Crazy Cabby

My brother had this game for PS2 called 'Crazy Taxi' and I used to love it. You'd drive around big cities trying to get people to their destinations quickly and score points. Obviously you tried not to kill any bystanders or drive on the lawn but that didn't always happen.

Now, fast forward to 2010 in Manhattan. A Sunday night and a girl with a few glasses of merlot in her and a crazy cab driver. The ride started with him saying "GOOOOD MORNING" (Fuck). I gave him my address, grabbed my new blackberry and started plugging away at Facebook. He wouldn't start driving until he grilled me about Jackie Gleeson and why I never watched The Jackie Gleeson Show. (Um, I wasn't born).

Within the first three blocks, I knew that this guy was crazy. All I could think of is 'how is this going to end'. It very easily could have been the most hysterical cab ride of my life or the one that ended with me dead in the east river. The more we drove the more it felt like the later was the possibility (only me), so I kept updating my status on Facebook with my location and the cab number!


In the fifty blocks that it took to get to my apartment he showed me the weather in Manhattan and gave me a tutorial on how to use the around the world features on his iPhone. Mind you, this was all done while he was hanging through the small barrier (eyes on the road please). Next came the lecture on why I shouldn't get an iPhone: "This phone is bad news" WHY? "Because it's addicting and you will never get work done" WHY? "Because you can watch porn!"... And with that he was driving with his knees, was almost completely past the barrier with both hands on his iPhone showing me a porno in full stream (and I thought half the time was spent buffering).


I'm not sure if I was in shock, or if I was just tipsy (I did drunk dial my mother earlier), or that I just didn't want to get out to hail another cab in the rain (I'm lazy), but I stayed in the car! The guy was crazy! I could have died! But at least if I did, I would have been watching porn when it happened! Oh NYC, you never cease to amaze me!