Hitchhiker's Guide to the Northwest
I hitchhiked to the airport yesterday. Cool, huh? Due to the snowpocalypse, no one could get transportation off the hills without being a bit creative.
Okay, maybe the trip wasn't all that exciting. The exciting part comes in the language I can now use to describe my transportation situation. Do I want to say: "I hitchhiked to the airport" or do I want to say "I solicited strangers on the street for . . . " (That second works much better with the trail off in person.)
Here's how it went down:
8:00 am - I start calling taxi companies to get a taxi. (My flight wasn't till 2 pm, so I was thinking about a 10:30 am taxi.) At all of Yellow Taxi's numbers, I get getting busy signals. But, y'know, it was kind of crazy, so I start a call-wait-call-wait-call rotation.
9:00 am - I still haven't gotten through to Yellow Taxi, so I expand my phone call searches. Orange Cab, Graytop, Farwest, Eastlake. All busy signals. Oh, dear.
9:45 am - Getting desperate, here. I start in on towncars. Most don't even answer their phones. The people at Classic Towncar were really nice actually. (The dispatch guy asked if he could call me back in five minutes so that he could check in with his fleet to see if anyone had time and location. He was very apologetic when he called back to let me know he couldn't do anything. Still, I really liked his efforts and his phone demeanor . . . I'm totally putting Classic Towncar in my phone and taking them whenever Yellow Taxi ignores me in the future.)
10:00 am - Okay, buses it has to be. Am I going to make it to the airport in time to catch my flight on this crazy adverse-weather-conditions bus schedule? Well, maybe. If I left an hour ago. Nothing for it.
10:05 am - Not even at the bus stop yet, I'm pulling my suitcase along when a guy who's de-icing his car calls out to me, "Hey! You going to the airport?" Sadly, he isn't driving to the airport in the car he's de-icing. But, he'd called for a taxi the night before and it was only an hour and a half late so far. His flight is at noon. We commiserate for a few minutes on the unlikelihood of our getting to the airport. His name is Lucas.
10:07 am - Random guy walks past us on the street. He's not wearing a scarf, gloves, or hat. Figuring it can't hurt, Lucas and I call out to him. "Don't suppose you have all-wheel drive?" The kid looks like he's going to ignore us. "We'll pay you $120 to take us to the airport!" (That's $60 each, what cabs would have cost us.) The kid stops, "Well, I'm getting breakfast for my girlfriend, but maybe. Let me check with her."
10:10 am - Kid (Andrew) has gone to the market. Lucas and I are waiting with crossed fingers. Yellow Taxi calls Lucas to check that he got his cab. "No! I haven't got my cab yet!!!!" He's asked to please hold.
10:30 am - Andrew is back with permission from the gf to take us to the airport. We make it by 11 am because the freeways are beautifully cleared. It was getting off the hills that took effort.
10:35 am - On the next block, we pass the bus stop I would have started at if I hadn't caught a ride. The bus I would have taken? Jack-knifed (the accordion kind) across 3/4 of the street, turned off and abandoned. Guess I wouldn't have gotten anywhere on the bus!
There you go. Technically technically I hitched a ride with two strangers in order to get to the airport. No one was getting off the hills yesterday morning. My flight had been overbooked, but we got on all of the standby passengers and had a few seats left over. Whew!
Okay, maybe the trip wasn't all that exciting. The exciting part comes in the language I can now use to describe my transportation situation. Do I want to say: "I hitchhiked to the airport" or do I want to say "I solicited strangers on the street for . . . " (That second works much better with the trail off in person.)
Here's how it went down:
8:00 am - I start calling taxi companies to get a taxi. (My flight wasn't till 2 pm, so I was thinking about a 10:30 am taxi.) At all of Yellow Taxi's numbers, I get getting busy signals. But, y'know, it was kind of crazy, so I start a call-wait-call-wait-call rotation.
9:00 am - I still haven't gotten through to Yellow Taxi, so I expand my phone call searches. Orange Cab, Graytop, Farwest, Eastlake. All busy signals. Oh, dear.
9:45 am - Getting desperate, here. I start in on towncars. Most don't even answer their phones. The people at Classic Towncar were really nice actually. (The dispatch guy asked if he could call me back in five minutes so that he could check in with his fleet to see if anyone had time and location. He was very apologetic when he called back to let me know he couldn't do anything. Still, I really liked his efforts and his phone demeanor . . . I'm totally putting Classic Towncar in my phone and taking them whenever Yellow Taxi ignores me in the future.)
10:00 am - Okay, buses it has to be. Am I going to make it to the airport in time to catch my flight on this crazy adverse-weather-conditions bus schedule? Well, maybe. If I left an hour ago. Nothing for it.
10:05 am - Not even at the bus stop yet, I'm pulling my suitcase along when a guy who's de-icing his car calls out to me, "Hey! You going to the airport?" Sadly, he isn't driving to the airport in the car he's de-icing. But, he'd called for a taxi the night before and it was only an hour and a half late so far. His flight is at noon. We commiserate for a few minutes on the unlikelihood of our getting to the airport. His name is Lucas.
10:07 am - Random guy walks past us on the street. He's not wearing a scarf, gloves, or hat. Figuring it can't hurt, Lucas and I call out to him. "Don't suppose you have all-wheel drive?" The kid looks like he's going to ignore us. "We'll pay you $120 to take us to the airport!" (That's $60 each, what cabs would have cost us.) The kid stops, "Well, I'm getting breakfast for my girlfriend, but maybe. Let me check with her."
10:10 am - Kid (Andrew) has gone to the market. Lucas and I are waiting with crossed fingers. Yellow Taxi calls Lucas to check that he got his cab. "No! I haven't got my cab yet!!!!" He's asked to please hold.
10:30 am - Andrew is back with permission from the gf to take us to the airport. We make it by 11 am because the freeways are beautifully cleared. It was getting off the hills that took effort.
10:35 am - On the next block, we pass the bus stop I would have started at if I hadn't caught a ride. The bus I would have taken? Jack-knifed (the accordion kind) across 3/4 of the street, turned off and abandoned. Guess I wouldn't have gotten anywhere on the bus!
There you go. Technically technically I hitched a ride with two strangers in order to get to the airport. No one was getting off the hills yesterday morning. My flight had been overbooked, but we got on all of the standby passengers and had a few seats left over. Whew!