I will think of a better name for this blog one of these days.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Drunk Cockroach

Last night I saw a cockroach drinking from a discarded beer can. I kind of regret not taking a picture of it. It's exactly how you would imagine it would look like. The beer can was tipped sideways on the sidewalk and a big ass cockroach (the nasty kind that flies) had it's head inside the opening. It's butt was angled upwards and moving up and down a bit, it really looked like it was excitedly enjoying beer for the first time. I wonder if cockroaches can get drunk. . .

Anyways, speaking of getting drunk. I got pulled over Saturday night for drunk driving. . . well technically drunk riding as I was on my motor scooter. That was an interesting experience to say the least.
A little background on how the Taipei police catch DUI people. Mostly during weekends but sometimes on weekday, checkpoints are setup randomly at key points around the city, almost always at on ramps to bridges and highways. You have to slow down and let the police take a look at your face and smell for alcohol.
My girlfriend and I were on our way home from a Mexican restaurant/bar. We were supposed to go there and watch the World Cup semi-final match or something like that with some friends. When we found out that the match starts at 4 AM, we said F that and we left. On the way home we passed by two police DUI checkpoints. No problem at either one, police let us pass. I told GF "Wow, crazy amount of cops tonight." When we were at the most 2 minutes away from our destination, unbelievably there was yet another checkpoint. While we were approaching it I jokingly told the girlfriend "Watch, we're gonna get stopped."

Two seconds later. . . the cop takes a look at my face, same as the two checkpoints before except this time I get asked "How much did I drink tonight?" I responded "Nothing" but I did not say it in complete confidence. I was lying. I think he knew it. I'm such a bad liar.

He tells me to turn off the engine and show him my license and registration. I'm a bit nervous now. He looks at my license/registration and asks me to walk over to the patrol car. He asks me again "How much did I drink tonight?". . . this time I said I had one or two sips of beer. I changed my story, unsurprisingly he doesn't believe me. He takes out the breathalyzer machine. He asks me "Are you sure you only had one or two sips?" trying to pressure me into confessing. I say "Yes, only one or two sips."

Now I'm really nervous. This little machine in front of me will decide if I will forever have a criminal record, if i will be fined a huge sum of money, have my license taken away, and have my motor scooter towed away. As I blow into the breathalyzer I'm thinking "What if it's defective? What if it's been tampered with?" I mean the difference between being fine and going to jail is miniscule, only a small fraction of 1% BAC (Taiwan's limit is 0.055%).

I hear a beep. That means I can stop blowing. I nervously wait for the readout on the small digital display. It feels like forever, but in reality it was probably 3 seconds.

Eventually, it flashed "0.000%"

Hahahahahahaha! Cop loses, I win! I actually only had at the most 1/4th of one beer, almost two whole hours before the breathalyzer. I was only nervous because I have very low tolerance for alcohol, a 12 year old girl could probably out drink me. I look completely wasted when I've had one or two drinks even though I feel fine.

There was a million funny things I could've said to the disappointed cop. But (very typical for me) I couldn't think of a single funny thing to say. We just rode off, relieved, tired, excited and glad that it was over. Definitely an interesting experience.

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