For $7.90, New York City cab drivers can teach you a lot about the world, life and men. In between trying to figure out what’s causing the rancid smell in the backseat and starting to breathe after speeding through a yellow turned red light, I get my money’s worth by talking to drivers about their lives. It turns out, when they’re not on the phone talking about me in languages I can’t pronounce, they love to talk about themselves and their opinions, giving a huge amount of insight into the male mind.

I was unusually bored on one particular night, so I asked Mr. Cabby my signature question, “How’s life?” If only I could take back those two words! In the time it took to get from the Upper East Side to Midtown west, I not only learned that this particular driver was single, but also why he spent cold winter nights alone.

He unloaded. And I mean unloaded. Between Third and Fifth, I learned that men are single-a-phobic too. Priceless! Between Fifth and Seventh, he disclosed his depression due to the lack of a dating life, and between Seventh and Eighth, he told me that he hated when women get fat after you start dating them.

Hold up. Excuse me? We’ve known each other for what, eight and three quarter minutes, and you decide to talk about weight? There are people I’ve known for years that don’t discuss weight with me. Immediately, I mentally decreased his tip by 10%.

Having assumed that I had a ridiculously shallow boyfriend or a boyfriend in general, Mr. Cabby, or should I say Mr. Crabby, began to tell me that my so-called boyfriend would dump me if I got fat. In lieu of punching him in the face, I tried to explain that studies have been done that explain why women gain weight in relationships, and that it’s typically the man’s fault. Surprise, surprise. He, even more disgruntled, rejected the idea that men had anything to do with women’s weight gain – shocker – but I was determined to justify my point.

I explained that men make women fat because of their unrealistic intake expectations. They want a woman who “eats,” but they want her to be thin; they want to order bottles of wine, but they want a woman to be thin; they want to order dessert and benefit from chocolate’s aphrodisiac qualities, but they want a woman to be thin. How can anyone maintain a size four if she’s downing 1,000 calories at a romantic dinner? Remind me again why men can eat like pigs and not gain weight till they’re 40.

Although I told him that I understand his annoyance with the added kush in the tush, I was rather insulted and moderately self-conscious. I encouraged him to stop being superficial because it’s likely to be his fault if his “woman,” or so he called his future love interest, gains a few. Perhaps I went overboard, and yes, women are in control of what they put in their mouths, but I had to defend my kind.

To all this he responded, “Women should learn to keep their mouths shut.”

If only you could have seen my face. I’m still not sure whether he meant I should shut up or that women should eat celery and egg whites for every meal, but it’s clear that what Crabby really means when he says, “Let’s share the soufflé,” is “Once you put a spoon full of that chocolate decadence in your mouth, you best put on your gym clothes and head out for a double spin class.” Jerk.

When we finally, and I mean finally, reached my apartment, I handed him a ten and decided to give him the best tip I could. I told him to keep his manpinion to himself and hit the gym. Then I ran out of the cab and into my building, because as much as I like to think I’m a badass, I was scared for my life.

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