From The U-Files: Macgyver Security, Flight Attentant Interview, and Mandarin’s Four Tones

The U-Files is a blog operated by Michael Pickard- a local artist, Uber driver, friend of CTOB, and full-blown weirdo. We harvest our favorite stuff of the week from his site to share with you here every Friday to remind you to have fun while traveling safe this weekend.

1. I met a real-life MacGyver.

He has his phone on his wrist for all task rabbit jobs that come in, and tells me about one of his first gigs. He got a job through Task Rabbit to essentially be security at an empty mansion where a man was squatting. His job was to stay at the house and keep this guy away from coming back and living there. He found bags of poo all over in miscellaneous places, like the cupboards, cabinets, and on top of the fan. There was a room where he had put up pictures of male super models for decoration. The guy came back, and was aggressive, so he ended up sending up boobie traps! “I set up booby traps all around the house. I set up a Rock Fall trap in the front. I had a trip line connected to a bucket of rocks, so if he were to walk into it, the rocks would fall on him”. I told Macgyver this sounded like the real life version of Home Alone. After an incident where he sprayed him with a hose, the guy ended up not coming back. He also responded to a Task Rabbit post where someone wanted to hire a group of people to be human chess pieces, but the pay wasn’t worth it.

2. Passenger is from Hawaii and is having job interview to be a flight attendant.

He was first excited about the job, but now questions it. “It sounded like a good idea at the time.” He realizes he would not get to see his wife and kids often, and would miss them a lot. He has his own business back home doing vending machine installation and really enjoys it. Mainly he would be a flight attendant is for the benefits. His interview is tomorrow. 

3. Two girls who by chance both fluently speak French as a second learned language.

The back passenger learned French when she lived in Paris. The girl in front was raised in Montreal and was forced to learn at a young age because of all the French speakers. She Also speaks Mandarin. She teaches me about the four tones in the Mandarin language. How each word has four different tones, and each tone creates a completely different word. She explains how The Word Shi means both Rock, Shit, Am and Yes.

Find Mike at www.U-Files.com and on the road.