Last night I got a ping from a woman named Kitty. I picked her up at a house near downtown Minneapolis. She had short brown hair and was wearing those thick intellectual glasses that middle-aged woman wear when they want the world to know how condescending they are.
I asked her if she was having a good night and she let me know she was having a great night and she was just leaving a birthday party at a friend’s house. A birthday party for her friend’s dog that is. She went blabbing on about how this dog birthday party included little cupcakes and some of her other friends even brought their dogs to this party. I went to my own thoughts as she kept on rambling on.
As I was driving farther south, I came to this place on Highway 169 that I have nicknamed “Wayne’s Way.” At this time I opened up my window and I tossed the empty can from my energy drink out it. This caused this woman to completely freak out. ” oh my God! I cannot believe you just did this!” I began explaining that I am a strong supporter of Greenpeace and I have sent money to save the rainforest more than once in my lifetime, but this is just a dirty weedy old ditch by the highway we’re talking about here. There are people who clean the garbage out of the ditch of the highway regularly.
I tried to explain all of this to Kitty.
” I’m calling the police right now!” She yelled at me. I tried to plead with her and then finally she told me that I had to turn my car around and pick up my garbage or she would call the police on me. So I did a u-turn to backtrack and then I did a second U-turn to get back I’m going the right direction. I pulled the car to the side of the highway and turned on the flashlight on my iPhone and began searching the ditch near the place I threw the can out the window.
At about 5 minutes I was not finding it so I began complaining to Kitty that it was not found and I would pay her $5 if we could just continue on our way. She would not accept it and she kept standing by outside my car. I’m pretty sure she was recording me with her phone also!
Finally I said “I found it!” But actually I outsmarted her, it was not my energy drink can but just a Pepsi can I found lying in the ditch. So we got back in my car to take her the rest of the way to her destination. She was talking on her phone to some friend of hers about me as if I was not there.
When we got to her apartment she said to me “1 star.”
I replied “1 star” as I held up my phone with the name Kitty on it and selected the one star in front of her face. The look on her face was priceless. It was obvious she did not know that riders have a rating also.
I’m not taking any crap from anyone anymore!
Last night, as the hazy Los Angeles air settled in, I got a buzz from a peculiar bird named Kitty. I cruised over to a pad near K-Town, half-expecting some high-octane drama from the heart of this absurd metropolis. Kitty, with her short brown mane and those beastly intellectual goggles – the kind women her age don to passive-aggressively declare their intellectual dominance – climbed into my ride.
“Wild evening, eh?” I queried, trying to get a read on her mood.
She shot back with tales of a canine shindig. “It was splendid!” she exclaimed, recounting tales of cupcakes designed for dogs and a gathering of her pals’ pets. The sheer absurdity of it all began to drown her words, and I swiftly retreated into the bizarre depths of my own mind.
As the wheels rolled and the neon lights of LA zipped by, I reached a stretch of the 101 I’ve affectionately dubbed “Wayne’s Way.” Feeling the remnants of an energy surge and a crumpled can to show for it, I flung the trash out into the night. The hells of Kitty’s rage unfurled as she lost her mind over the act. “You fiend! That’s a crime against nature!” she howled.
I tried reason: “Listen, darling, I’ve tossed some coins Greenpeace’s way and the rainforest and I are on speaking terms. This isn’t pristine wilderness, but a trash-collector’s buffet off the old 101!”
But Kitty, ever the keyboard warrior, would hear none of it. “Turn this godforsaken vehicle around or I swear I’ll get the law involved!” she threatened, voice dripping with righteous indignation.
So, with my own mix of resignation and defiance, I double-backed, hitting the brakes near the presumed crime scene. Scanning the area with my phone’s feeble beam, the trash seemed to have pulled a Houdini on me. In a bid to end this mad charade, I half-shouted to Kitty, “Hey! How ’bout five bucks and we call it square?”
But no, Kitty was hell-bent on justice or perhaps a little show for her virtual audience, as she seemed to be documenting my humiliation with glee. In a last-ditch effort, my fingers grasped a discarded Pepsi relic. “Eureka!” I proclaimed, not letting her onto my sly switcheroo.
The rest of the ride was tinted with an undercurrent of disdain. Her voice echoed with tales of my wickedness to some unseen compatriot on the other end of her phone. By the time we reached her lair, she shot me a wicked smile. “One star for you,” she declared, the vehemence palpable.
Matching her tone, I brandished my own device. “One star for you too, Kitty,” I retorted, jabbing pointedly at her abysmal rating. The color drained from her face – a realization hitting that in this digital duel, both swords were double-edged.
The moral of this twisted tale? This city might make you crazy, but I’ll be damned if I let it get the best of me. No more shenanigans. No more taking the backseat. Hell’s bells, I’ve had enough!