I was supposed to head home after work today and I did, kinda sorta. I turned on the app and set my home address to see if I could sneak a ride in while I was headed home. Since I was still downtown, there was a very good chance I would get a request even with the address restriction in place.
I immediately got a ping and it was just around the corner at the state capital. As soon as turned left from Brazos street on to 11th street the riders spotted me and began waving at me. I easily pulled up and two nice looking oriental ladies ran to the vehicle and jumped in. "We have to get to Greyhound and catch a bus" they franticly stated. "Okay, we are on our way", I responded and we took off. I looked at the clock at it was exactly 5:00pm. "What time does your bus leave", I asked. Keep in mind that the evening rush-hour traffic is in full effect although it is usually a little lighter on Fridays. They told me that their bus was at 5:25pm and because sometimes the busses leave a little early, they were not sure they were going to make it.
By now we were on Lavaca and I could see that there was a delay up at the light at MLK. I cut across 17th street to Colorado and then continued over to MLK and successfully avoided the jam up at the Lavaca and MLK light. MLK to I35 was a little slow but it was moving and the turn to the I35 ramp was packed and not moving. I swung wide and stayed on the frontage road bypassing all of the stopped traffic and then had to do the same thing again and the next on-ramp. As I zipped past 38 1/2 street I held to the far left lane. I could see that past the tracks and up the ramp the traffic was moving slower in the other lane. I was easily able to slide through the traffic, over the hill and down onto the on-ramp to I35. The next exit was the one that I needed so I never really merged onto I35. The whole time I am taking glances at the clock and we were getting really close on time. I exited on 2222 and just as before I was able to slip through in the left lane all they way to the traffic light and after a brief wait for the light to change I lifted off while in a left turn for the final leg of the journey.
I could see the building with the Greyhound letters across the side and could also see that there was no traffic for this final stretch. I accelerated rapidly, then slowed equally as rapid to turn into the driveway. The time was 5:20pm. Nice, we had made it with 5 minutes to spare. The ladies had already bolted out of the vehicle thanking me as they ran to the door. I once again began my journey home as the earnings for the ride popped up on the screen. Wow. It seemed like more than what it should be. As I stopped for traffic on Airport Blvd I reached up and opened the detail section of the earnings to see why it was so high. What I saw made me smile. It was almost like receiving a secret message. The ladies had added a large tip to the ride signifying that we did make it in time and that they were pleased with how I had accomplished that.
I made it the rest of the way home, picked up my wife a daughter and we headed out to try out a restaurant that I had seen on one of the past journeys.
No comments:
Post a Comment