Today was a very fun day! First, I got to drive the bus up to the State Highway Patrol post so my instructor could check on some times for CDL tests for some of her other students. Then, the other girl training with me took over the driving for a bit, and we headed back downtown.

She drove around the city streets for a while, practicing various difficult turns. At one intersection, the instructor told her that normally, she would want to take the turn in the curb lane, but she could go ahead and do it wide, since there were cars parked, and we needed to be in the left lane after the turn anyway. She went ahead and got over in the right lane and made the turn. As soon as she started to get over, the instructor just looked at me with this huge smile, and said “She ain’t listening to me today, is she?”

After she drove around for a bit more, the instructor had her pull over, and we switched back to me driving. I’d only gone a few blocks when I heard some discussion behind me about the Izzy’s deli on the corner where I had stopped to wait on a light. The instructor had me check the times on the door to see if they were open yet.

“Yeah… they opened at 10. You want me to make an emergency pullover? This sounds like an emergency to me.”

“You know it.”

We ended up having to circle around the block, because some cars were parked where I was gonna pull over, but we circled around and got out. As soon as we did, we noticed the wonderful smell of gyros filling the air. We had managed to park right next to some Greek restaurant that had just opened up, and had one of the better gyros I have had in a while. My instructor still ended up going to Izzy’s, though, since the Greek place didn’t take any kind of card for payment.

We then went back and sat on the bus, eating and talking about other good Gyro places around town. Once I had eaten about half of my sandwich, I sat back around in the driver’s seat, and started heading back to the academy. We ended up talking about all sorts of things on the drive back… including a very long discussion about pot and other drugs. My instructor even made fun of me… at one point, she commented, “Man, you really like that right lane. I’m not criticizing you, I just think it’s funny.” And I do like the right lane… it makes driving more interesting.

Then we got back, and some idiot had parked his Camaro where the bus was supposed to park, even though there was a whole row of parking spaces about 20 feet to the right of him. So I ended up having to park the bus blocking in all the cars, including mine, until the idiot came out and moved his car, and the instructor took the bus away. Then I got my check, and on the way home discovered I was shorted hours, but I got that all straightened out. All in all, a very fun week, and we even get a three-day weekend to make it even more rewarding! Yay!