My Field Sobriety Test

Wherein I explain the story behind this tweet:

I've happily started travelling for work, and I'm currently splitting my time between Ohio (weekdays) and Maryland (weekends).  Yes, I am working seven days a week through the end of July.

Last night, my friend came up to get dinner with me, and then we headed into the city for a little karaoke.  I can never say no to karaoke (must be the Asian), and luckily, unlike many other people, I don't need to be drunk to do it!  My friend and I hadn't really discussed DD or anything, but I sort of assumed he would be driving since he was the local and had the car, and I didn't really know how to get back.

Fast forward to 2 AM when they're closing up the bar, and my friend is clearly in no condition to be driving.  His bartender friend made sure I was driving, I took his keys, and we headed out.  He tried to tell me where we were going, and then he promptly fell asleep, so thank God for GPS-enabled phones and Google Maps.  Now I was really, really tired.  I had gotten a few hours of sleep in the past 40 hours or so, and had made the conscious decision at the bar to only have one drink so that I wouldn't get even more tired.

I've never been really good at driving really late at night, and especially not on so little sleep.  So I was half falling asleep at the wheel and going back and forth from my lane a little.  I was aware of it and was actually keeping an eye out for rest stops when I saw the cruiser behind me.  AWESOME.

So the trooper came over and shined his flashlight right in my face and asked me a few questions, and then got down to business.  "Ma'am, how much have you had to drink tonight" he said.  I told him, "I had one drink, around 10 PM."  He looked really dubious and repeated slowly, "I'm going to ask you again - how many drinks have you had tonight?" And I told him again, "I've only had one."  He told me I was swerving on the road, and I said, "Yes, I'm very tired.  I've gotten about three hours of sleep in the past 24 hours."

He had me get out of the car, at which point he asked me again how much I'd had to drink, then informed me that he could smell the alcohol coming out of my mouth when I had spoken to him from inside the car.  Then I told him that maybe that was because my friend had about 15 drinks.  And I offered to take a breathalyzer test, but I guess he wasn't ready to jump into that part just yet.

After some more chitchat - mostly me insisting to him and the other trooper that I ONLY HAD ONE DRINK - he started the test.  The first test was to stand still and follow the end of his pen moving just my eyes only, while he shine his flashlight in my face some more.  That went on forever.  Next he had me stand heel to toe - which was extremely uncomfortable, and coupled with the fact that I was very cold and shaking from anxiety, made for a very stressful stand, as I was trying not to fall, as he would for sure think I was drunk - while he demonstrated the "walk in a straight line" test (which honestly, the way they do it, is hard enough to do sober).  Once I passed that, I had to hold my foot up and stare at it while I counted out loud.  Since I didn't fall over, he finally resorted to the breathalyzer test, which he made me take twice.  I swear he didn't believe the first results (I'm pretty sure he was convinced that I was drunk and lying), and he never showed me the results of either blow, but whatever.  (Also, he littered.  He threw the plastic wrapper from the breathalyzer straw AND the breathalyzer straws on the ground!  NBD though, right?)

So I went back and sat in the car while he did whatever, and he came back and gave me the car registration, my license, and a huge piece of paper, saying he was "just" giving me a warning.  I was speechless.  I think he expected me to thank him or something (for what?  For not charging me for something I didn't do?), because he repeated that I was just getting a warning a second time, so finally I blurted out, "FOR WHAT??"  Now, now, I know - swerving around is dangerous, but it just kind of felt like a slap in the face for trying to do what I thought was the responsible thing.  And it's not like I was all over the road, but anyway.  I just took the warning and then we headed off, and you can bet I was wide awake after that.

It was definitely an interesting experience though! And I will say that even if the trooper wasn't the most pleasant guy in the world, it's a little comforting to know that they don't just let that kind of stuff go unnoticed. When they pulled me over, I knew exactly why, and I was kind of glad to see that they take that kind of stuff seriously.  I just wish he had been a little nicer when it was obvious that I wasn't drunk!  :)