Someone peed in my car during rideshare on the Bay Bridge. newsworthy..?

I wrote this to the SF chronic February 26, 2007 A.D.

Subject: Newsworthy?

To Whom it may Concern:

Just wanted to make someone aware that at approximately 9:05AM today, while driving three people (picked up in the Berkeley rideshare on College Ave/Claremont Ave) over the Bay Bridge to Downtown SF, the man sitting shotgun pulled out a plastic bag and started fiddling with his pants zipper to pull out his penis to pee in the bag. I put the brakes on this action immediately, stating forcefully "What the F%&K are you doing!! Are you serious! You are a grown man! Hold it!. WTF!!".

Here's what followed:

Man: "...But I really have to go"
Me: "I don't give a $hit! You knew this trip would take 35 minutes. Any human can hold it for 10 minutes beyond the point where they don't thing they can hold it anymore!"
Man: "Ok, I'll hold it... but I really have to go..."
Me: (Looking back at the two back seat passengers for support on my stance..)
Them: (Hiding behind their newspapers; terrified)..

(To back up, this was the first day I ever participated in casual carpool, and I did so because I was late for a job interview and need to buzz through traffic. In hindsight, this was a poor decision.)

We had just passed the Treasure Island Tunnel and were still in heavy traffic, about 5-10 minutes from Downtown SF. I was steaming. But what can you say or do?? I contemplated stopping the car and throwing him out on the bridge, but realized he would be run over or fall off the bridge, and I subsequently would be charged with involuntary manslaughter, so I nixed that plan. (If you disagree with this point, look at how dumb our nation's legal system has become).

After pleading with the man to hold it (and thinking he would, because after all; he's an adult human), and after about 2-3 minutes of groaning from the man, he went
quiet.

This was disheartening, as his silence meant the groaning had stopped, and his groaning stopping meant he pissed his pants. And him pissing his pants more disturbingly, meant he pissed my cloth passenger side seat...

(There's little I could have done to prevent this. Once you commit to casual carpool, you can't pre-screen passengers that quickly at a pick up spot. You pick up the first two or three passengers and go. The man looked respectable. Certainly wasn't homeless, but he CLEARLY had problems).

When I got to the city (Fremont St.), I pulled over and screamed at him and demanded he pay for my detailing. He said no, and pointed out that I agreed to drive him and he thanked me for the ride..

What do you do in that situation? My friends said I should have called the cops.. I was livid, but I wasn't going to do that because I would have wasted time waiting for a police report, only to serve no purpose other than a funny story for the guys to re-tell at the station with no further recourse. Plus, I would have missed my interview. (FYI: I was in utter shock when I got to my interview and told the interviewer that I would not be able to answer any questions or speak in full sentences until he understood what I had just gone through. He was happy I told him).

Long story short, this type of $hit happens to me all the time. I just never thought it would get to the point that someone I was kind enough to give a ride to would thank me by emptying his bladder on my front seat.

Fondly,

Stuart

My first Start-Up Mixer event.. Nerd Alert!

A few nights ago I went to the SF Beta event in San Francisco. What does "SF Beta" mean you might ask?? Well, from what I gather, it is just an excuse to cram 150-200 mostly computer nerds into one room and have them get cyber hard-ons while explaining their start-up websites to one another. It really was spectacular. There was enough Ram pulsating through that room to sink one of the smaller Peloponnesian islands.

Since these are the supposed innovative people changing the world, they have started trends that I hope die very soon. Such as dropping the letter "e" on their titles or company names on their name tags. For instance- and I think we can all blame Flickr.com for this- a person isn't a programmer, but rather a programmr. They are a Directr. They are an Inspectr. When they're mad, they Bickr. After writing several pages of code, they presumably get a bonr. You get the point.

We were getting free drinks, which made all the Web 2.0 nonsense talk considerably better. We also received a free gift bag, which included a pint glass, a coffee mug, a pen and what I though was a highlighter, but turned out to be a screw driver. This was the most exciting part of the night. Other than demo'ing the site "Likebetter.com", which is a website that determines what you like/who you are, after you click on images for a while, and having it tell me that I'm a smoker and I don't drink. Ironically, even though I despise smoking and I had a beer in my hand, he'll probably be a millionaire in few months.

Still a fun event to go to, as the venue was the same venue as the Matadortravel.com launch party in March, and the Managr comped us drinks all night.

FW: I usually do forwards...

Look for the face in the beans..

This is bizarre - after you find the guy - it's rather obvious. Once you
find him - it's embarrassing, and you think, Why didn't I see him
immediately?

Doctors have concluded that if you find the man in the coffee beans in 3
seconds, your right half of your brain is better developed than most
people. If you find the man between 3 seconds and 1 minute, your right
half of the brain is developed normally. If you find the man between 1
minute and 3 minutes, then the right half of your brain is functioning
slowly and you need to eat more protein. If you have not found the man
after 3 minutes, the advice is to look for more of this type of
exercise to make that part of the brain stronger. Or in layman terms: quit taking drugs.

Ps. I found it in two seconds- Which is probably why I somewhat regularly refer to myself as Einstein's illegitimate love child.

And, yes, the man is really there. Creepy looking, but really there.

Boring + zzz + wet + weird guy in unitard with funny looking guitar = SUPERBOWL

Is it me or did I just watch the ugliest (and potentially the most boring) football game in Superbowl history??

After the first 7 seconds of the game, I didn't get excited once. Although I must concede, by the third quarter my friends and I were having increasing excitement predicting which member of the Colts secondary would intercept Grossman's next pass.

Granted, the rain certainly played a part. But, I can't really remember one play other than Hester's Kick-Off return, that long Bears' run and about 8 fumbles that got a rise out of people. I'm glad for Peyton. He's a good man, destined for more commercial shoots.

Speaking of, which Ads did people think were the funniest??

My list looks something like this (I am sure I am forgetting a few good ones):

1) Sierra Mist "beard-over" with frayed cut-off jeans shorts and roller skates. Simply Amazing. (Two commercials later, Sierra Mist sabotaged their funniness with the Karate Class Commercial).

2) Chevy's shirtless men dancing around the car (Mostly because of the 1-second shot of the man in tighty whities on a horse.)

3) Bud light: Girl: "The man has an Axe.." Guy "Yea, but he also has Bud Light" Girl: "Hey, what's the axe for??" Man With Axe: " mmm.. Bottle Opener" Guy: "Hop on in"

4) I thought the Career Builder ones were clever.

Anyway, Good for Peyton and the Colts. They deserve it. Too bad for the Bears they didn't have a semi-useful quarterback.

ps. Is anyone else slightly surprised Prince performed in the rain?? For some reason, I imagined he'd bail on the half time show, so not to get wet.