wish. japanese girls love Black guys. so we just paid, had a good time and returned to the base on time.
the 405 on saturday night at 10pm was like pandemic-times. no traffic. at all. my uber app kept saying bro, 70 mph? well done. it was just chilly enough to keep the windows up. but not cold enough for the heater. i was wearing a mask.
what did they have you do over there?
jack shit, he said.
excuse me?
modern warfare is all about long range missiles from an aircraft carrier hundreds of miles away – not boots on the ground in north korea.
so cyber warfare?
yep.
did they teach you any of that?
we were mushrooms, he said, as i cracked the moon roof open cuz i think he let one fly back there.
they kept us in the dark and fed us bullshit.
we got to his gated community of identical bachelor apartments.
we bumped knuckles. he stumbled out.