Thursday 5 June 2014

"Next time walk, you might lose some weight you fat fuck."

I had just dropped off in Harrison from the airport and was heading back to the airport on a Sunday night.  I had travelled halfway down Majura Road when they threw me a radio job.  I wasn't sure whether to accept but decided to take a chance that it was a good job.  The job was from Gunghalin Lakes Sports Club - very unlikely to be a good job.  It took me about 15 minutes to get back there and when I did I regretted accepting the job.  A large, overweight 40 year old bloke got in and said "Where the fuck did you come from?  I've been waiting 20 minutes.  What kind of service are you operating."

I apologised for the delay and explained where I had come from.  He had either lost a great deal of money on the pokies or something but this guy was in a foully. He went on about how fucked the taxi industry is and how we rip people off with our extortionate fares.  I tried to explain that we only earned $12 an hour on a Sunday night and that was the cost unless we were going to be subsidised by the Government.  He said I was a bullshit artist and that cabbies were rolling in it.  By this stage we had got to his house - clearly a short fare.  He paid the $6 for the fare and told me where to go.  He got out of the cab and walked five metres.  I wound down the window and said, "Instead of waiting 20 minutes for a cab, why don't you walk home.  You might lose some weight you fat fuck."  I put the car in gear and burnt some rubber as I sped off. 

“Don’t mean to insult you mate, but yeah, cabbies are the little people”

It was a quiet Tuesday night.  I sat there on Alinga Rank in the city for two hours waiting for a fare.  I wondered what alcohol fuelled or drug fucked individual I would be taking home.  All of a sudden two suits emerged from around the corner.  “Great,” I thought, “At least I will be taking someone who is actually going to pay me home.”

They hopped in and asked to be driven to Kingston.  One of them commenced the conversation with the usually line of “How’s your night been?” 
“Okay.” I replied.  I didn’t request the next line, one of the customers just proffered it to me.

“We’re lawyers.  But despite the fact that we’ve made it, we still know how to talk to the little people.”  I was a little bit taken aback by this and wasn’t quite sure what he meant by “little people.”
“And just who are the ‘little people’.  Cabbies?” I queried.

“Don’t mean to insult you mate, but yeah, cabbies are the little people.”  I thought about this for a moment and then went on a little diatribe.
“You’re about 26 years old mate.  For the next three to four years you’ll work, shag beautiful women both here and abroad and take a promotion at work.  When you are 30 you’ll marry a trophy wife who is as materialistic as Kim Kardashian and as stupid as Paris Hilton who marries you not because she loves your heart and soul but because of your social status as a lawyer and the fact you drive an Audi A4.  But you feel like a king when she is walking hand and hand with you on Franklin Street in Manuka so you don’t mind.  You have a couple of kids and things start to get ugly when she wants to drive an Audi Q7 but you can’t afford it because your firm hasn’t promoted you.  That promotion goes to a 26 year old female up and comer stunner who is fucking the managing partner.  Meanwhile, your wife leaves you for a stockbroker who drives an Audi A8 and takes the kids with her.  And it is at that moment that you realise we are all little people, struggling for the perfect life, the perfect career, the perfect relationship, the perfect friends and the perfect family.  We are all little people struggling to find the meaning to this life.”

The lawyers were speechless.  We sat in silence for two minutes.  Then I decided to play “Another Day in Paradise” by Phil Collins to further fuck with their heads.