1. We know all of the best places to get street food at 3 a.m. — Chinese, Vietnamese, Italian, you name it.
2. In fact, if you are traveling to a new place, we are often better tour guides than the ones you actually hire.
3. Yes, we are listening to your phone conversation.
And we may even give you unsolicited advice when you hang up.
4. We spend a lot of time reading the news and listening to it on the radio, so we're willing to offer our perspective to anyone who will lend an ear.
5. And we love gracing passengers with our philosophical words of wisdom.
6. Black Cab taxi drivers in London know the streets and best routes better than anybody.
7. We have eyes all over the city, so tell us if you just got mugged or robbed or whatever else. We will do our best to help.
8. But we're not always perfect. Sometimes, we go the slower route so we can get more money.
9. In fact, we may ask you which way you want to go. That's because your way is usually longer, so we get more cash.
10. Our cars may not always pass an engineer's inspection.
11. And someone may or may not have thrown up on the seat last night.
12. We occasionally tell our passengers that we just started our shift, so you won't suspect that we have $200 in our pockets.
13. And when passengers ask for a flat rate, we may agree to it even if we know it's more than what the actual meter would charge them.
14. We may not even get the meter fixed right away when it breaks, because asking passengers to name their price actually works in our favor.
15. We judge people who lack the common sense to look both ways before crossing the street.
16. If we roll the window down or blast the radio, it may be because we just farted.
17. But when it's all said and done, after countless drives and conversations with people from all walks of life, we've come to realize that the rich and successful really aren't that much happier than the rest of us.
And at the end of the day, we really do enjoy the ride. And we hope you do, too.
