Corporate Peon: D-D-D-Drama


Friday, September 09, 2005

D-D-D-Drama

Saturday my gfs (L, J, and N) and I all had a leisurely lunch at a place known for their margaritas. J and N had two big-ass ones; I had one and an amaretto. Mmmm. We got back to L's mom's house (since L's house is in BFE) to continue the pre-partying and to get ready for that night's reunion festivities.

The dinner was at the local country club and S, L's sister, agreed to drive us up there. I made sure my girls were kept stocked with liquor. Shots, drinks, whatever. The bar manager was part of our reunion and cut us some fat deals. $10 for five shots? Sold! I spent close to $100 that night. It was a lot of alcohol.

When we were ready to leave the club and go bar-hopping, we called L's mom, who had offered to get us. Mom didn't answer her phone, so we tried S. Knowing her sister quite well, L asked S if she had been drinking. The answer? "We just started. I've had one beer."

Okay, cool. Come get us.

N was pretty drunk at that time. Her baby is 11 months old, so it's been quite some time since she's gone balls-to-the-wall. L was on her way to being drunk and J was just rounding the corner. I was buzzing pretty well but wasn't drunk quite yet. We were all damn happy and starting to enter the hysterically funny stage. I swear, I almost peed my pants a dozen different times at the dinner alone. Ah, good times.

So, S drives her big-ass pickup up to get us. Her friend, A, was with, which meant that my three gfs and I had to fit in the back of the pickup. Which we did, suprisingly with ease. HUGE pickup.

Something about being in the fresh air (windows down on the pickup), or just being together and drunk, made us all pretty giddy. Camera flashes were popping off, stupid sayings were being shouted, people were trading seats, phone calls to the absentee-bfs/hubbies were made...we were all laughing our heads off. Just being loud, obnoxious drunks having the time of our lives.

Sometimes, when you're sober and everyone else is drunk, it's a pain in the ass to be around them. S and A, though, just laughed right along with us. S doesn't get to see us that often, and while A doesn't really know us, S was glad we were together and having fun. She's hung out with us before and actually went out with us the previous night. She was also our DD (as she was underage) for N's bachelorette party, so she's done the routine before.

We drove down to Bar #1, hopped out, went inside. The bar was dead, despite being the hangout of the local boys we were friends with. So, we turned back around and drove to Bar #2, which was also dead. We didn't even go inside #2, we just drove through the lot and headed back to #1, where we knew people would show eventually.

Out of the blue, S tells us to hang on, we're getting pulled over. What none of us had realized until then was that S had an open beer in the truck with her, and two more cans ready to be popped. We stashed the empty open under our four pairs of feet in the back.

The first thing the cop said was that he clocked her going 60 in a 55. WTF? My standard speed is about 8miles over. He asked if she'd been drinking, b/c of course liquor wafted off of all of us, and she said she had had two (the beer we knew about and then the empty). He ran her license and then called her back to his car.

Copper did the pen test, then gave her a breathalyzer. We saw her look at the reading; we saw her hold up her cuffed hands and get in the backseat. When the cop came back to the pickup, he told us she blew a .11, and the legal limit is .08. We were all like, what the fuck? There's no way you can drink two beers and have a .11 unless you haven't eaten in days and weigh 95lbs. Neither qualifies. He asked about open containers, but luckily, with four pairs of legs in the backseat, he couldn't see anything.

He asked if anyone else could drive, and A said she could, and took a breathalyzer to prove it (.56, not legally drunk, and certainly less than the rest of us). She drove us back to the bar (hello, where else would we go?) while S got hauled off for a blood test. She's on a shitload of meds that can impact how her body metabolizes alcohol - anti-depressants, anti-anxiety, allergy...a whole cocktail that's finally in the right combination to work for her. So it's possible that the breathalyzer was right, but also wrong.

As you can probably guess from the meds, S has had some hard times. She has a couple facial piercings and multiple tattoos, all in an effort to look tough. She's a welder and while she can definitely kick most anyone's ass, she's also a complete sweetheart. She's worked hard the past couple years to get her life straightened out, and while she doesn't always make good choices (hello, open container), she certainly wasn't drunk to the point of a DUI. She had a prior DUI dismissed just last month that was bullshit (she wasn't in a car when she got charged - wasn't even leaving a car - but it's a long story that I won't go into). A friend was driving her pickup a few weeks ago when said friend got a DUI. Since it's a small town, her pickup is pretty recognizable. That didn't help. L and I aren't sure if she's just an unlucky person or if she just continuously makes bad decisions. Probably a little of both, but as I said, she tries.

Anyway, we got back to Bar #1, where I saw CK, one of my high school crushes. God I adore him. First thing he asked was if I was still in Chicago, and then if I had gotten his message a few years ago. Apparently I had emailed him my # (no memory of that) and while he was out here visiting his sister, he called me. Yeah, no memory of that, either. He was having a house party that night, but of course we had to go get S out of the tank, so his party was out of the question. I got a few hugs from CK, his number, a swat on the ass, and that's about it. I was disappointed, but J and N thought they'd be sick, so we made a Taco Bell run while we were waiting for S to get cleared.

Once we picked S up from the tank, S and A went to a friend's house party, but my girls were tired. I knew if we went along that we'd be stuck there until like 6am, so we went back to L & S's mom's house to stay the night.

S told us that the reading she saw said .25, which is suspect. There's no way in hell she was that drunk, and I would never have gotten into the car with her if she acted like someone who would blow a .25. Her blood tests will come back at the end of the month; those results will determine what kind of fine she gets and whether or not she loses her license. She just found out (this week) that she was offered a position as a power plant manager here in WI. She's trying to break some ties with some unsavory characters and give herself a fresh start, and I'm proud of her for that.

It was a pretty crappy ending to an otherwise great night. I have a few pics back from the night before that I'll post soon, and I'll have more pics in a few weeks.
Until then, though...S damn well better drive safe.


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