Thread: .... Illiteracy in America shows up here as well.

Sun Apr 8, 12:14 PM ET

NEW YORK - Betty and Bob Matas have retired and are moving to Arizona, but like many New Yorkers they don't drive, and they don't want their cats to travel all that way in an airliner cargo hold.

Their solution: "Hey, cabbie."

They met taxi driver Douglas Guldeniz when they hailed his cab after a shopping trip several weeks ago.

They got to talking about their upcoming move, and "we said 'Do you want to come?'" said Bob Matas, 72, a former audio and video engineer for advertising agencies. "And he said 'Sure.'"

It was initially a gag, Matas said, but as they talked over the ensuing weeks it became reality.

They plan to leave Tuesday on the 2,400-mile trip to Sedona, Ariz., with Guldeniz driving his yellow SUV cab 10 hours a day for a flat fee of $3,000, plus gas, meals and lodging.

They're getting a break. The standard, metered fare would be about $5,000 â?? each way, according to David Pollack, executive director of the Committee for Taxi Safety, a drivers' group. But city Taxi and Limousine Commission rules direct drivers and passengers to negotiate a flat fare for trips outside the city and a few suburban areas.

It's also a good deal for Guldeniz.

"This job is not easy, and I want to do something different," said Guldeniz, 45, who has been driving a taxi for two years. "I want to have some good memories."

The Matases will ride in relaxed comfort in Guldeniz's sport utility vehicle while their cats ride in the back in their travel cases. A mover will haul their belongings.

"It's a little unusual, but it will be fun," said Betty Matas, 71, a retired executive administrative assistant.

2 words, "cat people"

Never mind they could have rented a car for far less than 3 grand for the trip.

lol @ america

An update:

They left yesterday. The total cost (with gas & hotels is $4000)

hmm, I was gonna get smart and quote a car rental price for the same trip but there seems to be no cars to rent from new york, NY :Puzzled: (and yes I checked several one way car rental places....)

Actually Bro they could have rented a car from JFK in NY and dropped it off at the airport in Flagstaff, AZ for around $500-600...and we are talking about a full sized Town Car...lots of room for the darn cats!

here are the prices

Thats true, except the article says they don't drive, and since they also lived in Manhattan, there is a good chance they don't even have a license.

Originally Posted by Smitty

Thats true, except the article says they don't drive, and since they also lived in Manhattan, there is a good chance they don't even have a license.

Yup, but if you look at Sedona, AZ it's suberbia, the will need a car out there...

Originally Posted by The Dragon

Yup, but if you look at Sedona, AZ it's suberbia, the will need a car out there...

Old people buses.

And I don't see a Lincoln Towncar in that image.

I guess I'm getting old. Turning into my father and not even noticing it happening. I'm tired of seeing people cuss in their typing. It just makes my evaluation of your character lower. I don't see you in real life. I see you here, I have very little to evaluate you on, but if you want cussing to be part of your evaluation criteria, so be it.

Even more irritating is people's lack of command of the English language. Particularly when they are pleading their case in trying to be unbanned. Simple punctuation and spelling would help the case. Instead, I get to read long run-on misspelled sentences loosely shaped like a paragraph. I then get to try to deciper what I see and what I think they mean. If I were ever asked my opinion about unbanning someone and I was split evenly on granting a pardon, some of the crap I've read would have me sustain a ban.

At first, I thought it was just the younger players that really couldn't spell or write coherently. I was all ready to blame people learning chat-ese as being the reason their English is suffering. But then I look in the banned threads and most of the people seeking leniency are grown adults.

Laziness? Lack of proper education? Broken computers that are mangling the words after the Post button is pressed? No self respect and really don't care what others think of them? I do not know what the answer is.

Laggy ... and not feeling terribly groovy right now

Well you have to understand that this is just a forum as well it's not a job interview application or something along the lines that'll decide where your life goes. People aren't that concerned if they misspell "because" or "business". They don't think someone is going to read it and say "Wow he's a dumbass for mispelling that word". It's just not in their nature to think about what other people will think if they misspell something. As good a point as you have, welcome to America where TV's and Computer's own peoples life. Most people are just lazy to, I know I am.

Hope you get in a better mood soon. Life has it's ups and downs, they all pass on.

I find cursing in typing is the only real way to express anger and such. The internet is very impersonal, and there's very little you can do to get what you really mean across.

I do agree with the people who type like they're just learning english.

A lot of adults learned "chat-ese", simply because they used e-mail or IMs or something to that extent, and they felt it was an easy way to type quicker. Or some of them just don't pay attention when they type, so make a bunch of typos. I know I personally type have to go back and re-type words quite often; without it, a lot of my posts would look like I'm typing "chat-ese".