And today was the day.
I had no intention of driving today but on the way home from a job, I decided to wash the vehicle. That lead to a full cleaning of the inside thinking that maybe this would be clean enough for doing some Ubers. When finished cleaning I opened the Uber app and checked to see what was needed nowadays and basically as long as everyone was wearing a mask, all basic requirements are met.
There was an active promotion of a $100 bonus for the completion of three trips. Hmm, I can do 3 rides easily and take advantage of that. I selected the home screen, the app had me take a selfie to verify identity, and the screen lit up with a map that was on fire with demand. A request immediately came in and I was officially engaged with ride share driving for the first time since February of 2020.
I had completely forgotten that this was weekend 2 of the ACL music festival and the first riders were headed that way. I had not re-subscribed to Sirius XM so I just put on a radio station for music. It sucked for creating an atmosphere. The music seemed out of touch for the trip and the two guys that were talking, assumedly the D.J.s, were just big dufuses. I fired up my Spotify and found on of my playlists that would add some feeling for the ride to a music festival. Hearing one of the girls singing along with a song on the playlist, confirmed that I had done the right thing. I thought the traffic would be horrendous near the drop off point at Mopac and Barton Springs but it wasn't to bad and the riders wanted to jump out early and walk which worked for me. Another request immediately popped up.
The next pick up was not far away and they were going to the airport. There was a little conversation about how difficult it has been to get an Uber since the pandemic. Upon dropping them off, just as before, there was someone to be picked up. Easy enough, I am already here. That will get me the $100 and I am pretty sure the previous 2 rides were under Surge conditions so there is probably some good money from them although I had not been able to look at the earnings screen.
The app locked up and had us in limbo for a moment at Cesar Chavez and 2nd street. I turned down 2nd street anyway as the customer had his app going and did the guiding for a brief movement until the Uber app caught back up with us. I had already accepted the next request and had noticed that my phone was not charging. I had already accepted the next ride so I took off hoping that it would last until I finished this one. I went ahead and stopped the app from receiving requests, which is a feature that did not exist before.
It didn't take long to get that unique rider. "You are about to go to the worst place you have ever been" he told me. Okay but I don't think so, was my answer. "Human trafficking, drugs, you name it". He had many claims of how he had taken care of things in his community and involvement in helping take down notorious local criminals. I begin to think he was probably full of shit when we pulled into the manufactured home community and said "there they are. None of them even have drivers licenses because you can't get one unless you are an American citizen". I just happen to know first hand that this is not true. He told me what number his home was and asked if I could pull up the driveway for security reasons. His home came into view and his home did indeed look like one of the worst places I had ever been. The address was spray painted on the front wall and there were 2 broken down cars in the driveway. I could barely get into the driveway and the only security threat I could see would be from getting tetanus from stepping on a nail or something.
I left my mask on until I was a couple of miles away. I was finally able to look at the earnings and was very pleased with what I saw. The $100 bonus was indeed there and for 2 hours and 36 minutes I had earned almost $217.00. A very good way to get going again after more than a year.
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