Download or read book Taxi Cab Stories written by John Egan and published by . This book was released on 2018-12-22 with total page 125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Infused with John's unique sense of wry humor, these stories take the reader along on a ride through John's experiences as a cab driver in Brockton, Mass during the late 1970s. The stories are a mixture of the hilarious, odd, insightful, and sorrowful; introducing the reader to such characters as Black Laurel and Hardy, Captain Quaalude, and Mr. Magoo.This is how one cab ride ended as John pulled up to an ER..."An orderly, hearing the tires give up their remaining tread in an anguished squeal, ran out expecting a near death emergency arrival. I jammed my driver seat forward and ran over to open Mom's door. She got out calmly, I was anticipating a warm "thanks."She got hold of her purse. I figured to get the fare and a great tip. Instead, she starts beating me with it! Hard! I am 6′4″ and she was able to hit me squarely on top of my head. She was going to nail me into the ground like a human spike!She said, "I told you to get me to the hospital quickly, not to put me in it!" (as she rained beats down on me with her purse) Little Guy (her son) was hopping up and down saying "Can we do that again!?! That was unbelievable!" which made Mom angrier.The orderly skidded to a stop, wondering if I was the bad guy, Mom was a maniac, or this might be some personal matter between two consenting adults, especially one (Mom) that weighed about 4 times what he did. He said nothing, did not come an inch closer. He seemed frozen in fear, a desire for personal safety, and a crushing curiosity to see how it played out."This is how another cab ride ended after two guys considered robbing John..."I got them to their destination in one piece. The fare was just under $10, blond threw me a twenty and said, "Keep it," as they fell over themselves in their hurry to get out. I didn't even thank them for the tip, just acted as if I expected it. Like it was payment for the 'joy ride.'The last thing the black-haired guy said as the scrambled out. "I never met someone as nuts as you, man. Never!"Blond goes, "You're not safe, man. You're nuts. You shouldn't be f**kin' driving!"I looked at them with a bored, 'do this all the time' look and shrugged....I radioed for Gary to get the cops. I gave the address, a description, and said the cops should be careful as at least one was armed."Join John for other fares as he drives from experience to experience, wending his way through an incredible world of stories from his cab driving days.

Download or read book Hack written by Dmitry Samarov and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011-09-01 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cabdrivers and their yellow taxis are as much a part of the cityscape as the high-rise buildings and the subway. We hail them without thought after a wearying day at the office or an exuberant night on the town. And, undoubtedly, taxi drivers have stories to tell—of farcical local politics, of colorful passengers, of changing neighborhoods and clandestine shortcuts. No one knows a city’s streets—and thus its heart—better than its cabdrivers. And from behind the wheel of his taxi, Dmitry Samarov has seen more of Chicago than most Chicagoans will hope to experience in a lifetime. An artist and painter trained at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Samarov began driving a cab in 1993 to make ends meet, and he’s been working as a taxi driver ever since. In Hack: Stories from a Chicago Cab, he recounts tales that will delight, surprise, and sometimes shock the most seasoned urbanite. We follow Samarov through the rhythms of a typical week, as he waits hours at the garage to pick up a shift, ferries comically drunken passengers between bars, delivers prostitutes to their johns, and inadvertently observes drug deals. There are long waits with other cabbies at O’Hare, vivid portraits of street corners and their regular denizens, amorous Cubs fans celebrating after a game at Wrigley Field, and customers who are pleasantly surprised that Samarov is white—and tell him so. Throughout, Samarov’s own drawings—of his fares, of the taxi garage, and of a variety of Chicago street scenes—accompany his stories. In the grand tradition of Nelson Algren, Saul Bellow, Mike Royko, and Studs Terkel, Dmitry Samarov has rendered an entertaining, poignant, and unforgettable vision of Chicago and its people.

Download or read book Taxi Driver Wisdom written by Risa Mickenberg and published by Chronicle Books. This book was released on 2016-07-19 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Insights on love, pleasure, fate, and other topics” collected from conversations with New York City cabbies (AM New York). The worse a town’s economy is, the better looking the guys who work at the local gas station are. I see more of what is going on around me because I am not concerned with finding a parking place. There is no chivalry. For that you have to go upstate. Real taxi drivers know more than how to get you there without a GPS—often, they know how to get you there in life. This twentieth anniversary edition of the wise and hilarious classic, as true now as ever, is a celebration of the witty, philosophical perspective on human nature culled from real quotations from real cab drivers who’ve been around the block.

Download or read book Confessions of a New York Taxi Driver The Confessions Series written by Eugene Salomon and published by HarperCollins UK. This book was released on 2013-01-31 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Driving a cab for more than 30 years Gene Salomon has collected a remarkable selection of stories. He shares the very best in this unforgettable memoir.

Download or read book Taxi written by Graham Russell Gao Hodges and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2020-03-17 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why the cabdriver is the real victim of the false promises of Uber and the gig economy. 2007 Noteworthy Book in Industrial Relations and Labor Economics, Princeton University Industrial Relations Section Hailed in its first edition as a classic study of New York City's history and people, Graham Russell Gao Hodges's Taxi! is a remarkable evocation of the forgotten history of the taxi driver. This deftly woven narrative captures the spirit of New York City cabdrivers and their hardscrabble struggle to capture a piece of the American dream. From labor unrest and racial strife to ruthless competition and political machinations, Hodges recounts this history through contemporary news accounts, Hollywood films, and the words of the cabbies themselves. A new preface recalls the author's five years of hacking in New York City in the early 1970s, and a new concluding chapter explores the rise of app-based ridesharing services with the arrival of companies like Uber and Lyft. Sharply criticizing the use of the independent contractor model that is the cornerstone of Uber and the gig economy, Hodges argues that the explosion of for-hire vehicles in Manhattan reversed decades of environmental anti-congestion efforts. He calls for a return to the careful regulations that governed taxicabs for decades and provided a modest yet secure living for cabbies. Whether or not you've ever hailed a cab on Broadway, Taxi! provides a fascinating perspective on New York's most colorful emissaries.

Download or read book Taxi written by Aimee De Jongh and published by . This book was released on 2019-09-10 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An homage to the taxi driver in the age of Uber. Aimée de Jongh, one of the brightest new talents in Europe, creates her first autobiographic work, focusing on taxi rides from four cities: Los Angeles, Paris, Jakarta, and Washington, DC. Despite the stunning and detailed streetscapes she passes, de Jongh discovers she's more interested in the cab drivers than the view from the backseat. As the drivers slowly open up about their personal lives, de Jongh does too -- even when it means challenging her own ideas and prejudices. Through these vulnerable -- and often humorous -- moments, de Jongh finds common ground with the people driving her. TAXI is an ode to taxi drivers everywhere.

Download or read book Moments of Magic written by Shep Hyken and published by Shepard Presentations, LLC. This book was released on 1993 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Taxi Confidential written by Amy Braunschweiger and published by 671 Press. This book was released on 2009-09 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An outrageous encounter in a cab is a rite of passage in New York City. Trap two or more strangers in a careening yellow sedan and add an unexpected variable-say, a well-armed transvestite hooker, the urgent need for a restroom, or a stabbing victim-and the story that emerges is sure to be worth telling. In Taxi Confidential, cabbies ranging from a lead-footed pothead to a philosophizing immigrant sage grapple with what chance tosses their way. Author Amy Braunschweiger uncovers the best taxi stories from the 1970s through present day, and takes the reader on a 100-mile-per-hour ride through Gotham's darkest alleys, roughest neighborhoods, and hidden sweet spots.

Download or read book Taxi written by Joseph Rodriguez and published by powerHouse Books. This book was released on 2020-12-22 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York City in the late '70s was a collection of villages with its downtown scene, midtown workers, and uptown elegance. It was also a city that was more integrated than ever before or ever would be again. All of the city's humanity met in its streets with layered soundtracks of salsa, rock, disco, reggae, and soon hip-hop booming for all to groove to. But, NYC was also a place of chaos and mayhem. Teetering on the brink of bankruptcy with rampant crime it was the city's drug users, dealers, and pimps and prostitutes who ruled the streets of Manhattan. The grittiness of the city was a beacon and a promise to many outsiders, those who didn't quite fit into any mold, and a vibrant LGBTQ community became the nexus of an underworld of sex workers who liked to party. For a NYC cabbie such as Joseph Rodriguez, the hot spots to pick up fares were clubs like the Hellfire, Mineshaft, The Anvil, The Vault, and Show World. Losing his first camera and lens in a classic '70s New York stabbing and mugging, Rodriguez's wounds healed and he armed himself with a new camera to document what he saw on the job: hookers getting off their shifts, transvestites and S&M partiers doin' it in the back seat or somehow pulling off an unlikely costume change from bondage gear to emerge from the cab clean-cut in an oxford and khakis ready to face unwitting family and friends. A humanist at heart, his photographs speak of the dignity of the city's working class from all the boroughs and those struggling to get by. The Economic Hardship Reporting Project provided funding to support Taxi: Journey Through My Windows 1977–1987.

Download or read book Taxi Cab Stories written by Egan John and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Today in the Taxi written by Sean Singer and published by Tupelo Press. This book was released on 2022-12-28 with total page 75 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the passenger seat of Sean Singer’s taxicab, we witness New York’s streets livid and languid with story and contemplation that give us awareness and aliveness with each trip across the asphalt and pavement. Laced within each fare is an illumination of humanity’s intimate music, of the poet’s inner journey—a signaling at each crossroad of our frailty and effervescence. This is a guidebook toward a soundscape of higher meaning, with the gridded Manhattan streets as a scoring field. Jump in the back and dig the silence between the notes that count the most in each unique moment this poet brings to the page. “Sean Singer’s radiant and challenging body of work involves, much like Whitman’s, nothing less than the ongoing interrogation of what a poem is. In this way his books are startlingly alive... I love in this work the sense that I am the grateful recipient of Singer’s jazzy curation as I move from page to page. Today in the Taxi is threaded through with quotes from Kafka, facts about jazz musicians, musings from various thinkers, from a Cathar fragment to Martin Buber to Arthur Eddington to an anonymous comedian. The taxi is at once a real taxi and the microcosm of a world—at times the speaker seems almost like Charon ferrying his passengers, as the nameless from all walks and stages of life step in and out his taxi. I am reminded of Calvino’s Invisible Cities, of Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn... Today in the Taxi is intricate, plain, suggestive, deeply respectful of the reader, and utterly absorbing. Like Honey and Smoke before it, which was one of the best poetry books of the last decade, this is work of the highest order.” —Laurie Sheck

Download or read book The Last Taxi Driver written by Lee Durkee and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2022-09-13 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Kirkus Best Book of 2020 “A wild, funny, poetic fever dream that will change the way you think about America.” —George Saunders Hailed by George Saunders as “a true original—a wise and wildly talented writer,” Lee Durkee takes readers on a high-stakes cab ride through an unforgettable shift. Meet Lou—a lapsed novelist, struggling Buddhist, and UFO fan—who drives for a ramshackle taxi company that operates on the outskirts of a north Mississippi college town. With Uber moving into town and his way of life vanishing, his girlfriend moving out, and his archenemy dispatcher suddenly returning to town on the lam, Lou must finish his bedlam shift by aiding and abetting the host of criminal misfits haunting the back seat of his disintegrating Town Car. Lou is forced to decide how much he can take as a driver, and whether keeping his job is worth madness and heartbreak. Shedding nuts and bolts, The Last Taxi Driver careens through highways and back roads, from Mississippi to Memphis, as Lou becomes increasingly somnambulant and his fares increasingly eccentric. Equal parts Bukowski and Portis, Durkee’s darkly comic novel is a feverish, hilarious, and gritty look at a forgotten America and a man at life’s crossroads.

Download or read book Migrant Journeys written by Adrienne Jansen and published by . This book was released on 2015-10 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Immigrant taxi-drivers represent the 'invisible other' in NZ society. This oral history focuses on the immigrant experience, through the lens of 'the taxi-driver'"--Publisher information.

Download or read book Hack written by Melissa Plaut and published by Villard Books. This book was released on 2007 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In her late 20s, Plaut decided to honor a long-held secret ambition by becoming a New York City taxi driver. With wit and insight, she recreates the crazy parade of humanity that passes through her cab and shows how this grueling work provides her with a greater sense of self.

Download or read book Diary of a Taxi Driver written by Mingjie Cai and published by Talisman Publishing. This book was released on 2010 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Dr. Cai Mingjie, a lifelong scientist and university professor, lost his job at a leading research institute in Singapore, his world collapsed around him. Despite having published numerous papers and a Stanford PhD, he could not find a suitable job. Disheartened by the global financial crisis, he became a taxi driver, the Singaporean job of last resort. While driving a cab he jotted down notes about his experiences and posted them on his blog, quickly becoming an internet celebrity with close to one million pageviews so far. Experience the real Singapore and join Dr. Cai as he recounts true stories about naive prostitutes and lecherous johns, abusive customers and kind strangers, violent drivers and heart-wrenching encounters... "This book is not just the story of what it is like to be a taxi driver: It offers snapshots of a Singapore literally on the move, of a restless and dissatisfied population, of people rushing to be somewhere else. - The Straits Times" (Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars)

Download or read book Taximan written by Stanley Péan and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Stanley Péan's Taximan is the trace, the record of exile from Haiti. It is also a portrait of urban North America through its displaced people who, despite their native sadness, turn up the music and drive."--

Download or read book Taxi English edition written by Khaled Al Khamissi and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2012-03-15 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A best-selling modern masterpiece in the author's home country of Egypt, Taxi consists of fifty-eight fictional monologues with Cairo taxi drivers that have been recreated from the author's own experience, taking the reader on a roller-coaster of emotions as bumpy and noisy as the city's potholed and chaotic streets. Described as an urban sociology, an ethnography, a classic of oral history - and a work of poetry in motion - it tells Herculean tales of the struggle for survival and dignity among Greater Cairo's 80,000 cab drivers.