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I do not make a habit of drinking to excess, but I have my days. Likewise, sometimes my friends have their days and I’m the one driving them around. Saturday was one of those days. If I had volunteered, that would be one thing, but it was the sheer logistics of the situation which ended with me at the wheel. That being said, I didn’t mind. Much.

“Friends,” in this particular instance, means my good buddy from college, one of his coworkers (with whom I hang fairly regularly), and and my buddy’s coworker’s female high school friend who was in town for her brother’s chess tournament. When buddy’s coworker and buddy’s coworker’s female high school friend are in the same town for any reason, apparently their practice is to inebriate themselves and “hook up.”

So, as a result, buddy’s coworker was fairly eager to get himself and his visiting female high school friend started on the beverages. I, responsible driver that I am, nursed a single beer while buddy and buddy’s coworker and buddy’s coworker’s visiting high school friend tossed back all manner of inebriants. By the end of the evening, which seemed like a long time coming, I was preventing them with limited success from making tall towers of empty glasses and from putting ketchup in each others’ drinks. This would be much funnier, I decided, were I not so cursed with sobriety.

When last call finally came, I made sure no one had to go to the bathroom and began driving. We were about forty minutes from anyone’s home, so naturally about twenty minutes into the drive people started saying they needed to use a restroom. Not the most convenient road for that, so I drove a little faster toward the destination.

No one urinated or defecated in my car, thank the gods, but when I finally got buddy’s coworker and buddy’s coworker’s visiting female high school friend back to buddy’s coworker’s house, I thought to check to see if anyone had left anything in the back seat. Lo, buddy’s coworker’s visiting high school friend had left her phone.

And some chicken.

Somehow — and this is not a complaint — she had managed to vomit chewed up chicken strips (from much earlier in the evening) around all the alcohol on top of it in her stomach and onto my back seat, completely dry. It was super easy to clean up, for which I am extremely grateful. That does not change the fact that I just don’t understand how it happened.

So I’m not a huge fan of being the driver, but in retrospect I would rather not have joined that merry brigade in their particular brand of levity either. Maybe next week I’ll just watch TV.

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