You are currently browsing the monthly archive for March, 2007.
Apparently, I’m a little more inebriated than I thought I was. I won’t be posting a real blog until Monday. I like to post daily during the week so that it comes more naturally, but on the weekends I tend to devote my time to working on fiction.
I have a fictional short about half complete, at the time being. I hope to have it ready for the site by the end of the weekend.
For those of you who know what I’m talking about:
I might get a job working for that Christian Cult, after all. I’m sure that would bring about some interesting writing material, but we’ll see.
I also want to thank the 15 people that have stuck it out with me thus far. I’ll see you guys Monday. Have a good weekend.
Despite my loathing for the city of San Angelo, I miss it often. I miss it for all of the people I knew, because they are what got me through that delicate time in my life. I had great friends; friends I was closer to within three months than friends with which I had grown up. Some of them seemed more like family than friends, and one of those members of my extended family was Julio.
I remember picking him up at the airport. Setting a wonderful example for the rest of the city, the sewer lines had cracked at the airport; the whole area reeked of rotten human feces. It was bad, ‘singe the hair in your nostrils’ bad. But I greeted him, got his luggage loaded into my car, and set off to the base to welcome him to his new life. Julio was Puerto Rican and a native speaker of the Spanish language. His English left something to be desired, and everyone had frequent trouble understanding him through his thick accent. Don’t get me wrong, I had mounds of respect and admiration for his ability to speak in two languages. The more he worked with us, the better his English was; despite his remaining accent, it’s easy to say he’s now a fluent speaker.
We hit it off almost immediately, having shared a common interest in import automobiles. My car alone was enough of an icebreaker and in the months to come there was little dead air when in shared company. He was married when he showed up, so he didn’t have to live in the dorms, but once they found out he was separated from his wife, they considered making him move in. Before they had time, he relinquished his on-base housing and moved in with me. We shared a 3-bedroom apartment with my previous roommate, Jerry, who had met a girl and spent frequently less time with us. Having worked and lived together, Julio and I spent most of out time in each other’s presence. Yet, we somehow managed to never argue, less the occasional tussle over beer preference, or some other insignificant difference in taste (as far as the large scheme of things goes, anyway).
Julio was a very easygoing guy; it was a nice contrast, since I’m constantly pinging off the walls. Sometimes we would just sit on the balcony and smoke a cigarette, or enjoy a beer. Sometimes we would just ride. We rode around back roads, through expensive neighborhoods, and into old areas of town. Sometimes we would pick our favorite old house, or talk about what we would do if we had one of the mansions, but a lot of the time we just rode in silence, taking in the scenery. Those we’re the rides I cherished the most; the ones that were near transcendental, meditative. Jerry moved in with his girlfriend and Julio and I eventually started renting a house on the outskirt of one of the neighborhoods we frequented. Sooner or later I started spending time at other people’s houses, and Julio met a girl who moved in with him. I moved into a house with a friend who returned from the Middle East, and Julio’s and my interaction dwindled to mostly in-office interaction. Though the rides stopped, they were, and will continue to be, forever cherished.
To you, Julio, I tip my hat. Thank you for being a brother.
I drove my mother to her bank the other day so she could get some cash. It was after banking hours and we took the drive-through to the 24-hour ATM. The ATM in the middle of all the lanes of the bank drive-through. The drive-through. And on its little keypad, I found braille.
This is either good, bad, or ugly. Using my exquisite powers of deductive reasoning, I would assume that GPS systems have become so advanced that they are no longer limited to mere “turn left, 25 feet” directions, but can now take on autopilot-esque qualities, and actually control the movement of the vehicle. I want one. Imagine the possibilities. Man, I could go for a 6-dollar burger right now, but I want to finish this chapter, “Carl’s Jr.” Boom, your zooming your way to go get your grub on – while reading a book. That would be cool, read a book while your car drives for you. Multitasking. But who are we kidding here? Let’s think huge – life-changing. You could go get shit faced, and always have a designated driver. Don’t feel like waiting till you get to her place? KITT, take us home!
But I seriously doubt this is what it means. More likely, we’ve got blind people who walk through the drive-through to use the ATM. This is dangerous. It would be bad enough for anyone to walk where jackasses drive, but it compounds when they can’t see you coming and don’t know where to aim when they dive out of the way. They’d probably hear some soccer mom barreling around the corner in her Ford Excursion, or H2, or equivalently oversized gas-hog, just to dive out of the way and slam their head into a column they weren’t aware of. They could knock themselves unconscious, fall onto the drive-through ground, and be ran over by someone talking on their cellphone, putting on eyeliner, and yelling at her four kids in the back seat.
That’s bad, but I can think of even worse. We’ve got blind people driving around out there, with no auto-pilot! Just kind of winging it. Mowing over innocent joggers and dog-walkers. The roads would not be safe, and neither would the sidewalks.
I may be overreacting, and it could just be there for all those voluntarily-braille-reading patrons. But I wouldn’t count on it. Next time you see someone driving beside you, rocking it out with some Stevie Wonder shades, get as far ahead of them as you can.
The first life lesson I recall learning was the permanence of death. When I was four years old, my step-dad took me downtown and picked up a Daisy Red Ryder. It was magnificent. Real wood, lever action, even a little metal loop with some leather tied to it! Oh, how I adored it so. I was finally a real-life, shoot-em-up cowboy.
With my little rattlesnake-skin boots, my red bandanna, and my Red Ryder, I was the new sheriff of Perry’s Yard. Watch out. I spent day after day with my glorious Red Ryder. I showed every tree, bush, fencepost, coke-can, and beer-bottle who was boss, one BB at a time. No single inanimate object dare step out of line with me in town. Then, when I had shot everything, and shot everything again, and shot some stuff I wasn’t supposed to and got yelled at for it, and then shot some more stuff, I started to get bored. These lifeless entities were no match for my superior marksmanship. I needed a challenge.
So I set my sights on moving prey. I shot at squirrels, and birds, and pretty much everything that I could get away with. My favorites were the birds who often settled along the barbed wire fence in our back yard. They just lined up, sat there. It was like a row of coke cans, without the effort of setting them up. They would sit. I would shoot. They would fly away. I was, once again, the supreme ruler of my domain. All was grand, until one fateful afternoon, when a hoppy-toad (yeah, I called it a hoppy-toad. get fucked.) decided to test my rule. And by test my rule, I mean he just kinda… hopped… across the porch, but let’s not get caught up in semantics here.
So there I was. And there he was. It was high noon, and we were having a draw. I informed the town inhabitants (my parents), and gathered them outside. My mom and my step-dad warned me, “Are you sure you want to shoot that toad?” “You know, if you do, he’ll die.” Of course he will. That’s why I’m shooting him. He’s challenged my rule, and for that, he must suffer the consequences. I take aim. I pull the trigger. My BB gun clicks. The hoppy-toad just sits there. What a sham?! Shouldn’t he be grabbing his chest, and flipping all around saying, “Oh. Yuh got me.” Again, I take aim and fire.
This time, something is different. The little hoppy-toad looks flat. He’s just sitting there, not moving. Something is oozing out of him. What’s going on here? Hoppy-toad, what’s wrong? I kind of poke him with the barrel of my gun, “hoppy-toad?” I reach down and pick him up by one of his little hoppy-toad feet. His tongue rolls out of his mouth, and I can see it’s covered in blood. I totally freak out. Mom, fix it. The hoppy-toad is broken. I start crying, and run to my mom. They explain to me, that the hoppy-toad is dead, and he’s not coming back. I killed him. I cry some more. How could this happen? My step-dad says, “Well, you killed him. I think you better go bury him.” I cry some more. But I do as I’m told, and I go put my little hoppy-toad in a shallow grave, just into the edge of the forest that lines our front yard. What had I done?
Neither my mother, nor my step-dad seemed very concerned with this tragic loss. This wasn’t the case with me, however, and I would not touch the cursed Red Ryder for months to come. The vision of that dead little hoppy-toad is still so fiercely emblazoned in my mind that every time I think if death, I see him. I see him sitting on the porch, and I see him hanging lifeless as I carry him to his grave. To this day, I have yet to shoot at another animal.
I blame NASCAR. Growing up in North Carolina, you’re raised around it. It doesn’t matter if you watch it, because the other 95% of the population around you does. With its roots stretching back to bootleggers running moonshine in Wilkes County during the prohibition, more corporate offices in N.C. (4 to be exact) than any other state, and the fact that Charlotte N.C. is home to more racing teams than anywhere else in the nation, it’s part of Carolinian culture. To quote the great Lt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, “I have a need… a need for speed!” and for this penchant, I blame NASCAR.
Now, a lot of people like to go fast. This is apparent every time you drive – anywhere. There’s always some asshole behind you, riding your bumper, and you’re already going 10mph over the posted limit. Where it gets sketchy, is when it’s coupled with a strong tendency toward competitiveness. That’s me.
So I’ll set the scene for you. I’m with my high school sweetheart, heading for an ice-skating rink in an adjacent town. I take a road that was initially built as a by-pass. It cut out the stoplight-to-stoplight driving for those traversing from HWY 127 into uptown Hickory. That was, until some asshole (smart guy, actually, and probably rich too) bought a huge strip of land down the said by-pass and tossed up a ton of duplexes. The area gets zoned as residential, and the speed-limit drops from 55 to 35. So here we are, driving down this gloriously wide road, in a pack of cars, going somewhere from 50 to 60 mph. I’m somewhere in the middle, making the occasional lane change, winding my way to the head of the pack. I’m almost to the front, when I get cut off by some inbred hick in a 5th generation Celica. I compensate for his jackassery, and then continue my pursuit for the pole position. But, to my dismay, the Celica is diligently keeping me boxed in.
Eventually, we both arrive at the front of the pack, and this is where the fun begins. We’re both accelerating down the road, slowly gaining our speed as we weave through the slower traffic. The speed is picking up, and neither of us shows sign of backing down anytime soon. We approach a pair of cars that are side-by-side and we have no way of getting by, without slowing down, of course. (Slowing down wasn’t much of an option at this point, anyway. The last time I check my speedometer it was reading something like 97mph). I, being to the Celica’s left, opt for the suicide lane (or turn lane, depending on where you’re from) to circumvent the blockade. Not to be outdone, the Celica drops to the shoulder and zooms past them as well. We’ve just passed the National Guard Armory, a sign that we’re about to lose our wide, open road for something smaller, slower, and filled with stoplights.
We decelerate, fall into the rear of another group of cars, and start stopping for our first red-light. We wait, it turns green, and traffic crawls forward to the next light. This one is red as well; rinse, repeat. The rush has faded, adrenaline levels are normal, and the moment is over. I’m carrying on some pointless conversation with the little lady in my passenger seat, and we play red light-green light through two more intersections. We come to our final stoplight, at a larger, 5-way junction. This one takes a while, our conversation is over, and the mood is rather boring. The light turns green, and traffic starts creeping forward. The direction we’re heading, you’re blind to traffic coming from your left, so every goes kind of slow up to the intersection, then scoots through – myself included. Well, that’s how it usually goes. This time, however, is a little different, mostly due to the police car that comes screeching by, sliding sideways through the intersection, blocking all traffic.
As if that weren’t enough to get my little heart pumping, the fact that she was screaming something unintelligible, staring, and pointing at me the whole time definitely was. I freeze, just sitting there, all slack-jawed. Screech, screech, screech, screech; four more police cars come barreling into the 5-way junction, surrounding me. I’m two of them are barking some form of garbled, spit-language at me, pointing at a small side road. I interpret this as, “get your fucking ass into that road and stay there, you son-of-a-bitch!” and do just that.
I’m pulling into the road when I see the Celica parked there too. That’s when I’m like, “Oh, shit.” I know I’m in deep trouble. *click* That little thing in my head goes off. Focus. Ditch the Opeth CD for some Temporary Christian radio. Turn your hat back back around. Think about that bird that fell out of a tree when you we’re 4 years old; the one that you fruitlessly tried to resuscitate, for what seemed like hours; then ended making a coffin out of a shoebox, and burying in your aunt’s back yard. Yeah, that’s the one. There ya go. Those puppy-dog eyes are looking good and ready. You’ve got those little puddles going on under each one. Let’s do this shit. I say to my girlfriend, “Alright, just don’t say anything.” The cop comes up to the window, and asks for my license and registration. Shaky handed, I give her both, “O-okay, here ya go, ma’am. Oops, I-I-I j-just kinda tore my registration, I’m nervous.” “That’s alright,” the lady officer says. (That’s right, another female cop. I guess I’m just lucky.) She’s off at her car, doing her radio thing, and I’m watching everything else that’s going on. They’ve got their 5 cars boxing us in, and the side road we’re on is, for the most part, rendered impassable. Two of the cops are having a back-and-forth with the guy in the Celica, one of them is directing traffic, and one is hovering around the back of my car. Your bird is wearing off…think ’sad’. Shit, no time. The lady is back already, “Do you have any idea how fast you we’re going?” “No, ma’am.” “Well I didn’t have my radar on, but I know you we’re going at least 70.” No radar? YES! “Your buddy almost hit me. I was pulling out of the Armory.” That was when we we’re four lanes wide, passing the two cars. “Huh?” “You don’t know the guy in the Celica?” “No, I was just trying to get around another car, and he kept speeding up. Wouldn’t let me by.” “And you couldn’t just let him by and wait? Where we’re you going in such a hurry?” “Church. We’re supposed to meet our youth group, and we’re running late.” Hot damn, I’m good. We’re going ice-skating, and we still have 20 minutes to burn. “Alright, sit tight,” she and the 3 other officers meet up between me and the Celica. They talk for a while. Then they talk some more. One of the guys that was talking to Mr. Celica starts getting red-faced. I can’t hear them, but he’s pissed about something. They talk some more. What’s all this talking about? I start to doubt myself a little, rightfully so. I mean, she should have yanked my sorry ass out of that car, threw me on the pavement, tore my license up in front of me, and sent me packing. Speed competition with another vehicle, ~95 in a 35, halfway in the oncoming traffic lane. Yeah, I could seriously be fucked.
The cops all go to their cars for a minute, then start walking back. I see the red-faced cop writing a ticket, and that’s when I start getting really nervous. My mom is going to kick my ass. And that’s if I DON’T lose my license. She’s back at my window, and she’s looking more serious, and scarier than she has before. Shit. In a most hateful tone, “Can you give me one good reason not to cite you right now?” Damn, this had better be a damned good one. Like,’ you we’re on your way to save a bus full of nuns that had flipped over onto a group of orphans’ good. Nothing. I stammer, “B-b-because I pay my own insurance, and if I get a ticket, the rate will go up, and I won’t be able to afford it, and I’ll lose my car, and I won’t be able to get to my job after school, and I’ll probably lose my car.” Some crap like that, “I didn’t mean to go that fast, I was just trying to get to church.” So then she starts in on this boring, long-winded lecture about how churches have been here for thousands of years and they weren’t going anywhere. I’m not about to show an ounce of disinterest, and I punctuate each of here sentences with a nod and a, “Yes, ma’am.” She finishes up her spiel and says, “I’m going to give you a warning.” Oh fuck yeah. “But if I catch you around here again, I won’t hesitate to cite you.” “No, ma’am, you won’t.” I nod at her. She writes up the warning and sends me on my way.
I fold it up and hide it in my owner’s manual, then go have a blast ice-skating with my girlfriend all night. I walk away unscathed with some bitchin’ bragging rights to tell my friends tomorrow. All in all, a good day, I’d say.
There was a time during my stay in Texas that I was on probation. Card carrying member of the Concho Valley Community Supervision and Corrections Department, but how I ended up there is another story for another time. While I was on probation, I had a ton of rules I had to follow. I wasn’t allowed in an establishment that sold alcohol as is primary source of revenue (bars, clubs, etc.), I had a curfew (I think it was 9pm, maybe 10), I wasn’t allowed to consume alcohol (regardless of me being 19 years old, so that’s a double whammy), I had to go visit my probation officer weekly, just a bunch of babysitter crap, the list goes on.
It was your typical Saturday night, we hit up Graham Central Station. It wasn’t the best club I’ve been too, but it did have 5 bars (hip-hop/dance, karaoke, country, tejano, and a coyote ugly knockoff), and it was the only thing happening every Saturday. I had just introduced a new guy into our rather tight knit group of friends. His name was Tom, and he hadn’t done much drinking or partying in his life. Tom had caught a ride with a guy named Brad, and was sitting in his back seat. We we’re parked along a housing development street right off of the loop (See Picture), where Brad was by the curb and I pulled along side him in another car. We’re all planning out our next move, seeing who had gotten invites to after-parties or whatnot, when I see that Tom doesn’t look like hes doing to well. He was fumbling with the door, and then he just went white (noticeably since he’s of Native-American descent, an usually pretty tan). The window made it about half way down when Tom puked all over it, and presumably the inside of the door. Brad and Kenneth started yelling and the two girls in the back with Tom started screaming.
Tom is freaking out so I say, “Dude, hop in. I’ll take ya home.” Before I’ve finished my sentence, Tom is climbing in the car. As soon as his door shuts I drop the clutch and we’re gone. Speeding down this dark street, it’s a scene right out of Gone In 60 Seconds, “Trapped in this suburbia hell.” “What do you mean, we’re lost?” “All the fucking houses look the same!” I know the development is within a square of “main roads” attached to the feeder roads off of the loop, so I just take a left and head down to each road until I hit a stop sign, with the logic that within, at most, 3 left turns I’ll be hitting the freeway. First road comes to and stop, so it’s another left. I don’t see a stop sign ahead yet so I speed up a bit, going about 65 or 70, trying to get out of there as soon as possible. Then I see that the road I’m going on just ends. So I hit the brakes, which pretty much accomplishes nothing. My ABS locks up anyway, and I slide. Curse those damn bald tires! I see the curb coming, and I don’t want to wreck my alignment, so I straighten my wheels and let off the brakes. Bam! We pop up over the curb and stop. Shit. I throw it in reverse and back onto the road, but something feels wrong, “I think I blew a tire.” Probably the front right, since its beat all to hell and has been patched about 3 times already. So I keep rolling to feel it out a bit, hoping its still drivable. It is, and I keep rolling down this street, about 10 mph. I come to another stop sign and go right this time. Why? Because I’m totally fucked up, and for some reason this street looks familiar, and I think the loop is to my right. I had been drinking since about 6pm, mixed drinks, shots, beers, you name it, and my friends we’re slipping me shots and mixed drinks in the bar. It’s probably about 3am right now, so you could say I’m a couple notches above inebriated; completely sauced. As I’m coming out of my right turn I feel the tire start to unmount, and not wanting to ruin my nice wheels, I immediately pull to the curb and stop. Son of a bitch! Okay, center. Figure it out. So I turn on my flashers (soon to be my downfall) and get out to assess the situation.
I see the tire is halfway dismounted and completely flat, with a big tear where one of the plugs had been. No need to worry, I have a spare! I’ll get this bitch changed and head on my way. If only it we’re that simple. I open my center console compartment and look for the key to my wheel lock. Not there. Glove box? Nope. Floor boards? Door pockets? Seat pockets? Trunk? No, nada, zero, zilch. So I sit back down in the car and give Tom a status report, “The tire is blown, and I can’t find the key for my wheel lock.” Tom’s not looking to well right now. He’s half passed out and just kind of reclined on the seat. He just replied with this odd sort of grunt/moan, then lays his head back down. I pull out my wallet and look for my road side service card. I pull it out and give them a call. My drivers license number, registration number, membership number, mothers maiden name, my first pet, where I was born, a sample of my blood, the rights to my first born child, and about 20 more questions later, the lady asks me where I am. I have no fucking clue. “I can’t read the street sign from here, hang on.” I get out of the car and walk toward the sign, and start reading off the intersection to the dispatcher. She says, “Sorry, sir. We don’t have any 24-hour service in that area, we can’t get anyone out there until 7am.” “Fuck me, okay, well, thanks.” I hang up, drop my head and walk back to the car. I get back in and shut the door, look up and see headlights coming up behind me. They seem to be getting closer to my side of the road instead of going around. Maybe some kind passerby is going to offer some help. Then the blue and red lights come on. You have got to be fucking kidding me. Shit just went from bad to worse.
“Tom, dude. Sober the fuck up. Now! The cops are here.” I bark at Tom. Alright, deep breath, focus your chi and shit. You need your a-game to get through this one. I sit and wait, until the officer approaches my window. She flashes her light around and asks, “How you doing tonight?” Bam! Instantly sober, “Well, to be honest, not that well. I have a flat tire and my roadside service can’t make it for 4 more hours.” She smells alcohol, “Have you had anything to drink tonight?” “No, ma’am. I’m on DD slash babysitter duty tonight. My friend here isn’t handling his vodka very well right now and he kind of thew up on my earlier.” “She kinda of laughs and says, “Well, can I see your license and proof of insurance?” Hey, I know what she means now. Haha (see Don’t Mess with Texas). I oblige and hand her my Driver’s License, Military I.D., and registration card. “I’ll be right back,” she goes to her car. “Dude, you okay?” Tom’s pale face is starting to get some color. Just the wrong one, he’s looking kind of green. He leans forward and drops his head in his hands. She comes back and asks me to get out of the car. I walk a line like I was raised by Barnum & Baily themselves, and the tight rope was my headline performance. I stand on one foot like I’ve been doing it my whole life, and I touch my nose with deadly accuracy and elegant grace. She pulls me off the road and over by a fence, away from the lights. I get asked to follow her stupid little light back and forth so she can look for nystagmus. Oh yeah, gotcha bitch. Bet you didn’t think I’d know all about that one, eh? I “follow” her light back and forth a while, keeping my eyes totally unfocused and just generally pointing in the direction she wants me to look. I just breathe slow and stay relaxed. Eventually she becomes convinced that I’m sober, smiles, and asks me to wait there, “I have to go back to my car.” Hell yeah, got her wrapped around my finger. Hook, line, and sinker. I’m so golden right now. Then I see another cop car round a corner about 3 blocks down. Fuck me. Things go from worse to even worse… er. Level 3 shittiness.
So, you remember how I mentioned earlier that I was supposed to visit my probation officer ever week? Yeah. I haven’t been in over a month. I hated going. I didn’t deserve to be on probation, and I wasn’t doing my community service. I didn’t want him to bitch at my for not doing it, so I was always coming up with excuses as to why I couldn’t make it to his office. The magnitude of the shit I’m in starts to sink in. The fact that me just standing there was breaking about 10 terms of my probation was enough to put me in jail for about a year, no questions asked.
“Ma’am.” “Yes?” “Let me be completely honest with you. I’ve had a few beers tonight. Three, but it’s been a few hours. I’m kinda skating on thin ice back on base right now, and if I get in trouble I’m done.” I muster my best pouty face and puppy dog eyes. “Alight, I’ll do what I can,” she smiles again, and turns around to meet the second officer. Let’s call him Captain Asshole. She brings Captain Asshole up to speed of the situation, and continues to her car. He comes over and starts interrogating me. Your Silver Screen quality Good Cop/Bad Cop. This guy is a total tool. Probably one of those guys who got shoved in a locker in high scool, so he became a cop to exact his revenge. He asks me if I hit something to blow my tire, and I keep claiming it had a few leaks and that it was just its time. He threatens me, “So, if I drive around, I’m not going to find anything broken, or ran over?” Nope, I assure him. After fighting off his bullshit for a minute or two, the nice lady comes back and motions him over. “Alright, I’m going to ride around and look for where you wrecked.” They talk a little more, and he gets in his car and leaves. The lady asks me some more generic questions, and asks Tom if hes okay. He just kind of nods his head yes. A few minutes go by and Captain Asshole shows up again. He and Nice Lady talk for a while, then he moves over to my car to check on Tom, who’s still got his face in his hands. Since I’ve been pretty much pulling everything out of my magical ass thus far, I’m a little nervous that Tom might say something to jeopardize my, already fragile, spiderweb of white lies. When under pressure, I completely sober up. Tom has the opposite reaction, and gets even more drunk. Doing about the best thing I could ever hope for, Tom opens the door and starts barfing uncontrollably. Need a minute? Grab a Twi- fuck it, just puke your guts out. That’ll keep em busy. Score 2 for Team Belligerently Drunk!
The nice lady cop asks me to go through some more gaze nystagmus tests. Since she knew I had been drinking, she was wondering why I passed the test. One can be naturally well-coordinated, well balanced and surefooted, but even at low BAC levels your natural nystagmus is affected. I pass again, and once more before Captain Asshole shows up. He says something along the lines of having the intention of taking us in. Fuck me. I’m going to have to bite bullet and call my supervisor (a total man-hating bitch) to see if she can get me out of this one. She won’t let me live it down but it’s better than jail. I suggest, “Could I please call my supervisor and have her come out here and pick me up? She can take me in and be accountable for me.” The nice lady pipes up before Captain Asshole has a chance to shoot it down, “If you don’t think she’ll be bothered that you call her at 3 in the morning.” I pull out my recall roster (this stupid piece of paper that we had to carry around. It showed a flowchart of all the offices of all the sections of my squadron, complete with name, rank, and phone number). I point to my name, and hold it out so they can see it. Sweet! I move my finger up one more slot, and above me is SrA Patrice Williams (my forever-pregnant co-worker, not my supervisor). “That’s my supervisor.” “Okay, give her a call.” So I walk over to my car and call her up, “Shit Patrice, you gotta save my balls on this one, I’m in some pretty deep shit.” She gives me a piece of her mind, then assures me she’s on her way. Woo Hoo! Score 3 for Team Belligerently Drunk!
I walk back over to the two officers, “She’s on her way. She said she’d be here in about 10 minutes.” Captain Asshole tells me to stand next to the fence again, and wants to start another gaze nystagmus test. I’m obviously reeking of reluctance so he says, “Officer [Nice Lady, I don't remember her name] is planning on releasing you to your supervisor, so this isn’t official or anything. I found where you ran off the road. There we’re some black tire marks up that other road. You’re lucky you didn’t hit anything. If it we’re up to me I’d throw your ass in jail, but it’s her call and she’s made her decision.” What a dick. “I just want to go over it with her because she says you’ve had a drink but she can’t tell from the eye test.” “Alright, sure thing.” We go over the damn thing about 4 times. Up, down, left, right, left, right, left, up, left, right, left. Finally he goes, “There! Okay watch this.” The guy has me do a really fast jerk to the left and look as far as my eye can go. Then hold it there and follow his light up and down, while its further than my peripheral vision will allow for. He gets his twitch, and hes happy. I do it about 3 more times while he goes over with Nice Lady what she should be looking for (judging from the way they talk to each other, she’s fairly new to this).
Finally, Patrice shows up and the cops go over with her what’s going on. Tom crawls into her SUV. Captain Asshole gets his last word in, and we’re informed we have to make sure my car gets towed tonight. “I’m coming back here at 6am, and if it’s not gone, I’m coming to get you.” Dick, can’t let me come back in the morning when I find my key and just change it myself. Patrice bitches me out a bit in front of the cops, mostly because she’s pissed I woke her up; regardless, it’s a good show of faith. Nice Lady gives me a number for a local 24-hour tow company, and I call them up. She and Captain Asshole get in their cars and drive away. Patrice asks how I’m doing in spite of my situation, and I tell her I’ve been worse. As a reflex to my imminent jail-time doom, my body had conjured up a massive amount of adrenaline. It all starts fading once the police are out of sight, and like a brick wall at 80mph, the fatigue hits me. I feel completely drunk. And tired, really tired. Patrice tells me to go sit in her car, but I argue that I’ll probably pass out. We wait till the tow truck comes and hooks my car up. Patrice offers to take Tom home for me, and we part ways. I ride in the tow truck back to my apartment and write the guy a check. I go into my apartment and find my roommate, Julio, asleep on the sofa with his girlfriend. He lifts his head and asks what happened, “I just had a rough night dude.” He passes out and I move to the balcony for a smoke with his girlfriend. We don’t really say anything, I just stand there calming my nerves. Whew. I can’t believe I got out of that unscathed. Not so much as a verbal warning.
So, the moral of the story? I don’t really know. Obey the terms of your probation, and don’t stay belligerently drunk; you won’t have to worry about being in this kind of situation. But then again, you wouldn’t have a fun story to tell either. Or maybe it could be: If you’re drunk-off-your-ass don’t speed through unfamiliar back roads. Or if you use wheel-locks, make sure you always know there the key is. Yeah, just pick one of those.
Team Belligerently Drunk prevails once again!
A few nights back, a friend asked me to tell them a story, and I couldn’t think of anything. I said, “Sorry, I can’t think of anything interesting that’s happened to me.” To which I get the reply, “C’mon. You were in the military. You’ve got to have some fun military stories.” I think that’s when I looked back and realized that my life didn’t really start until I joined the Air Force. The earliest one I could think of, at the time, happened very close after getting to my first duty station, Goodfellow AFB, TX.
Goodfellow AFB adjoins the city of San Angelo. No, not San Antonio. San Angelo. No, you haven’t heard of it before now. It’s in the middle of nowhere, and there’s absolutely nothing special about it. Which is why we we’re driving down to Randolph AFB to meet up with some friends from our previous station. When you’re in a place like San Angelo, you go somewhere else, because everywhere else is better. Randolph is about about three hours Southeast, right outside San Antonio.
This night was my first experience vomiting from alcohol consumption. I blame the ever girlie Captain Morgan’s Parrot Bay, Coconut Rum. Now, I don’t know if was because I can’t stand coconut, the smell of it makes me queasy, much less the taste, or it could have just been the brutal amount of alcohol we all consumed, and the equally punishing rate at which we consumed it. But, nonetheless, we had already drank everything else, so the ole captain was our only hope. We drank and drank, and drank some more. And eventually we all passed out.
The next morning, we woke up and said our goodbyes, Jenny and I. Jenny was a friend from Mississippi who lived a few miles south of San Angelo. So, I got in my car, cranked it up, and sat there waiting for Jenny to come out. But something was wrong. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I knew something was up. I started to reach for the radio and turn it on, but then I figured it out. I was about to blow chunks. So I open the car door, and expel what looks like a whole carton of orange juice, but smells more like my drunk step-father on a Friday night. Jenny comes out and sees me staring, mesmerized by the splatter paint art I just made in the parking lot, and offers to drive. I oblige.
I drop her off at her parent’s place and hit the road again. Just as I get on the highway my mom calls me, for what was probably call number 1 of 45 for that day (she called non stop when I first moved to Texas). I’m leaned over and talking on my cellphone, and my radar detector goes off. I slow down about 5 mph (since I was only going about 5 over), top the hill, and see the police car coming. As he passes, I lift my first two fingers on the hand holding the wheel, just like everyone else waves in redneck places like North Carolina and Texas. I look in my rear view mirror and see him turning around, so I throw the phone down, and yank my radar detector off into the floor. He hits his lights, and I start pulling over.
Like most people do when they’re being pulled over, I started to get nervous. First thinking to the cellphone I was talking on. Wondering if they’re illegal to use while driving in Texas. Then I remember I just puked my guts out, and I probably still reek of alcohol. Not a good thing if you’re 18 years old and driving a car. So my nervous starts evolving into a downright panic. Then a flashlight wraps my window, “Could you down the window, please.” I do as he asks, “License and proof of insurance.” What? Does he mean registration? I have no idea. Fuck it. Just give him your license, your military I.D., and your registration and hope for the best. So I give him all three, and sit there. “Could you turn the car off please?” So I switch it off. Then I notice the other officer peering around in my passenger side window. Where the hell did he come from? The first officer takes my information back to his car, and the second one stands at the front of my car. I avoid eye contact.
About 16 hours later the first officer returns to my window, “Sir, could you please step out of the vehicle?” What the fuck for? “Sure,” I step out and start to follow the officer to the back of my car, but it rolls forward. “Shit,” I lunge for the driver window, reach in, and grab the emergency brake. “Could you stand over there?” he tells me, more than asks it, and does a kind of carefree wave, to an area somewhere near the front of his car. I try to listen as they hover over my trunk and whisper to each other, “Is there anything in the trunk?” “Uh, I don’t think so”, and I step forward with my key out, ready to open it and show them. You know, since I’m a nice guy and all. “I TOLD YOU TO STAND RIGHT THERE. RIGHT THERE. DO NOT MOVE! GET BACK IN FRONT OF MY VEHICLE!” the guy does his impersonation of my drill instructor from basic training, spitting and screaming, veins popping out of his neck. Woah, what the fuck is going on here? “Sorry-”. They finish whispering and he turns back around, “your registration doesn’t match your license plate, and the plate doesn’t match the car.” “Uh… I don’t know why they wouldn’t” “This car isn’t stolen is it, son?!” again, more of a yell than a question. “No, sir. I just bought it.” “When?!” “About 2 or 3 weeks ago.” “I’m gonna need you to step over here,” the officer leads me off the road, further from his car and mine.
The second one stands guard, looming over me. I just remember dead grass everywhere, and the ugly bulge his pen made in his shirt pocket. So tacky. I stand there, hands behind my back, in the shadow of the second officer. My heart was going about 482 mph, and all I can think about is “I’m going to go to jail for stealing this damn car… when I’m the one getting robbed with this damn car payment.” So I wait. I wait, and I worry, still a little freaked about smelling like rum. Until he finally comes back over and says, “It looks like whoever filled in your temporary tag wrote one of the letters down wrong,” in a way that makes me feel guilty for their mistake. He gives me a few more words of warning, hands back my information, and heads for his car. I hop back in mine, put on my seatbelt, crank the car, and let down my e-brake. I look out of my windshield, and there, about 15 feet in front of my car, is an anti-litter campaign sign. Don’t Mess with Texas.
I guess they don’t fuck around.
I always have a difficult time when I’m trying to start writing something. The plot, no problem. The ending, no problem. It’s all about the first sentence of that first paragraph. Because, from there, you can take your story anywhere. But everything has to start somewhere. Blogs are no exception.
So here I sit, struggling with the first line of the first paragraph. Wish me luck.
