August 2, 2020 10:19 a.m.
One of my Uber passengers last night rated me two stars, saying my vehicle was in poor condition.
My guess is that it was the guy I picked up from Diamond Cabaret in Sauget whose primary complaint about the condition of my vehicle was that it did not have any cocaine.
August 1, 2020 8:30 p.m.
I picked a couple up at a bar in Dupo, Illinois. They were wearing masks like good, considerate people, and I couldn't really tell their age, but they looked like they were maybe the same age as me. They got in the back seat.
The destination was about half an hour away. The husband and I started talking a bit, while the wife began to nod off. The subject of video games came up. We talked about the first systems we had ever played - for both of us it was the Atari.
He went on to tell me about a game he played - I don't recall the name, and he may not have mentioned it - but it was pretty difficult, and he spent five months getting to a certain point where he was about to beat it. Then his five year old son went and erased his save file. Just like that, all his progress was gone.
His wife, who had been half-asleep, perked up and said, angrily, "nobody cares about that stupid story or your stupid game!"
"I'm telling our Uber driver a story, babe!" he protested. "He plays games! He gets it!"
We were maybe five minutes into the trip at this point. They argued back and forth for nearly the rest of the ride about this story he was telling about their five year old deleting a save file - him arguing that it was, indeed, a tragedy, and her arguing that he should just get over it.
Finally, as we reached their exit on the highway, the wife said to me, "oh, sir, did my husband mention that our son is now 25 years old and that he's been telling this fucking story for 20 years?"
