THE DUI DIARY: Chapter Seventeen

Today, court went exactly as I’d expected; it just carried on a bit longer than I thought it would. This sucked, because I was scheduled for a CT scan at noon. I was actually scheduled for it yesterday, but someone forgot to call me to reschedule because all the physicians were off. After twelve today, no one would be there to help me, so I had to get out of court by eleven.



I got out by ten-thirty, which worked out nicely. The courtroom was fuckin’ packed, and not just with DUI cases. In fact, very few of them involved booze at all. I don’t know what was going on with everyone, but we were getting domestic battery cases and animal cruelty stuff, and just crazy shit. It was so crowded that the judge paused a few times to check with other courtrooms to see if they could help out and lighten his load.


When he got to me, it was very quick. It was so swift and easy to remember that here is the conversation between him and Earl verbatim.


JUDGE: I see we’re waiting on the status of the appeal. Have you heard anything?


EARL: No, I haven’t, your honor.


JUDGE: Do you know when you’re going to hear from them?


EARL: I have no idea, sir.


JUDGE: Okay. Come back in August. Is the 13th good? Or would you rather have the 20th?


EARL: The 20th would be good.


JUDGE: Okay. 9:30 in the morning.


EARL: Thank you, your honor.


It was that fast and that easy. Nothing remarkable about it at all. However, the true star of the day was my fellow defendants. Get a load of these examples.


A Russian guy, probably late twenties, was in for animal cruelty. The judge asked him if he wanted to hire a lawyer before his trial, and the guy said no. The judge then warned him about the possible consequences, including jail time. He asked the prosecutor if she wanted this guy to go to jail, and she said yes. The judge then asked if the defendant was sure he didn’t want representation. The guy asked how he could go about it. The judge then had to describe the obvious process of how one could go about getting representation. The guy still wasn’t sure. The judge gave him his trial date.


An Indian guy, also up for animal cruelty, was asked if he was going to hire a lawyer. He said yes. The judge gave him his trial date. The guy then asked, “Can I ask you a question?” The judge nodded, and the guy said, “Is it possible to not hire a lawyer.” The judge sighed and explained that he didn’t NEED to hire a lawyer, that he has the right to defend himself, but it would be ADVISABLE to get representation. The guy decided not to.


A young guy who kept looking at the floor was called up for possession of cannabis. Apparently, he was in school to become a teacher. The judge asked him if he would hire a teacher with a history of drug use. The entire courtroom laughed at this one . . . except me. Maybe if the guy was gobbling PCP, I’d find an objection, but he was smoking weed.


A young woman, maybe about twenty, a bit too skinny, was in for retail theft. She sat one row and five seats over from me, and she was carrying a bag on her shoulder. More of a man-purse than an actual purse. When the judge called her up, she stood quickly. As a result, her jeans slid down her body, and her ass popped out. She only wore a lacy g-string under her jeans, and the guy sitting behind her started licking his lips. This is apparently a usual occurrence for her, since she casually pulled her pants back up and pulled her sweater down over her ass. She didn’t seem to be very concerned about this.


Believe it or not, she was not the only person to moon me today. During the whole ordeal, there were three party girls who were sitting directly in front of me. One was in for underage drinking, and she seemed to be the responsible one. The other two looked like they’d just dragged themselves out of bed, hungover from the night before. The one who sat in the seat in front of me—the real winner in court today—was the worst off, though. She had the shakes, for one. Her friend had them, too, but not as badly as the one in front of me. Every once in a while, she groaned and dropped her head back, bathing my lap and the book I was reading with her blonde hair. She didn’t seem to notice. This was before the judge showed up. When he arrived, we all stood. She got up first, and when she did, her jogging pants slipped down, advertising the fact that she was wearing nothing underneath. The seats are so close together that her ass was about five inches from my face. If she’d farted, I would have felt the breeze. She didn’t seem to notice at first, but when the guy sitting next to her started staring at her ass—very obviously—she figured out what had happened, and she yanked her pants up. It was a very loose fit, and I figured that they wouldn’t stay up on their own. Later, she tried putting her head on her friend’s shoulder to get some rest, but her friend shrugged away and said, “Don’t.” At that point, she slid down in her chair and tried to rest her head on the back. The back was too short, so instead, she accidentally dropped her head into my lap, her eyes closed. This was the first good look I’d gotten at her face (by then, I had a definite working knowledge of her ass), and I was kind of surprised. She was maybe—MAYBE!—eighteen years old. This is a specimen of the party girl during her early years. The drinking and promiscuity had not yet taken its toll on her face. She could still turn back, if she wanted to.


“Um,” I said.


Her eyes opened. They were unfocused. She muttered something that might have been an apology (if apologies usually involve the word “fuck”), and she sat up, swaying back and forth. I noticed that every male eye in the courtroom was on her, and whenever a new guy arrived, he always sat in the empty seat next to her, despite the fact that it was the hardest seat to get to. At one point, the guy who sat next to me very obviously looked over her shoulder to get a glimpse down the front of her shirt. Somehow, she didn’t notice. One of the many men who sat next to her put his arm around her at one point. She had an objection to this, especially since the guy looked like a fat, balding child molester. She pushed his arm away so hard that the bailiff looked over. I’m shocked that he didn’t notice something was wrong with her.


I’m not joking when I say that no less than three different guys hit on this woman. IN A FUCKING COURTROOM. This doesn’t include the guy who put his arm around her. She didn’t entertain a single one of these men, even in the fucked up state she was in.


I think that’s about it. Anyway, after I was dismissed, I went out into the hallway to wait for Earl. When he came by, he reminded me of the next court date. I then had a question for him. According to one of the letters from Jesse White I’d received about a year ago, I had to make a payment of $250 to reinstate my license. I could pay over the phone or with a personal check sent to Springfield. He advised me to do this. It would take a week with a credit card, but it might take 45 days with a check.


I have about 45 days until my year is up.


I asked about the appeal, and he said that the way it went, they sent the appeal brief to the appellate court, and they would make up their mind. This decision was actually due on Monday. Then, Don and the others would have to send their response/rebuttal, and when it was registered, the process was over. One way or the other, I’d be driving again on the 17th of June (provided the reinstatement went out on time).


I get the feeling that my next time in court will be my actual trial. The appeal can’t go on for much longer.


When I got home, I wanted to call up the Secretary of State to see if they accepted debit cards. I have no credit cards, as I view them being no better than the Mafia, except if you don’t pay them, they send financial thugs after you instead of actual thugs. Credit cards exist solely to keep you in debt, and if you don’t believe me, look at your interest rates. Are you paying only the minimum payment each month? Why is that? [NOTE: Since I wrote this, I have three credit cards. They were absolute necessities. Guess who’s in debt up to his fucking eyebrows with no sign of things letting up. Oh yeah.]


Anyway, when I looked at the form, I noticed that they only accepted credit cards. No debit cards would be accepted. Angrily, I wrote out the check and hoped that they’d get to it soon.


I don’t know how much longer I can stand being driven around. I know I have a month and a half left, but still . . . it’s getting to me. I dream about driving. If I ever struck it rich, I would never hire a limo to drive me around. I can’t bear to be out from behind the steering wheel. It’s probably a control issue, since I’m definitely a backseat driver, at least when it comes to other people driving my car.


Well . . . here’s a little secret, if you promise not to tell anyone. Back when this first started, when my grandfather was driving me around, he had bad cataracts. He could barely see. So . . . I steered for him from the passenger seat. Does that count as a violation?


TO BE CONTINUED TOMORROW!

WHEN I HAD FIRE WITHIN MY BLOOD: CHAPTER THREE

JUNE 10, 2000.  9:15 PM.  DERRY.  EVERGLADES HOTEL.

I suffered through breakfast better today.  I knew enough to stick to things that can't get screwed up, like cereal and milk.

The tour of Belfast was amazing and scary.  It had a lot of the types of things Dublin had, but everything is falling apart in Belfast, as if they didn't bother rebuilding because they knew it would only get blown up again.  Not only that, but the British soldiers and the UVF left all their barricades and barbed wire and stuff lying around, as if they knew they would probably be back.

The place was scary enough as it was.  Imagine what it would have looked like with pissed off, armed soldiers.  There was also so much graffiti there, Chicago doesn't hold a candle to it.

The Irish Sea, on the other hand, is staggeringly beautiful.  There is nothing like watching the waves attack each other while the strong sea wind looks Lovecraftian, just without the sea monsters.

The old Bushmills Distillery was pretty cool, despite the fact that it was the worst tour I'd ever gone on.  The tour guide just took us around, said her scripted piece, asked, "Any questions?", and without waiting for an answer, started leading us on to the next stop.  However, there were free drinks, and that makes up for everything else.

Speaking of alcohol, I tried some Guinness in its home land.  I'm not a beer guy (I prefer whiskey), but this Guinness was amazingly good.  Nice and thick.  There's even an art to pouring it.  Most importantly, the first drink was free.  They keep the best for themselves; the rest of the world gets it with a lower alcohol content.  Regardless, I think they've just made me a happy customer, and I'm sure I'll be spending a lot more money on their wares.

I should say something about forests in Ireland.  So far, I've hardly seen any.  I did see a few, like the one on top of a mountain, which was so scarce and twisted and insidious that I wouldn't be able to work the guts up to hang out there at night.  There must be some kind of demon in those woods.  The pine woods, though, you could never get lost in them because you'd never be able to get in.  You could probably throw a penny at this forest, and it would bounce back at you, it's so thick.  It probably covers up some kind of evil, too.

The Everglades isn't exactly the piece of America it claims to be, but it's better than the Mespil.  The waitresses are beautiful, but one strikes my interest in particular.  Hearing only my voice over the phone, she was able to recognize me in the dining room and actually recited my order to me from memory.  When I didn't finish the terrible fish they gave me to eat, she guessed exactly what I wanted:  a cheeseburger with fries.  Either she's psychic, or she's the modern day Sherlock Holmes.  I'm very impressed with her.  If she can make a great cheeseburger, I'll ask her to marry me and go back to the States with me.  She could very well be perfect.

JUNE 11.  8:00 PM.  DERRY.  EVERGLADES HOTEL.

I think I'm finally getting used to living this way.  Breakfast doesn't bother me, so long as I stick to the cereal, and riding that small bus (sorry, "coach") doesn't hurt as much as it used to.  Maybe it's because I'm finally drinking Coke.  The bathroom, like everything else, was not made for big people.  I'm beginning to think some midget fell into political power and is now making us big people pay for our jokes.  Anyway, I had to do acrobatics to wash my hair this morning, seeing as how the showerhead only went up to my chest.

I had a great time on the walls of Derry.  Could you imagine that these walls have never toppled?  They call Derry the Virgin City because no one has ever successfully conquered the city.  Mona, the local guide (who has a love for dirty jokes and is always reminded of something else), told us great stories, including the one about George Walker's head (the Catholics got tired of the Protestant, so they bombed the statue and stole its head).

Speaking of bombs, Derry is scarier than Belfast in a way.  In Derry, which is the site for almost all "Troubles" (their euphemism for their fight for independence), they keep rebuilding and rebuilding because they know that if they don't, they won't have a city anymore.  It's even more downtrodden than Belfast.  The British soldiers are gone, but they've left cameras all over the place as a reminder that Big Brother is watching.

I saw where the Irish kings lived.  It's a fort named Grianan Ailigh.  It was extremely difficult to get to the top, considering the narrow, small steps (the midget has always been in charge), the rain, and the very strong wind (it's on top of a mountain, which our driver, Michael of the Steel Balls, managed to get our coach up).  Supposedly, the old Irish army is still buried there, and if you listen carefully at certain times of the day, you can hear their horses marching.

As we left Grianan Ailigh, a couple of drunken Irish teenagers stood on top of the fort (which must have taken a big pair of brass balls, considering the weather conditions) and mooned us not once, but twice.  If not for the presence of elderly ladies, I would have assaulted their wiping practices.

(By the way, in Ireland, the age you can smoke is 16, and to drink, 17.)

I got the cheeseburger promised to me tonight.  While it wasn't all that great, it was still the best Ireland had to offer.  The fries, however, were glorious.  A word to the wise, Ireland:  cheeseburgers should not crunch in your mouth, and use sliced cheese, not shredded; shredded makes it look like a cat puked on the meat.

I was in a real pub today (not like the pub I was in the other day), and the chairs are (surprise, surprise) made for small people.  Even the doors were so narrow that even if I was as thin as Calista Flockhart, I still wouldn't get through comfortably.  If I don't see something made for big people, I'll go mad.