0 comments
Annie’s Rules
Annie’s Yellow Cab Rule #4: If her hail attracts a minivan with a duck bill snout and sliding doors, she must shake her head and wave it on. The door is a test she always flunks. Either she doesn’t tug fast and masterfully enough to satisfy the driver and he treats her to a stream of derision, or she tugs so hard that the door slams with tinny reverb, cuing the driver to buck vengefully into traffic before she can find the goddam seatbelt.
Rule #4.5: If it’s raining, and she’s not wearing a raincoat (you know of course that she doesn’t own an umbrella–eyepokers, she calls them, which you also know, you being she being I), if it’s raining, etc, and Sixth Avenue is bereft of Crown Victorias, yellow cabs as they should be, and she has sworn off Uber and Lyft for boring reasons, and her backpack contains a rotisserie chicken, intended for her husband in rehab at Village Care, which means travel by subway would contravene Conveyance of Cooked Food Rule #1 . . . .
The shiny chrome minivan noses its way across two lanes of honking trucks and skittery citibikes, and despite her energetic wave of dismissal, the emphatic shaking of her head, the rueful smile and shrug to suggest she wants with all her heart to open the sliding door and ascend to the running board, but she mayn’t, she must not take said cab–despite all this and perhaps more, it stops inches away from her, imperiously flashing its blinkers, and does not move.
She gets in. She can’t close the door for all the tea in China.
She gets in. She closes the door with precisely the force required and not a penny more.
She gets in. She exerts such outrageous oomph that the car spirals up up up and over the rainbow, landing millliseconds later at Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG). The Paris Poulet Police, chic as ever in their yellow feathered vests, arrest her for importing rotisserie provender without a single sauce.
She doesn’t get in. She ignores the minivan and the next one and the one after that; she closes her eyes and conjures a Crown Victoria. Comme d’habitude, she tips as if she had infinite moola and still feels guilty toward the driver without knowing of what.
The rain stops as suddenly as it started. Annie walks at a decent clip for a woman who, let us admit, is no spring chicken.
The chicken of the first instance arrives at Village Care still hot and juicy. Self-saucing, as it were.
Annie suddenly knows that her husband will soon be okay and much more than okay and they will once again go to Paris. N’est-ce pas, cheri?
Annie’s Yellow Cab Rule #4: If her hail attracts a minivan with a duck bill snout and sliding doors, she must shake her head and wave it on. The door is a test she always flunks. Either she doesn’t tug fast and masterfully enough to satisfy the driver and he treats her to a stream of derision, or she tugs so hard that the door slams with tinny reverb, cuing the driver to buck vengefully into traffic before she can find the goddam seatbelt.
Annie’s Yellow Cab Rule #4: If her hail attracts a minivan with a duck bill snout and sliding doors, she must shake her head and wave it on. Wave it on. Wave it on. The door is a test she always flunks. Either she doesn’t tug fast and masterfully enough to satisfy the driver and he treats her to a stream of derision, or she tugs so hard that the door slams with tinny reverb, cuing the driver to buck vengefully into traffic before she can find the goddam seatbelt.
Rule #4.5: If it’s raining, and she’s not wearing a raincoat (you know of course that she doesn’t own an umbrella–eyepokers, she calls them, which you also know, you being she being I), if it’s raining, etc, and Sixth Avenue is bereft of Crown Victorias, yellow cabs as they should be, and she has sworn off Uber and Lyft for boring reasons, and her backpack contains a rotisserie chicken, intended for her husband in rehab at Village Care, which means travel by subway would contravene Conveyance of Cooked Food Rule #1 . . . .
The shiny chrome minivan noses its way across two lanes of honking trucks and skittery citibikes, and despite her energetic wave of dismissal, the emphatic shaking of her head, the rueful smile and shrug to suggest she wants with all her heart to open the sliding door and ascend to the running board, but she mayn’t, she must not take said cab–despite all this and perhaps more, it stops inches away from her, imperiously flashing its blinkers, and does not move.
She gets in. She can’t close the door for all the tea in China.
She gets in. She closes the door with precisely the force required and not a penny more.
She gets in. She exerts such outrageous oomph that the car spirals up up up and over the rainbow, landing millliseconds later at Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG). The Paris Poulet Police, chic as ever in their yellow feathered vests, arrest her for importing rotisserie provender without a single sauce.
She doesn’t get in. She ignores the minivan and the next one and the one after that; she closes her eyes and conjures a Crown Victoria. Comme d’habitude, she tips as if she had infinite moola and still feels guilty toward the driver without knowing of what.
The rain stops as suddenly as it started. Annie walks at a decent clip for a woman who, let us admit, is no spring chicken.
The chicken of the first instance arrives at Village Care still hot and juicy. Self-saucing, as it were.
Annie suddenly knows that her husband will soon be okay and much more than okay and they will once again go to Paris. N’est-ce pas, cheri?
Annie’s Yellow Cab Rule #6.2: If her hail attracts a minivan with a duck bill snout and sliding doors, she must shake her head and wave it on. The door is a test she always flunks. Either she doesn’t tug fast and masterfully enough to satisfy the driver and he treats her to a stream of derision, or she tugs so hard that the door slams with tinny reverb, cuing the driver to buck vengefully into traffic before she can find the goddam seatbelt.
Rule #8: If it’s raining, and she’s not wearing a raincoat (you know of course that she doesn’t own an umbrella–eyepokers, she calls them, which you also know, you being she being I), if it’s raining, etc, and Sixth Avenue is bereft of Crown Victorias, yellow cabs as they should be, and she has sworn off Uber and Lyft for boring reasons, and her backpack contains a rotisserie chicken, intended for her husband in rehab at Village Care, which means travel by subway would contravene Conveyance of Cooked Food Rule #1 . . . .
The shiny chrome minivan noses its way across two lanes of honking trucks and skittery citibikes, and despite her energetic wave of dismissal, the emphatic shaking of her head, the rueful smile and shrug to suggest she wants with all her heart to open the sliding door and ascend to the running board, but she mayn’t, she must not take said cab–despite all this and perhaps more, it stops inches away from her, imperiously flashing its blinkers, and does not move.
She gets in. She can’t close the door for all the tea in China.
She gets in. She closes the door with precisely the force required and not a penny more.
She gets in. She exerts such outrageous oomph that the car spirals up up up and over the rainbow, landing millliseconds later at Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG). The Paris Poulet Police, chic as ever in their yellow feathered vests, arrest her for importing rotisserie provender without a single sauce.
She doesn’t get in. She ignores the minivan and the next one and the one after that; she closes her eyes and conjures a Crown Victoria. Comme d’habitude, she tips as if she had infinite moola and still feels guilty toward the driver without knowing of what.
The rain stops as suddenly as it started. Annie walks at a decent clip for a woman who, let us admit, is no spring chicken.
The chicken of the first instance arrives at Village Care still hot and juicy. Self-saucing, as it were.
Annie suddenly knows that her husband will soon be okay and much more than okay and they will once again go to Paris. N’est-ce pas, cheri?
You must sign up or log in to submit a comment.
0 comments