Almost a full moon... You can tell

Last night my first ride was coming out of the airport (like normal) going to the Buena Park area.  The guy was coming to visit his nephew for a night and then going on a yearly birthday trip to warm springs.  This year they are going to a Buddhist warm spring.  His only concern was there was no wifi and no alcohol.  He said it was for only 4 days and he could manage because of the company he would be in.  He has taken the same kind of vacation with friends for the past 10 years.  Always having a wonderful time.  Plus he had this amazing bag that was a carry on but looked almost like a medical bag.  It was this amazing reddish soft leather bag.  Super cute.

I was surprised that I actually made the short back to the airport!  I don’t drive fast going either way but this time there was little to no traffic going there and back so it was easy!!  I was able to go the “front” of the line :)

My next ride was super excited to get home to his 3 year old little boy.  He had been gone for 10 days and couldn’t wait to spend time with him.  My passenger used facetime to keep in touch but it just isn’t the same.  He had many plans over the weekend with his son and family.

Since my last ride was just a few minutes outside of the airport so I went back to the airport.  This time I picked up two women.  The first lady seemed very nice and polite but the second lady….  She dropped off her suitcase outside of the taxi on the curb with the handle up and just got into the back of the taxi.  The other nice lady helped me put her carry on in the back and she said thank you very much.  I asked where they are going and the nice lady gave me cross streets and the rude lady said “no it is this exact address”.  At this point, I figured she was not someone who took questions nicely.  After leaving the airport there is a little dip in the road and the rude lady said it felt like they were still on the bumpy airplane.  The nice lady said she thought it was lots of fun, like a small rollercoaster.  They chated about work and the rude girl kept complaining about co workers and the nice lady would say something nice about that co worker.  The nice lady got all excited about a story on the tv in the back of the taxi about a lion cub.  She even got more excited when it came back on again and asked the rude lady if she could get one (no, they were not together just co workers).  The rude lady said, no, you cannot have a lion in the city.  The nice lady said, I know but look how cute they are!  Oh, and while we were driving the rude girl kept reading her text message from someone else.  The message were things like, “why are you ditching me”, “you need to drop your friend off and get here” and more like that.  The rude lady kept saying, “aren't’ these funny?”.  I didn’t think so.  So when I dropped them off and took their suitcases the nice lady was really nice and thanked me for getting her suitcase out for her.  The rude lady tried to turn the whole ride around with a nice thank you.  Just thinking if she had been polite the whole time, it would have been a great ride into the city.

Picked up a lady who looked really pissed outside of a dance club on 11th Street.  She got into my taxi to go to the Clift Hotel.  I asked how her night was going and she said terrible and then called someone.  I am assuming it was the person that didn’t help make her night nicer.  She kept saying things like, “why are you doing this to me?”, “why are you playing with me?”,  “You are suppose to be there for me this weekend since you know how hard it will be”, “I thought you loved me, why are you doing this?” and “baby do you love me as much as I love you?”  I think she was over 30 and should have been someone who didn’t need this male's support.  After a few minutes of talking to him like this, she started calling him Baby and Boo because he had turned the conversation around on her and made her the bad guy.  I was really embarrassed for her and him too.  When we got to her stop and she paid, I told her, I hoped she had a better night.

I dropped off an awesome couple in the area around where Candlestick Park used to be and after they got out of my taxi a crow, caw, cawed, very loudly!  I jumped!  I am not sure if the passengers heard it or not but I left really quickly.  All I could think of was the movie “The Birds”.  If you haven’t seen it, I would suggest seeing it!  Pretty amazing movie but a scary ton of birds.

Sounds like a super fun night of almost full moon?  It was!  I have the best passengers even if some of them make me a little crazy.

Hope you have enjoyed my night as much as I did.  Thank you again for reading.  I love telling my stories.

Not much is happening.

I heard this Sunday was Bay To Breakers.  I am not working so I am not going to be involved with the crazy race.  There is a pre expo on Friday and Saturday.  Maybe that will make it busy.  I am hoping since it will be busy since it has been a little slow lately.  I have had a few interesting passengers but nothing too exciting.  I feel all the exciting people are all waiting out there to get into my taxi but haven’t found me yet.  Hahaha.  

The week before Mother’s Day was a great week in tips for me, especially when I mentioned visiting or seeing Mom.  Sometimes using holidays in conversation can help with getting good tips.  I don’t use it as a reason for getting better tips, I use it more to connect with my passengers.  It seems a lot of people who live in SF’s parents do not live close so a lot of people spent the day with friends.  The day was perfect so I hope they had a fun day.

I really think I am watching too much tv, I don’t seem to have much time to write my blog.  I need to stop watching tv, I think.  Downside, I think there are so many amazing tv shows out there now.  Game of Thrones is AMAZING and I cannot wait for the next episode.  I also like all the old standbys of Big Bang Theory, The Fixer Upper and Awkward as well.

Thank you again for reading my blog.  

Happy night

Today didn’t really start great for me.  After taking my dog to the dog park, she threw up several times during the morning and wasn’t acting herself.  Happy after she took a long nap she was better, eating and acting like normal.  I don’t think she ate anything at the dog park, I tend to watch her very closely especially since there was another dog.  She does well with other dogs but I like to know she is safe and happy at all times.

After getting home I was able to sleep, which is a great thing since I didn’t sleep good the night before.  I am struggling with sleep right now.  I sleep great during the day but not so much at night.  Working nights is really messing with my sleep patterns.   

The airport tonight was moving!  Not real fast but much faster than it had before.  I was able to get a good ride into the city and make it back to the airport to get another great ride into the city.  After then I seemed to have someone in my taxi about every 20-30 minutes.  That is slow and steady for a Tuesday night.

I did talk to a waitress about what was happening in the city.  We shared views about the cost of living in the city.  We both agreed you have to work way to hard to be able to afford to live in the city.  She thought you have to have an amazing paying job to really be able to afford and to enjoy the city the way it can and should be enjoyed.  I think those people that make enough to afford to live in the city and maybe enjoy the city do not actually go out as much as they had before since the cost of living in SF is outrageous.  I do think people still go out but not like they did, maybe 2-5 years ago.  Now they pick and choose what days they go out instead of going out every night.  

On Friday night I picked up this young man on Mission and 17th St and he wanted to go to 24th St and Bryant.  I turned right onto 18th so I could turn to the left on Valencia since you can no longer make a left turn off of Mission St.  He wasn’t happy about me not being able to make that left but seemed to understand.  I asked him how his night went and he said he just got off of work then went for a few drinks with friends.  I asked him what kind of work he did, he said he was a chef for the bourgeoisie.  He then said he didn’t carry cash because normal people no longer have too (I thought that was a bourgeoisie statement).  He only takes Uber because the taxi business was gone because they suck.  I said, you are in a taxi (I thought you are very bourgeoisie).  He said, I really meant to get into an Uber because that is the best way around the city.  I said, you flagged a taxi (I again thought you are very bourgeoisie).  He said, well, you were there when I needed to get food.  He asked me why I didn’t drive for Uber since the taxi is almost gone.  I told him I much prefer the options that driving a taxi gives me as well as i am making more money than an Uber driver does.  I didn’t argue or make a big deal about his attitude but I really did want to toss him out of my taxi.  He ended up giving me a $5.00 tip.  Guess he didn’t really mind slumming in a taxi plus maybe I changed his mind about taking a taxi next time.

Happy my next ride was an awesome guy who gave me free tickets to see the USS Pampanito.  He said he was helping to restore this amazing submarine.  I am always excited to meet people who have cool jobs in the city.  I guess I never thought that the submarine still needed work.  I figured it was restored once and that was it, little did I know something is always getting broken on the sub.  Tourist do not always stay where they are supposed to stay.  Sad, we need to keep our National Treasures safe.

Often in the past I have heard how much of an awesome driver I am.  I hate to brag (I also hate it when people say that!!  Sorry!) but I have often received 100%+ for a tip.  That means that I not only do my job the way I should, letting them tell me the way they would like to go, talking to them about many topics, letting them know about all the cool things to do in the city and just being plain friendly.  I love almost every passenger that sits in my taxi.  

It is time for bed for me.  It is getting late and tomorrow is another long and exciting day for me!  Plus my kitty Loki is purring and walking all over my keyboard making it hard to type.  Haha!  Love her!

Thank you very much for reading my blog!  It makes me feel so great knowing others enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them!

Depression again

I haven’t written in a while because I have been very depressed.  Life here is wonderful and I am trying to do things to help me get out of this depression.  I am eating a little bit better, trying to get out of the house a little bit more and thinking about the positive things in my life.  I have an outward appearance of being happy but inside I am very sad and really just want to sleep and stay in bed.  I am even struggling with writing this blog post, which I love doing.  I love my job and I love to share things with you but when I feel like this, I just do not have the “time” to write my blog.  It makes me sad and the depression keeps coming back no matter what I do.  Such a horrible cycle.  Summer is coming so the tourists will be here and I will be busy again.  That normally helps with the depression.  I am still keeping track of things that happen to be during my nights via voice memo on my phone.  Much easier than trying to remember them after I get home and I am super tired.  

So I am doing what I can to survive and make every day count but it is tough.  I know it will be over soon.  Summer is coming.

Thank you again for reading my blog.

New website

I have a new website!  I hope you will continue to read my blog at my new website!  Clink the link and enjoy!

https://debbies-taxi-service.squarespace.com/

Some of the back stories I have missed...

September 26, 2015

I picked up an elderly lady outside of a grocery store.  We chatted all the way to her place in the Tenderloin District of San Francisco.  She said she does most of her shopping during the week but she actually forgot to buy meat when she had gone earlier in the week.  She didn’t know that this week was Folsom Street Fair.  She said she wouldn’t have gone out if she knew it was.  When we got to her place there was a bunch of fireman outside of her apartment.  She said they are there often, way too often.  She said, they are not suppose to smoke in the building but many people so it sets off the smoke alarm.  She hates the smell of any kind of smoke.  She was so cute when she whispered all this to me.  Haha.

Folsom Street Fair seemed a little tame compared to the previous year.  Last year I saw so many naked buttocks it was crazy.  This year…  No so many.  

If you walk across the street not in a crosswalk, please be aware that there could be a car coming at you.  Hopefully the person driving the car is paying attention more than you are.  Also hurry across the road that you really need to get across since you cannot use the crosswalk.  Do not glare at the driver of this car trying to avoid hitting you.  Please be safe out there!

Four young men in normal jeans and t-shirts were skipping arm-in-arm along Castro Street but they were wearing shiny silver capes, tiaras and shiny high heeled shoes.  Very, very cool.  I love the Castro.

Okay, so I spend a lot of time in the Castro.  You never know who you will meet and what you will see.  

Picking up extremely drunk men you never know what they are going to say.  This guy that I picked up kept saying to me “you know girl, I love you but….”.  He told me he was out with his boyfriend tonight.  His boyfriend is married but they boyfriend’s wife loves him too.  The boyfriend pays all his bills and they all spend a lot of time together, him, boyfriend, wife and kids.  Everyone loves each other, according to my passenger.  He was a little upset tonight because his boyfriend wanted to go home and spend time with his wife.  He said his boyfriend didn’t want a divorce because he is deeply religious.  (I am not here to judge, really I am not.) The passenger kept saying that I needed to be nice to him or he would do something.  I didn’t feel threatened but I wasn't sure what he was going to do. When we got to his house he didn’t have any money in his wallet and his credit card kept getting declined.  He said he had money upstairs but I convinced him to leave me his backpack, because I wasn’t sure he would actually come back down.  He said that was okay but when he went to get out of the taxi he said, this isn’t my house or even my street.  I said, this is the address you gave me.  He kept saying I am leaving him off someplace he doesn’t know and that isn’t right.  I said we are on 27nd Ave and this is your address, right.  He said yes but he couldn’t find his house.  So I turned the taxi around and went back down the street and he said, stop this is my house!  I stopped and he tried to get in through the front door but it wouldn’t unlock for him but he was able to get the garage door to open for him.  He came back down after a few minutes and gave me the cost of the ride plus another $20 for dealing with him nicely.  He then turned around to leave the taxi and pulled his pants down to urinate into the street away from the taxi but the taxi door was still open.  I guess he really needed to pee.  Happy that was the last ride of my night!  

October 1, 2015

I picked up a very soft spoken Indian man that was hitting on me the whole ride.  He kept asking about my personal life and if I wanted to meet up sometime.  I really just brushed him off because I found out he was going home to his wife and 2 kids.  It was a little creepy.

I was flagged by a lady who was with a very upset man.  She asked me how much it would cost to go to Napa.  I gave them a quote and she asked the male if he had the money to get home.  He said yes and got into my taxi.  I asked him for his address or if he wanted to tell me how to get there.  He gave me his address but he at first wanted to drive through the Castro to see if he could find his partner.  They just had a very bad fight and his partner hit him.  He said they both had been drinking and he just really wanted to go home quickly and that his partner was so mad at him.  I drove around the Castro and trying to get this guy to calm down a little bit.  I felt so bad for him.  He had bad scratches on him and wasn’t calming down much.  He tried to call his partner but he wouldn’t pick up.  So we drove over by where he thought he left his car.  He wanted to stab the tires of his car so his partner wouldn’t be able to drive back to their home in Napa.  He finally said he wouldn’t stab his tires but he would get a few things he needed out of it.  He spent a lot of time around his tires, emptying out his glove box and backseat.  His partner came around the corner and my passenger came to my window and said he wanted to try fix what was going on between them.  I let him know I would still take him wherever he needed to go.  I didn’t want him to be hurt.  His partner called him to tell him to let the stupid taxi driver go.  My passenger said he wouldn’t go anywhere with him and just wanted to talk about what happened.   I let him go, he didn’t pay for the ride.  After I left him, I turned the corner and stopped to call the police about what had and might still happen.  While telling 911 what had occurred they asked if the partner had a purple shirt and my passenger had a pink shirt. I said yes, the operator said the police were looking for them because they had a big fight in one of the bars in the Castro.  She wanted to know if I knew where they were and I told her where I left them off.  

While I was on the phone with the police a couple got into my taxi and wanted a ride home.  I explained to them what I was doing and they were okay with me talking to the police while I drove them home, which wasn’t far.  They were happy that I wanted to stand up for the guy who was being hurt.  I have driven them home before too, so that was nice.

I did drive back by where the car was as well as where I saw them last but only the car was still there, nothing else.  I haven’t heard from him either.  I just hope he got home safe and sound.

November 7, 2015

I picked up two guys who had been on every cruise that I would consider to be “cool” and then some.  In the past 30 years they have done at least 1-2 cruises every 6 months to 2 years.  They were super nice!  Great tips on places to go on a cruise!  They are going to the Amazon next, it will be their second time doing this cruise.  It was one of their first cruises they did together.

Picked up three women who were here for a convention.  They were from a small town in Texas.  Apparently they were very impressed with a 7 floor Macy’s and a 3 floor H&M.  It was fun listening to them get so excited about so many things city people take for granted.  They made me giggle.

Two guys and a girl were talking in the back of my taxi and she said she was going to hook up one of the guys up with her hot girlfriend.  He said her friend had better be hot and asked what her name was.  It was Annie.  He asked what Annie was short for.  The other two burst out laughing saying Annie.  He said she probably wasn’t really hot since her name was just Annie.  They showed him a few pictures of Annie and he said she was hot.  He then asked if she had any diseases.  The other male said, “you cannot ask people that question!”  I wanted to laugh so badly but I remained cool and calm until they paid and got out of the taxi.  I laughed so loudly!  Haha.

Okay, I think that is enough for now.  Hope you enjoyed them all.  I know I enjoyed the experience of driving all the crazy, amazing people around this city!  

Thank you very much for reading my blog!

Blah.... then Richmond Blah

I started today with very little energy.  I really struggled to sleep last night and just had a hard time waking up.  I hate when the day starts like that.  I just cannot get moving at all.  I am normally in a great mood, which I guess most would think is a little strange.  I got a late start because my day driver got an awesome ride.  I didn’t mind.  I was able to sit in my car and read until she got back to the yard.  

Since I wasn’t feeling like really moving, I thought I would just go to the airport.  I really should have gone into the city because there is a big Gaming conference and the weather was so nice here.  Many people out and about.  Reports from other drivers said that many of the hotels and CalTrain needed taxis.  Instead I sat and read at the airport.  

My first ride from the airport was a guy who had flown into the city for a last minute business trip and he didn’t have a hotel room for the night.  He was making phone calls to hotels and finding they were all booked up.  I let him know that we had a conference in town so maybe if he looked outside of the Union Square/SOMA area he might find something.  I guess he had someone else on a computer looking for a place as well.  He was able to get into a nice big hotel in Union Square area.  He was very happy to have someplace to sleep close to where he was working.  He asked a lot of questions and we chatted about the city and fun things for him to do over his few nights he was here.  

After dropping this passenger off I drove around the city for a little bit and picked up a guy that I drove 3 blocks.  I was driving around for about an hour and heard the airport was moving nicely.  I was still not feeling like moving much so I took off empty (deadheaded) to the airport.  I was able to get in easy and only waited for about 1 ½ hour.  I picked up a guy who wanted to know how much it would cost to go to Richmond and to Petaluma.  I gave his quotes for both.  He said the last time he took a taxi from the airport to Richmond it was only $79 but the sheet that gives us a quote says $96.  I let him know it was metered and he would have to pay for the bridge toll.  He said he was okay with that.  As long as it wasn’t over $100.  He said he would get mad at that but he would still pay.  I put his address into my gps and apparently he put it in his gps as well.  That is okay.  He is welcome to be the one to give me directions anytime but he didn’t actually say anything to me.  Okay.  So he tells me there is something wrong with my taxi, something about a sealed ball bearing is bad and that is why it is so loud in the back of the taxi.  I let him know I would tell the owner.  Maybe he will fix it.  The passenger went on to tell me about all the companies he owns and how awesome he is.  He also tells me he he has to get to Petaluma to help out his sick boss.  Not sure if I owned so many businesses I would also have a job working for someone too.  I was very confused.  Most of the conversation we had was okay and pretty normal until he started to say something about the single mothers in Arizona just having babies for the money.  I was very put off by that comment.  He has never been a single parent and doesn’t know how hard it is to be a single parent.  I don’t think all the people on assistance are baby making for the money.  I think some get on assistance and cannot find a way off of it.  I would have had more babies if I had the chance.  I didn’t say too much during this time.  He quickly changed the subject to something about trains and cars.  At this time I had tuned him out.  He paid me $140 on the $96 meter.  I was happy for that!

I figured I was done for the night.  I am really sleepy now and I am hoping tomorrow will be better.  Not sure I will be any less sleepy but who knows!

Thank you again for reading my blog!  I love sharing my nights.  I will try and start sharing my “old” stories as soon as I have a few extra minutes.