Friday, October 5, 2012

This has nothing to do with chess

I had a couple of margaritas tonight. I used to drink them quite a bit, but it had been a while. Tonight, I happened to be standing at the bar (my local one) when the girl next to me ordered one. As I had pointed out Katz's Deli several times today at my job atop the tour bus, "I'll have what she's having" just kind of spilled out.

I said it had been a while and now I will explain why. It is like this: The last time that I got really drunk, sick drunk, I had had nine margaritas. But that's not it. What it is is this: on that night, about fifteen years ago, I first vomited (hereafter "got sick") on the train on my way home from the bar. I am pretty sure I had sat down in an empty car, but somehow, they found out, and I suddenly found myself being asked by either a cop or the train conductor if I was ok, did I need a doctor, that sort of thing. I said no, I was ok. "You've messed up this car", he replied. "I'm sorry about that", I said. I had a vision of the train being taken out of service amid an announcement over the PA of "due to a sick passenger on board...", that sort of nightmare. Nothing like that happened, praise be to God (and the cop, or conductor), and I made it to my stop (one beyond, actually, but the end of the line happens to be just one stop beyond, so I never really worry about sleeping through it) without further incident.

I will cut now to the third (final) time I got sick that night, and then hop back to the middle. I had lain down in a fairly secluded spot in a parking lot, and soon got sick. At that point, I realized I was now ok, that I would not be sick anymore. That was actually a very nice feeling. In fact, it was possibly the best feeling I've ever had lying prostrate. Ok, back to the second time: I was walking up Manhattan College Parkway, headed home from the train station, when I needed to lie down for a while and be sick again. Soon enough, a school security guard first asked me if I was ok ("yes"), and then if I was a student there. And I should so, so have answered "no, I'm a professor", but all I in fact managed to say was "no".

And that's it.