Scabbie Cabbie

Here is my story of my trip to San Diego:

I arrived at San Diego airport with little event…which is always a good thing when you are flying. It was bright and sunny and warm as I deplaned and walked toward the ground transportation. I walked to the taxi queue and approached the next cabbie in line.

“I need to use a credit card.” I said, even though the “accepts all major credit cards” sign was clearly visible,
“Yes, yes, yes,” replied the cabbie.

I handed the driver my clearly written destination with the driving directions from the ever-trusted Google maps.

The 25 minute drive took a little more like 40 minutes as the driver took a completely different route…it was rush hour…maybe he knows better than me.

I arrived at my destination and handed the man my credit card.

“Oops, I forgot the machine,” he said, “you don’t have cash?”

Uh…wtf…forget the sticker on the window…I told you I was using credit. He proceeds to fumble around with some stuff on his passenger seat. He grabs a crinkled old carbon paper credit card receipt and rubs his pen over the thing on the dashboard to try to get an impression. It didn’t work. He tries it with a new one…FIVE F-ING TIMES! Finally he got one that was good. I signed it and asked for the other copies so that I could shred them. He takes them and tears them in half. “No, its ok…I destroy,” he says. I had to basically arm wrestle the man to get the used slips. He asked for my phone number so he could call me if there was a problem.

Fine.

I go into the office and sit down and begin working. Ten minutes pass and then the cabbie calls me. We play 20 questions and then hang up. He calls back…I’m sorry the card is declined.

Bull Shit! I bought my diet coke and pack of gum with that card this very morning. He asks me to come back out to talk to him.

Fine.

I go talk to the man and he is a bumbling idiot and is talking to his supervisor over the crackly radio. I give him another card. He does the same lame ass rubbing and finally I throw up my hands and say…take me to a bank…I’ll give you cash.

We rode a good 10 minutes to the bank (with the meter running) and I went in and got cash. But the ATM only gives 20s and it was a $50 cab ride. I asked him for a ten. Nope.

Fine.

Back into the bank to get the 20 turned into two 10s. Back into the cab and back to the office (with the meter still running). I threw the $50 at him and took off before he could count it. No way I was paying for the ride to the bank.

All I have to say is…if you want to stay classy San Diego, you should work on those cabbies.