(Note that I was not actually driving drunk. Please read.)
What happens when you mix 2 whiskey sours, the garden state sound track, cheese fries, larke, lacy and ledah and driving home exactly when the bars close?
Oh, and I might have been speeding.
Add on to that the fact that there are maybe 8 insurance cards in my glove box and I couldn’t find the right one and Whiskey is a foul smelling booze and you have: “Miss I smell a lot of alcohol on your breath, can you step out of the car, please?”
And when the police officer asks you “do you have any disability that would prevent you from standing on one foot?” I don’t think you are allowed to say “well, I'm a klutz.” I think that might be considered sass.
So there I am shaking like a leaf, either from nerves or cold, I couldn’t really decide, trying to stand on one foot and count to thirty.
And when that’s done I try to walk the straight line and the officer has me tuck my pants into my socks because my pants are too baggy and I try to walk heel to toe, which is fucking hard sober, and follow his finger with my eyes. And every time I blinked I wondered, do drunk people blink a lot? Am I acting drunk?
And then he has me sit on the bumper of his cruiser and as he’s reading me the whole thing about how I have the right to refuse a breathalyzer but if I do I lose my license blah blah blah all I really want to say is “I’ve taken criminology, I know this speech, you can give me the breathalyzer, and by the way, aren’t you cold? That shirt doesn’t look very thick. Where’s your coat?” But again that might be sass.
So he gives me the breathalyzer and he keeps telling me to blow harder, Harder, HARDER and I'm like “DUDE, only so much breath in my body.” And then he goes and he looks at it and he comes back and says:
“So how many drinks?”
“Two.”
“When’d you last have them?”
“Over an hour ago.”
“Do you ski?”
“I snow board, and cross country.”
“You nervous?”
“Very.”
“I ask because your breathalyzer was very low, but you weren’t doing so great on the balance things.”
“I know, I was falling over during the balance part of yoga today too.” (truth.)
And so I go back to the car and as soon as I'm in it I'm shaking so hard I can’t get the window to go up. These are automatic windows mind you. All you have to do is press a button.
And then the officer harasses lacy because she’s only twenty but in the end he lets us all off with a warning which is probably just as traumatizing as a ticket but I’m grateful for anyway. And miraculously enough I manage to stop shaking long enough to smile and get back my drivers license and drive to the Safeway parking lot where I park the car and then get out and practically have a seizure from nerves.
And I would like to note that any alcohol he smelled was from ledah. Girl’s a booze hound. (Not really. And even so, shes 22. She can booze hound all she wants.)
Update: I counted the number of insurence cards in the car. 14. Labels: lacy, ledah, missoula
