Falls, Urine, Speed Records, and Sleep

From the Life of Gringo



Two Sundays ago I had quite the night. Phil and I were closing together and early on decided we needed to get a nice fix of ONeils. He called them from his cell phone (because it was actually programmed in) and confirmed they would be open when we got out of work.
We headed over after replenishing our cigarette stocks and began our rounds of Jack and Diet Coke. My plan was 4 for the usual monetary reasons but Phil of course decided on more, and I didn't fight extremely hard against it.

While we were playing Golden Tee, our newest addiction, this guy at the bar actually threw a pint glass at Serg, the bartender, but missed and broke a bottle. Serg started to come out from behind the bar to serve up a little knuckle justice, and he wouldn't have been alone as Phil and I had the type of righteous indignation of drunks whose bar has just been violated. But a friend stopped Serg and the guys left, not acknowledging my half-assed attempt at starting a fight by yelling "get the FUCK out!

It was an early night as the bar actually closed at 2. Phil and I were the last two left and we talked to Serg while polishing off free shots (the best kind by far). Phil was definitely wasted. He argued with Serg for 10 minutes about whether or not he could tame Serg's dogs within 30 minutes of meeting them, then he started his head shaking (he literally just shakes his head around when he gets really drunk) then passed out.

Fortunately we had paid up so I rolled Phil on out of there. He was way too drunk to drive home so I decided to get him on a bus and we'd get back to my place to sleep it off. Realizing Phil didn't have a CTA card for the bus I started taking us to the Grand stop. Right after crossing Michigan he started fighting me.
"Stop! Le' go!"
"OK, yer the boss man."
He kind of moved around, trying I supposed to face the direction he intended to go. Unfortunately he rolled back and hit this little incline that lines the railings of the little gardens in the middle of the sidewalks. He promptly fell backwards, his head hitting the railing. I was afraid he might have impaled his head but s I saw no blood or bone I figured he'd be OK. I lifted him up and put him in his chair, then continued on.
Every 50 feet or so he'd yell at me to stop, then I'd comply for a minute or two. At one point, I believe outside the ESPN Zone on Wabash, he told me to go away, to step back. I did and he then started talking to invisible people. From what I gathered it seemed he was talking to one of his sisters. Finally he kind of stopped so I continued until we got to the corner of Grand and Wabash where he wanted to stop again.
I decided to make a run for the train station to put 10 bucks on a card for him. First I had him promise not to roll away, as I didn't want to relive St. Patrick's Day, when we lost him for about two hours in the crowd, finding him later on a corner with an Irish flag, a green plastic bowler hat atop his head, and a big sloppy drunk grin. I hauled ass, put money on a card and came back, relieved that he was still there.
The trip to the bus stop was without incident, only a couple of drunken stops. Waiting at the bus stop at Ontario and Michigan I put a hand on Phil's chest to keep him from falling out of his chair as he had passed out again, all the while keeping an eye out for a bus. After 20 or more minutes I said "fuck it" and started heading towards the train. I was pretty sober and willing to wheel him down the stairs at the Grand stop, and the stairs at my own Bryn Mawr stop.

This trip back to the station was more eventful. Phil was still out so couldn't protest or tell me to stop. I was going at a good pace, my calves burning from being crouched over and taking half steps to avoid kicking the backpack on the back of the chair. I was crossing Rush or possibly Wabash again when the combined factors of Phil's weight, the backpack's weight, and the up-slope of the pavement made his chair tilt backwards.
I tried to hold him up, but instead I was dragged down and fell on my knee, throwing Phil into a 180 degree spin with the chair, and then he was dumped out backwards into the middle of the street, once again cracking his head on a hard surface. He didn't seem to mind. In fact he looked ready to take a nap. I cursed while standing up, grabbed our bags and threw them to the curb, then righted the chair and moved it to the curb as well. I bent down, forced Phil's arm around my neck and lifted him up and put him in the chair again, thinking to myself "aren't paraplegics supposed to be light? Fuck!" and Phil said "man, yer strong."
This car was stopped at the light, though I hadn't noticed. After I had Phil situated, the guy in the car got out and asked "you guys alright?" I grunted "yeah" over my shoulder, silently thinking "why didn't he say something earlier and help out?" and feeling ashamed at dumping a "cripple" in the middle of a street.
Standing on the sidewalk, now fairly well sober, I decided I'd drive Phil home in his car. I got us back across Michigan Ave. and headed to Ontario because he usually parks off of it. I said "hey, Phil, where you parked?"
"Mmehhh..." he responded.
"Is it off of Ontario like usual?"
"Naahh...."
"Which way then?"
"Thah way..." he said, pointing North. I walked two blocks up to Huron, then turned right, figuring he probably parked around Northwester Hospital. I walked all the way down to Lake Shore Drive, but didn't see his car. I made the decision to trust my instinct and go back to Ontario.

At some point I gave him my hoody to wear because he was cold while I was sweating my balls off from pushing. Going down Ontario he had me pull into a couple of doorways so he could go pee. Unfortunately he had used his last catheter in ONeils, which he kept forgetting even though I reminded him. In the second doorway as he tried to find the non-existent catheter again I made my own river of piss across the sidewalk, while Phil's burdened bladder just relieved itself in his pants. Ah, memories of St.Patrick's day...
Finally I spotted his car on a cross street. I got him to the passenger side but when I tried to lift the hoody to tell him he yelled at me saying he was trying to make himself feel better. He pulled the hoody that was draped over him tighter, looking like a cross between a sheet-covered corpse and a sleeping bird.
After a rest we extracted the urine dampened keys and opened the doors. On the move from the chair to the car he fell for the third time, this time into the gutter. I lost my instinct to laugh when I saw his legs contorted in very uncomfortable looking positions. I straightened them out and got him into the car, then we dismantled the chair and all was set.
Once in the car Phil sobered up a bit. I drove us to the highway, the hand control brake rod uncomfortably in the way of my foot. As we were going down the highway Phil politely suggested I use the hand controls or he would punch my legs. As the choice was clear I grabbed the handle, similar in shape and feel to a bike handle though larger.
After a few jerky take offs and nick of time braking I got the feel. When we got to the interstate Phil said he wanted me to break my speed record in his car, using the hand controls. Laughing like a madman I complied. I topped out at 105mph, barely in the lines, feeling just like I was in a highly realistic video game. I'd have to say that I was extremely lucky in not being pulled over because unlike Phil's drunken assertions that he would be in trouble as it was his car, I'm pretty sure I'd be the one taken to court and hanged or whatever it is they do in Illinois.

We arrived at his house around 5:00 in the morning, about 3 hours after we had left the bar. Getting situated to pull and all nighter by watching "Underworld Evolution" Phil took his cell phone out of his jean pockets to find it malfunctioning and coated, like the keys, with urine. A week later we found out his phone was corroded and unrepairable which was kind of funny to me because I knew why, but Phil couldn't remember.
He also told me about this sci-fi book he was reading which was good because I learned that when I had thought he was talking to one of his sisters who wasn't actually there, he was actually speaking to the sister of a main character after assuming the role of said character.

After laying down Phil fell asleep in about 4.5 minutes. I started drifting off almost immediately after putting down a Playboy to watch the movie. I managed to watch the love scene where I could almost see Kate naked, then crashed on the couch. Thus ended one of my most interesting drunken nights, though the times I've streaked and seen several sets of boobs have their high place as well.