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[title]RECOMMENDED: The New York guide to life
1. You and the driver knowing each other's names will somehow lead to strangely intimate conversations about moving to New York, and recommendations for where to eat the best Turkish breakfast in the city.
2. You'll get stuck behind a garbage truck and the driver will say, "You smell good. Not like New York garbage." Which, you know, is good to hear.
3. The dude in Red Hook will totally accept your ride request from the Upper West Side (Gotta 37 minutes? Hell, why not! I'll just kick it with the guy in the doughnut shop!).
4. "Er, sir, why are we going over the Manhattan Bridge?
"You said Fourth Avenue. Brooklyn."
"No, 4th Street! Manhattan!"
"No, you didn't."
"Yes I did."
"No, you didn't."
"Yes I did. YOU ARE TOTALLY GETTING ONE STAR."
5. Your driver somehow never notices you already gave them a destination via the app.
6. You will do a fare quote when it's pouring outside and find it's $200 to drive you from your office to home. Then you will order the Uber anyway and try not to think about it. (It all happens through the app anyway—it's like imaginary money!)
7. The driver will bring his wife and you'll have to sit in the back like their weird overgrown child.
8. You will accidentally get into the back of a car idling outside your apartment and bark your destination to the driver, who you then realize is a very confused (and slightly scared) mother waiting for her kid to come out and get in the car. (There is no apology that won’t make you look like a crazy person.)
9. You will be offered a complimentary bottle of water by a driver who’s making a real effort to present a premium service. You will look at the warm bottle of Poland Spring wedged into the compartment in the side of the door and politely decline while feeling strangely guilty about it.
10. No matter how many times you've used the app, you still feel weird about just hopping out of the car outside your building, without fumbling in your wallet. It’s just too easy…
11. You'll be enough of a drunken fool to make the Uber driver go through drive-through, but polite enough to buy food for the dude driving.
12. You'll fight over whether you should take the Williamsburg Bridge or the Queens–Midtown Tunnel and have to spend the rest of the ride in stony, soul-sapping silence. Kinda like when you used to row with that boyfriend you were totally incompatible with.
13. You will decide midway through your ride that you got into the wrong car and wonder if your driver is taking you to a sex dungeon. (He's not. Usually.)
14. If you've ever requested an Uber car after a concert/show, you'll exit the venue and stumble upon a sea of black cars. You must then—embarrassingly—look into every driver's window and ask, "Are you Antonio? No?" Okay, cool.
15. You watch the little car icon moving on the map of your neighborhood, and yell at the screen because the route your driver is taking to your house is totally wrong (and takes way longer).
16. You'll get into the car only to discover that your Uber driver lives around the block from you. "Hasn't this neighborhood changed?" he sighs, and then blames your exact demographic for it.
17. Then he'll spend the next 20 minutes of your ride to Ridgewood explaining how he used to own a wholesale perfume storefront on Broadway and 20th Street but his cousin bankrupted the business; and besides now owns a half-million dollars in property AND has Uber, which he only does a few days a week and please don't forget to rate him five stars.
18. You will order an Uber, then see a normal cab and impatiently jump into that instead, right as the Uber car arrives. You will make eye contact with the Uber driver and know that somehow, he knows it’s you. You will feel bad.
19. You thank the technology gods that you can get home even though you lost your wallet in the bar, because you still have your phone.
20. Getting that terrible driver and wanting to give him a low star rating after the ride, but fear that he’ll find out and come after you because he now knows where you live because he just dropped you off at your apartment.
21. You're rushing to get ready for an event and you mistakenly book an Uber car too soon. Because in your mind, you think you'll have time to finish your makeup before he arrives.
Incoming call: "Hi, this is your Uber driver. I'm outside."
You: [See below]