Ten hours of hard riding in this city can really wear a pedal cabbie out. In my hometown, i have the city down: routes, shortcuts, vistas, hidden gardens, potholes, awesome hills to charge down; I could draw them from memory. Here, I have to devise a new path with every ride and have to watch traffic, make conversation and gawk at monuments. this is mentally exhausting. Keeping up with the flow of cars, weaving past the weird assortment of mismatched cabs, and dealing with the hilly terrain, this kicks your body's, well, butt. literally.
The money hasn't materialized just yet. I cleared 135 cash american tonight, but my body feels like i've worked more than twice this hard. back home, on a saturday, this would be no problem to make with an average effort. Tomorrow promises to be lucrative, though. The super big free concert at Lincoln Memorial should be the beginning of the big money. the show is being broadcast live on HBO; this is the party to be at...
an aside:
We have to call in rides from our bosses so we can be picked up from the city and driven back to our to the flop house (bout an hour away). tonight, those of us working the late shift, slowly gathered at our temporary garage. Parked in front of the garage door, in front of a garishly spray painted *no parking* sign, was a gunmetal PT cruiser. EFF WORD! We have to put the bikes up before we can leave...so the seven of us (the final number after everyone had gathered) lifted and shifted the car's back end until we had enough clearance for our cabs. I'd like to see the owner's face when they returned.
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