The Illogic of Waste...

Apparently, when I was being recruited to join Yellow Cab as a driver, there was no mention of how things slow down during the summer.

I get it, there are no guarantees.

However, I've also been seeing the writing on the wall the last two weeks, also. Grown men, sitting in the back or middle seat of their cabs with the side door open waiting for their next call. Sitting or sleeping. Taking that 12 hour day and turning it into an 18-20 hour day. The day after Memorial Day, half of Yellow's owner operator fleet was placed on Code 5, that means that 400 well-meaning cab drivers weren't able to pay their lease on time.

Anyway, that's where I've been... and it finally came to a head yesterday when I worked from 4am to 5pm and made 80 bucks - before the cost of putting more gas in that banana wagon and getting myself something to eat... leaving me with about 55. Needless to say, I went back on code 5 this afternoon.

My father had a saying, and I never agreed with him on much, but it went like this:

If you're not doing what you're supposed to be doing, it'll hurt you.

So, here I am, sleep-deprived, sick (only a bad cold, I hope) and I haven't been able to do any housework other than the laundry in the last 4-5 weeks because I've been staying out longer and longer trying to make the same amount of money.... until finally, the money just isn't there to be made.

Contrast the beginning of my cab driving experience with how it's been lately.

In February, I would roll out at 4 in the morning, and usually have my first trip within 20 minutes, and I would be working steadily through 9-11 in the morning. The haul would be somewhere between 80-150 bucks, and I would then switch to the bid board to pick up more trips through the middle of the day. In other words, there's no reason why I shouldn't have made $250-plus a day.

Now... well, I've pretty much described it. You log in, hunker down, and wait for that first call... and then you hunker down where you drop off at to conserve gas unless you see something on the bid board. Here's the thing, though... instead of being the only guy "who'll go to that call," you're now competing with a couple dozen or hundred other guys who need to eat.

But here's the thing... I don't need a taxi cab to eat. The sole premise of my driving a taxi was based on that conversation I had with that young man a couple months ago. FLEXIBILITY. Now, it doesn't take a math whiz to figure out that if you need 30 minutes or so in the morning to slap yourself to life and another 90 to unwind and let your brain drift before you crash every day before a 16 hour day, that means you're sleep depriving yourself and robbing your body of needed rest. There is no time to work on my novels or an acting project unless I deliberately take a day off. And, with the current environment out there being garbage for earnings, there's no point to it.

A conversation I had with a passenger not too long ago encapsulates it nicely. He's an older gent from India, but every word rang out loud and clear. "I've noticed that when I call for a cab now, it only takes five minutes or so, instead of the usual hour... the cab companies are money-lenders, and if they could take your blood from you, they'd do it and drink it right on the spot." He then went on to say that he was praying to "Almighty God" to make things better so it would take him longer to get a cab.

How apropos, I suppose.

Houston, for all its diversity and splendor, is hardly a New York or Chicago when it comes to working as a cab driver. You can't toss a Houston cabbie the keys for 12 hours, and expect him or her to come back with 150 bucks over and above his/her lease. Even in downtown, there's nowhere near the flagger environment that there is in those other cities. And, as I mentioned, a lot of us are having bad days and running at a deficit. Then again, is the country's current financial dilemma just plain running us all into the ground? Are the New York hacks in trouble? Is it rough on the cabbies in Los Angeles?

The sad part about this decision I have to make is the fact that I truly enjoyed being a cab driver, but not at the expense of my health and sanity. When you go to bed at night and you dream about driving a cab and not making money, that's your sanity. I still remember the stories of how Melissa Plaut was working only 4 days a week in New York and supporting herself. I wonder how much those times are changing the nature of this business. I didn't walk into this expecting easy money. Far from it. I wanted to work my ass off. But here's the deal:

If there are no flaggers to pick up, it doesn't make sense to drive around looking for them... other than Friday and Saturday night downtown, that is.

If there are no jobs within 10 miles on the bid board, it's usually not a bright idea to go burn off 5 dollars worth of gas if you get one, and most likely, someone closer to it is bidding on it too now that the work is drying up.

Finally, when you're hunkered down over a four hour period and all you get is one "take me to work" call and three 5-dollar "take me and my groceries home," that aint enough to feed the bulldog. I'm not going to sleep in a car for the sake of saying I have my "freedom."

And frankly, at my age, this bulldog doesn't eat as much as he used to.

This pretty much brings an end to the cabbie blog, since I will be discontinuing my contract with Yellow come Monday. What the hell... I had too many damn blogs going anyway.