by Carlson, JJ
He said “I have to go there."
That didn't sound good. My eyes darted to the mirror to double-check my assessment of his age. The older they are, the quieter they are, is the rule. No, he was as old as I first thought. So how is it that he has to go there? What trouble could a nice old man get into?
He spoke slowly, "They threw me out of the Bellagio last night."
"What? They threw you out of the Bellagio?" A long pause followed.
"First I lost 12,000 dollars," he said.
"They don't throw you out if you lose 12,000 dollars; they get you a free room."
"I had a room," he boomed.
"Oh" I said. Another long pause happened.
"First, they threw my girl friend out," he said with a little anger.
“They threw your girl friend out of the Bellagio?
My head had snapped around again, this time faster. I was shocked. Shocked he even had a girl friend. He was old. Maybe it was a hooker, I thought, silently.
"They called her a hooker," he said, outraged.
She was, I thought
"They called your girl friend a hooker?" I sympathized.
"So what, if she was?" he said. I bit my tongue. He went on.
"When you lose 12,000 dollars at a Casino in Vegas the least you expect is that you're going to get laid, but not at the Bellagio." Back came that outrage and another long pause.
"So, that had to upset you." I showed him I was on his side, because I had to get to the best part of the story before we ran out of ride.
"So then what did you do?"
"This is so embarrassing." Oh good. Tell me now or you are never leaving this cab.
"What did you do when they made you mad?" Yes, a really long pause.
"I got up from the table, went over and took a leak in one of their slot machines."
I looked right into his eyes, thinking, oh my god, did he just say that? The voice in my head got louder; Joe, the car is still moving- the car is still moving. I turned my head back to the road and started my own long pause.
The Bellagio was then considered to be the premier hotel on The Strip. Of all the hotels in the whole town you chose that one. Then my thoughts stumbled onto something good.
"Cheer up! At least, you are not in jail."
"Yes, that is the good news." But it did not cheer him.
"I am not allowed in the Bellagio again for at least six months." That figured. If not for the $12,000 he would never get in again.
"Did they take you to the back room?"
"Oh yes. They take you to the back room for that."
"Did they hurt you? Did they want to hurt you? Did they act like they were going to hurt you?"
"No, no, no. They just looked at me, for two hours. Then they escorted me out. This is so embarrassing."
"Oh… I bet they were checking out that machine to see if you damaged it. That is another good thing; you didn't have to buy a new machine. How good is that? “He clammed up on me.
“See, we are finding some good things. Evidently you didn't get your stream up into the ‘electrical's’ of the machine. You probably just filled the change tray?"
I noticed I might be talking too much for him so I went back to listening.
"This is so embarrassing." He repeated, and he was right because I was even getting embarrassed. Now we both needed to cheer up so I offered a new thought.
"Well, that was last night and this is today and the only one who hates you is the cleaning lady."
It did not cheer him and he slowly left the cab like a condemned man. His final statement,
"Yeah, but word travels."
He was right. They would be waiting with his stuff and they would all know.
As I drove off I remembered one of life's rules: there will be lessons.
COCAINE LESSON
One night I rolled up to the doorman for my next ride at the hottest new hotel in town only to see security officers escorting a guy to my car. I quickly locked the doors and opened the window a crack. When the door didn't open for the doorman the following exchange ensued:
He: Open the door.
Me: No.
He: What?
Me: No.
He: Why?
Me: Look behind you. It took three security officers to get him out here. I need to know if he was belligerent.
Me: Is he belligerent? He asked them.
He: No, he was not.
Me: Is he sick like going to vomit? He asked.
He: No.
Me: Does he still have money? He asked.
He: Yes, he still has money. Are you going to take him or leave him for the next cabbie.
I took him.
Background: 1) I had learned all of this at this very hotel. One night they brought up this girl in a wheelchair who was not disabled, except by alcohol. Her friends were stumbling behind her to my car. So I locked my doors.
He: Open up the door, said the doorman.
Me: Nope.
He: Why?
Me: Look at her.
He: What? What do you mean?
Me: She looks green. You better stand back. I think she is going to vomit on you.
He turned just in time to see her start to hurl and did not want that anywhere, especially on him.
Me: Push her up to that potted plant, fast. He managed, just in time, poor plant, and then came back, thanked and rewarded me with a different carload. Not my first rodeo.
2) On a different night several security officers escorted four drunks out to my car. Same thing, I put the door locks down. I was not opening this time, either. The reason was so obvious I was shocked they had not all seen it.
One of the drunks thought he was funny so he continued wrestling with his buddies all the way out to my car. When security heard I was not taking them because they were not behaved enough to ride in my car, they laughed and said "smart driver." Then they turned to the alcohol impaired group and said, "Get off our property" and pointed them out to the street.
3) It is against the law to take a cab if you don’t have money. Riders are responsible for the cash and the correct change, too. It is the same as a city bus; just try to get that driver to make change. Most cabbies are helpful and carry some change and some companies do take credit cards. But when you forget your money or ran out and you still owe the cabbie, life can get interesting and, or inconvenient in a hurry.
A) You can get taken to a bank or ATM (with meter still running)
B) You can get escorted to your room by security officer (smart cabbies don't take your word that you will come back and the meter is still running)
C) You can find the police arriving on the scene.
D) You can give a possession of value to the driver as payment or, in lieu of payment, and redeemable from the cab company. This possession could be your watch, wallet, DMV ID, iPod, cell phone, PDA, camera. These are usually available 24 hrs per day at the taxi office.
So, a guy at this same hotel was escorted to my cab and after I screened the doorman, in he got. And he immediately, loudly yelled “You dumbshit,” and again and again. He assured me there would be no "other trouble tonight." My mind said “other?” He told me his story
He was a "friend" of a member of the entourage of a female film star. The star, a once scandalous girl gone straight, made her name in scary pictures. And, no, he was not intimate with her. But he wanted to be closer to her. So it was his bright idea to bring a gram or more of cocaine to party like "a player "at the hottest nightclub in Las Vegas, at that time. Only, he got real stupid (his words) after he got drunk on alcohol and started openly offering coke to others in the club.
This was guaranteed to make a big impression, the wrong impression on the wrong people: the management and security. As he tells it, he was yanked out of the club, one of the most desirable hotspots in town, into the cold dank security office.
Here he met the entire senior security staff, and the President/ Manager of the hotel. They took turns grilling him.
"Where did you get the coke?"
"Was it in the hotel?"
"Where? When? Who?" They grilled him over and over again. What an enjoyable drug.
Finally, after satisfying them that it had nothing to do with their hotel they said it was "time to call the city police, unless he just wanted them to flush it all,"
So now you know who he had called "a dumbshit" when he got in my car. It wasn't me. And he might be a dumbshit but he was a dumbshit who now was free to leave. He just never could return again.
They have his picture in their computer. Just like a celebrity.
HAPPY DRUNKS
Happy drunks are common in Las Vegas. I think the happiest of them all are the Brits! They are, my favorites, by far, because they are not amateurs. Brits are such good drinkers that they can still amuse themselves even deep into their typical five day visits.
Americans are rank amateurs compared to these "professional grade" traveler/drinkers. Time and again I have had "the lads" get in my car after three days of partying and hard drinking and they don't have a cross word for each other. Come to think of it, maybe they passed that point days ago and they are back loving and living it up again. This is remarkable in my cab experience and still goes unchallenged by any other group. When I ask them how they manage it they say,
"Practice, Practice, Practice."
As an example, one such group filled my car on a Saturday morning on the way to "The Gun Store". This store is an icon in Las Vegas because on their range you can shoot "fully automatic." You get to choose from twenty or more weapons of WWII vintage to the modern ones you see in movies. Here you get to play Al Pacino and speak the famous line "say allo to my leetell friend." You can get targets like Bin Laden, Saddam, or Bush to blow full of holes. Lately, girls have been shooting, in groups, like at bachelorette parties and they report it to be a great way to relax the nerves. Watch out guys.
Off I go with the Brits to the Gun Store but we first need to stop at the bank. While waiting for one guy to do his banking the rest of us got better acquainted. We compared our governments and which had the stupidest President. At one point a quiet moment brought us all to the same question. "What is taking him so long?" After a pause, one of them answered.
"If he comes out running, be ready to gun the motor."
I said "With him or without him?" They are such sports their reply was, "driver gets to choose."
I was starting to have second thoughts about their alcoholic condition, our gun store destination and their comment about robbing the bank, but I calmed down when I saw him return slowly to the car. We hadn't gotten 100 yards when one quietly said to him.
"Did you get enough?" "I got 2,000 that ought to hold us, for now." Not knowing what that meant, how many would partake or in what they would partake, I did what cabbies do. I drove on.
++++
My other happy drunks would of course include the happy couple who were celebrating. They were not celebrating the normal things like getting married, anniversary or winning some jackpot. They were, in fact, partying because the girl had just won her division of the Exotic Dancer Contest at the national convention. Yes, they have their own convention. Conventions come in all sizes, for example your family reunion of 40 can be listed as a convention.
They proudly announced she was the new "Miss Petite Body" award winner. Given how drunk they were, I was not very surprised that she wanted to show off what won the contest for her. It's what she does.
"These are the babies that won it for me," she said. So up went the t-shirt. Out came the girls. And off went the horns in the cars near us. Then all available traffic joined in the fun. I felt like a Rose Parade driver with only two roses. But most importantly, my riders were so proud.
In the past I had seen those ironic signs that say, "Show us your boobs," but I never before had a volunteer in my car
Being the driver, I am responsible for those two in the back so I kept my eyes on the road, mostly.
THE OLD CABBIE
Occasionally, the stories are about the cab driver.
Once I met an older cabbie who had an attitude problem. Don't worry, they don't last long. Since he was pretty sick of driving I knew I had better listen fast to his stories. He was particularly disgusted with the cars his company assigned him. His thoughts were that they were purposely giving him poorly maintained or older cabs to spoil his life and encourage him to quit. I asked him for examples and he obliged me easily.
He: (The Cabbie) One time they gave me an old SUV with a transmission that would slip out of park gear.
Me: That cannot be true.
He: I brought it to the shop so many times and they couldn't make it slip. They told me to go break it some more, then bring it back.
Me: So what did you do?
He: What could I do? I drove it and when I had to get out to load some bags I would have to keep an eye on it and keep the door open. I got so tired of being worried about it and sometimes having to chase it when it wanted to "surprise" me. I was losing sleep over the whole thing. So, I made up my mind. I would not chase it again, ever.
Me: You would not chase it again? How did that work out for you?
He: First, I very carefully chose my hotels that I served. For instance, I hung out at the Mandalay Bay because it has a huge front deck where the people are spread out wide.
Me: And, so what happened?
He: It finally happened. I went to Mandalay to pickup a ride and when I got to the back to help load the bags the car started moving. You should have seen the look on the doorman's face as he lifted the bag to the SUV and missed, because it was still rolling. He said to me, “Your car is rolling!” I said "I know".
He said, "Aren’t you going to stop it?"
"Nope, not any more."
Me: “Tell me what happened then. Did anyone ever stop it?”
He: “Oh, yeah. Some fast guy chased after it and stopped it just before it hit anything.”
Me: “You must have gotten in trouble for that one?”
He: “No. Hotel security called my company, with me standing there, and told them to come get this vehicle off their property and not let it back until it is totally fixed.
++++
His other car story showed what a character he was and how soon he would be retired from driving. Newsflash: Las Vegas gets hot in the summer. All cabs are supposed to have air conditioning but the poor motor can really get hot. Cab companies want you to protect their cars so they insist you pay attention to the engine temperature. They all say something like:
"If you burn up my motor, you just bought a motor." Or they could fire you.
He: So they gave me an old car that ran hot on a cool day so I took it to the shop to complain that it would not do well in the summer heat. They said to drive it carefully if I didn't want to burn up the motor. Then they laughed, the sickies.
Me: Did you make that part up? Never mind. What happened? I've got to hear this.
He: You know how hot it gets. I had to keep shutting it off to cool it down even though I was losing rides each time. One day when it was 112 degrees in the shade and I spent all day shutting it off. I got so sick of it that I finally limped the car back to the yard with the temperature gauge still climbing, I barely made it.
I parked right under the sign that says ‘burn it up and you bought it’. I went in to the shop and they told me to see my supervisor. As I was going into his office a commotion started outside. The car I brought back had burst into flames.
Me: You’re kidding me? You were really in the office when it caught fire?
He: Yep. The supervisor tried to put the blame on me. But I had been seen sitting in the shop for a while, so I said, sorry about your car. I turned it over to the shop 20 minutes ago. Funny, though, how it's parked under that sign.
Me: Oooooh, you got away with that comment?
He: He had to laugh and even though it wasn't his car, I didn't see me working for them much longer.
&nbs
p; Evidently, I was right. He must have retired, because I have not seen him since.
Good for him and good for the visitors of Las Vegas.
BIG CITY GUYS AND THE PORN QUEENS
Sometimes drinking plays only a small part in a much bigger drama that is Las Vegas. One Sunday morning at 5:00 a.m., I picked up a carload of New York guys, but they could have been from anywhere and the story could have been the same.
It all started with the puzzle. There was something off about them. They were all too jolly for this time of day/night. I asked myself what is different about them. Then it hit me. They were talking all at once.
This is odd because guys don't talk this way, especially tired, drunk or recently drunk guys who have been out all night. Girls can do this because they are congenial, convivial or whatever they are, but not guys. Guys are too competitive, derisive and bitingly funny. They like, no, they love to cut each other. They listen to everything said and then they pounce, one at a time. They play off each others' comments, unmercifully, whether in defense or offense. They don't care which.
