Category: Uncategorized

It’s no secret that I am a sports fan.  Some of my favorite kid memories are going to Runyon Field with my Dad and his buddies to watch the AA Pueblo Dodgers (The Brooklyn Dodger’s farm team).  It is for that reason I despise the Yankees and put them in the category with the Patriots, Lakers, and Red Wings—Evil Empires.  By the time I was four I knew all the basic rules of baseball ⚾️.   I grew up cheering for very young a Maury Wills and John Roseboro.  I still smell the cigar smoke 💨 and beer🍺, and the…

I thought long and hard about whether or not to write this today.  On March 17th 1979, my brother Don, aged 20 and a friend who was 16, were killed in a car wreck in Pueblo.  Don was legally drunk and that is a fact that certainly contributed to this tragedy.  An hour ago I was sitting with 117 other folk at an AA meeting where we were celebrating One Year of sobriety for one of our members.  It was a joyful time.  In that old Denver Mansion at 13th and York, every day hundreds of folk meet in its…

About two weeks ago on the Friday before I headed out with 23 other folk to Israel, I decided to do a bit of Lyfting.  I pulled up in a neighborhood just west of Denver University.  Out on the front porch was what seemed to be an obvious three generation goodbye.  The woman in her mid 50’s was crying profusely as she was joined by her daughter, who was laughing and crying at the same time.  The infant boy was not to be outdone and he added to the cry chorus along with flailing arms and feet.  I got out…

Hello out there, Red the Lyft car is the garage and I am writing you from Tiberius, Israel.  I will be her another week and the I am back to Colorado. I have experienced once again how drawn I am to this country and all of its stories.  I look forward to processing my Lyft driving through the lenses of what I am seeing and experiencing here in Israel. Please know I value this weekly routine but I am taking my first week off in 14 months.  Talk with you next week!!! Onward and Upward, Mark  

I had just finished a sad 15 minute ride with a very broken young woman.  The details are ours; sometimes I assure my riders, “What is shared in Red 🚗, will stay in Red 🚗”.  My head was spinning and my heart  ❤️ hurt.  “Ping”… time to get focused for the next ride. He came out of a classic suburban ‘new build’ carrying a small backpack, destination: Denver International Airport.  He asked to sit in the front seat which I always welcome.  We had a good laugh because I asked him to pronounce his first name which had an obvious…

I’m someone who has always loved to travel.  I only realized somewhere in the middle of adulthood that I was a somewhat privileged kid.   I was very fortunate in that, by Pueblo standards I had seen a lot of the world by the time I was 18. My folks took us on many trips large and small.  The first time I saw the Pacific Ocean I was about 9.  We were on a one month road trip to the Northwest.  I saw the mystery of a tidal pool off the coast of Oregon.  Starfish, and Anemones. I went to…

I am back to writing about about a Lyft ride I took to DIA last Sunday morning. It is early Saturday morning, and I am on our lanai in Kauai. I confess to telling my Lyft riders “You are supporting my travel addiction”. It usually makes them smile. As I write I am listening to the cacophony of roosters that are like sparrows in Colorado. So we have done the math and it is way cheaper and much more convenient to take a Lyft to the airport than to drive and park. We requested the ride and the Lyft app…

About 20 months ago Lyft sent out a notice of a new service called Lyft-Line.   They had test marketed the concept in San Francisco and declared it a big success. The idea is that you take complete strangers in the same general direction.  Somehow through the magic of algorithms, your Driver app is able to connect folk who want a discount ride and are willing to jump in a car with not only an anonymous driver, but also a passenger.  The interesting part for Lyft is that both riders  pay them, but the driver only gets one set fee. …

This past Wednesday I decided to “do a little driving in the burbs”.  I sat in my driveway, turned on the app.  It didn’t take long.  Mandy at “Streamers Coffee” .5 miles away.   I thought 💭 “What, a coffee shop this close to me”?  Sure enough, right there on 86th, sits a dapper commercial niche with a coffee shop on the corner.  I parked the car and hit the “Arrived” button.  A little message came up that said “This is Mandy’s First Lyft Ride”.  About then a young woman came out of a business across the street. I assumed…

Lyft sent my “stats update” yesterday and it showed that I had given 3997 rides in 26 months.  I decided that before I could watch football today I had to get three rides.   This was complicated by the reality that I wanted to drive to Greeley for our monthly ‘Men’s Breakfast’ at First Christian.  My plan was turn on my Lyft app on the drive back to Arvada.  The breakfast is always a treat.  These guys even make me my own ‘vegan biscuits and gravy’.  The program today was fascinating. We got to watch custom ball point pins made…