Why not to get drunk on red wine
24 November 2004, Wednesday (written 26 November 2004)
Lyn, on Tuesday night, had asked my plans for Wednesday. When I told her we were going to the Gold Coast, she grimaced. “Ugh, why?” she asked. “Because I’ve never been there,” I replied. “Ever been to Miami?” she said, obviously making a comparison. “No,” I said. “Why not?” she said. “Because I can’t drive there, or take a bus,” I said. “Most Australians consider the Gold Coast to be a blot on the continent,” she said. “I’ll let you know if I agree with them tomorrow night,” I replied.
Although I related the story to Chris on Wednesday morning, it did not put us off our day trip. We called a cab from reception to take us to the place from which Chris had rented a car for us, and soon after, found ourselves in a car smelling very much of B.O. The driver didn’t speak very good English and seemed to not know where he was going. Chris had a map and the two of us in the backseat kept referring to it to try to figure out if we were at all headed in the right direction. The cab driver pulled into a building parking lot and said he wanted to change cabs, something wasn’t working right in that one, and indicated we should get out and wait at the curb. We got out and he drove into a big garage, which I now noticed did have the name of the cab company on it. “Thought something really dodgy was about to happen there!” Chris laughed to me. A few moments later, the driver came back in a different car that smelled a little less, and we climbed back in. The rental place ended up being not as close as Chris had thought, and we paid about A$30 just to cab there.
The rental place co-existed with an Ampol gas station. I wandered around inside while Chris filled out the paperwork. Our car was a little white thing of a variety I have never seen before. With less than 500K on it. (That would be 500 kilometers, not 500,000.) For a “new” car, it certainly drove loudly. It was a manual, which was all good with Chris, except for the fact that the directional lever was on the opposite side from what she was used to, so several times, she turned on the windshield wipers instead, much to her surprise, and my continual amusement. I was to be the navigator so we consulted the thick book of maps we’d gotten from the rental place, and chose our route: down the M1 to the Gold Coast Highway, which would take us within blocks of the beach, and then pulling over to see whatever beaches struck our fancy.
This week had the disadvantage to be “schoolies week”, meaning all the “schoolies are on leave”. This translates in English to the senior high school class being on break. This causes an annual traditional rush of the 18 year olds to the Gold Coast, generally with them getting plastered every night (drinking age here is 18) and spending all day tearing up beaches on the Gold Coast. Surfer’s Paradise is their center of operations, and that was precisely where we were heading.
I got us on the M1 and we soon found the Gold Coast Highway. Both of us were badly in need of coffee, but decided to drive to a beach first and get coffee and watch the ocean. We stopped at nearly the first beach we came to, Harrington, parked the car, paid extortionate prices for two coffees, and sat in the sand marveling at our good fortune with the weather (not hot, but warm and mostly sunny), and remarking on the colors of the water. The beach seemed to be moderately active, with maybe 20 people in our sightline. This is the definition of a crowded beach in Australia.
We got back in the car, and meandered along the main road a block out from the ocean, keeping the beach to our left until we reached Surfer’s Paradise. By this point, we were both quite hungry, so once we found the center, we parked the car as soon as we could, and walked back to see what we could do about breakfast. Surfer’s Paradise was definitely hopping. The average age was probably 18.5, and that would have been the mode too! Schoolies everywhere. The “main drag” in Surfer’s Paradise is a short, sort of half block that is pedestrian only. It ends on the beach with the famous Surfer’s Paradise sign (which you’ll see in my pictures). We got some money from the ATM, and found an outdoor café from which to get breakfast, both of us selecting the typical Aussie breakfast of eggs, toast, and bacon which was the special. (Yeah, yeah, I know. Bacon.) We also had fresh squeezed orange juice. We sat people-watching and got into a very interesting discussion about racism.
After breakfast, we walked along the beach for a few blocks back to the car. We had already decided to keep driving to find a quieter spot to spend an hour or so, and we dodged schoolies left and right as we trudged along the beach. Although we were not interested in fighting them off now that we’re o-l-d, how cool must it be to be 18 here, out of school, rent a cheap apartment with five or six friends, and spend a week on the beaches?
I directed us to Nobby Beach, partially because I liked the name, and partially because it looked a little smaller than some of the other beaches on our route, so I thought it might be less crowded. It turned out to be beautiful. Three guys were para-surfing, and a few other people were around, but all in all it was lovely. We lathered up with sunscreen and tested the water temperature. WARM. After a few minutes, we stripped off our shirts and waded in, Chris a lot faster than me because, on that walk to the water, I’d spotted a jellyfish on the shore, about the size of a tennis ball. “Oh, it’s just a baby,” Chris had said, and went on in. I rationalized, “Well, there’s only one, so it probably just got lost.” Eventually, the water won me over and we spent a little while wave jumping and mucking about. Proper swimming was impossible since the current was too strong and the surf too high. The other strange thing was that the level of the sandy bottom changed constantly. You’d be up high so that the water was only ankle height, and then take a step and fall in to your waist. It was very strange. But that still meant that we didn’t venture too far out because the signs warned about getting too far out of your “depth”. (And yes, we were taking care to stay within the lifeguard flags.)
Eventually, we got out, wrapped up in our towels and took a bit of a walk up the beach. Suddenly, we were passing loads of beached jellyfish, some small blueies, most the tennis ball sized clear ones like we’d seen before, and then we came along a melon-sized blue one. I was very glad we’d gone in the water before we took our walk, or else I knew I wouldn’t have gone in!! We walked back to car, pulled on some clothes, dropped our towels in the trunk, and walked to the store on the corner to get a cold drink. As we sipped our beverages, we walked a block further inland and wandered up the road along the highway, stopping in a second-hand bookstore, and briefly contemplating postcards in a window. As we walked back to the car, Chris said she’d like to drive inland to see the countryside. That was fine with me; I was just happy to be out and about. As I tossed some trash into the bin, she browsed the map, and selected the destination, a lake 40-ish kilometers inland. We chose the route, and my navigating began again. We drove through beautiful country vistas on rolling hills for the next half an hour. It was amazing how quickly the scenery changed from beach to lush green. Intrigued by a road called “Panorama”, we turned off our route and found ourselves on a very steep incline. Up and up we drove, until we could see the most amazing skyline of the buildings in the towns along the Gold Coast. The view was incredible. We pulled over several times to take tons of pictures.
After a brief debate about how much time we had left (we needed to be back by 5, we figured, so we could shower and attend the pre-conference reception at 6), we drove on to the lake, having lunch at a café overlooking it. Right on schedule at 3:30, we got back in the car, and drove over the dam, to take a different route back. After a while, we were back on the M1 heading north toward Brisbane. Chris had wanted to take a bigger loop to get back, but time constraints didn’t permit it. We stopped at the supermarket across from the car rental place and I bought the groceries Lyn had suggested (bread, milk, OJ, tea). Then, we dropped the car off, had a taxi called, and were back at the hotel minutes shy of 5 PM. It had been a great day. Chris said it was her favorite day since she’d arrived.
We headed back to our own rooms, showered, and then met up to sit by the pool for a few minutes. We each had a beer from Chris’ mini-fridge. Shortly, we joined Kakali and Kakali’s mother and headed to the reception. The reception was at Griffith University, the site of the conference, which is five minutes down the road from the hotel and across the street. Apparently, we’d just missed the shuttle going there, so we decided to walk. Once on campus however, we found ourselves walking on a steep path through the bush, and had no idea where to go. We found a security office with no one in it, and called security on an information phone. They didn’t know where the reception was. No signs were posted either. We used the payphone to call the hotel, who had, 20 minutes previous, not known where the reception was either, but now the shuttle bus had come back and said that it was in the “Club Room”. Asking people on campus where that was was no use, so we called security again, and they directed us. We arrived around 7.
Beautiful bags with various junk and conference information were distributed. I chose the last with sulfur-crested cockatoos on it, stealing it out from under Chris’ hands. She took one with other birds, although I know she had wanted the cockatoos, but had complained to me earlier in the week that she was never going to use the bag anyway (since it promotes QSR), and so therefore, I felt justified! I will use mine!
The initial idea had been to go out to dinner with Supriya, the woman chairing our panel, but already Chris and I knew we didn’t want to do that, having been out all day. So when that idea surfaced again, we politely declined, agreeing instead to a “huddle” later on. We accepted glasses of red wine, grabbed some hors d’oeuvres and attempted to socialize. We met Jenine, the conference organizer with whom I’ve corresponded a lot. She was completely unlike I’d envisioned her, much younger and more smiley. I quizzed her about my set-up for the presentation the next day, and Chris cornered her for other things. I met Leonie Daws, whose name I’ve always heard tossed around, but who I had never actually met. It is some of Leonie’s data that made the Bush Schooling tutorial in NVivo. Our huddle was less than satisfactory, since, although I was able to tear Dan away from Tom, Lyn seemed reluctant to join us, and came into the conversation late. Finally Supriya agreed to give Chris seven minutes to present her paper, the basis of our panel discussion, for Kakali to have five minutes, and for the rest of us to have two minutes. The order would be Chris, Kakali, myself, Dan, and then Lyn. Remember the details of this because this will reappear in tomorrow’s journaling.
What happened between that point and the end of the evening I don’t have a good memory of, so the following are just impressions I had, with some very specific things that I do recall. I ended up outside with Chris who was having a cigarette, and we tried to make plans for Thursday and Friday. Except it turned out that as soon as we made plans, we had to change them because of the conference schedule not working the way we needed! We’d originally thought about bailing on the conference after lunch on Friday, missing just a couple paper sessions to head into Brisbane instead. But then it turned out that Kakali’s paper was on Friday afternoon, so we didn’t want to not be there. (My paper, btw, was FIRST up on Thursday morning.) Second plan was to bail on Thursday, after the panel, only missing one session, and go into the city, have dinner there. But we’d forgotten about the conference dinner in Brisbane on Thursday night for which we were all registered. So we decided we’d go into the city after the panel and meet up with the group again for dinner. I got the information from Jenine (who seemed a bit drunk) while Chris got us more wine. At some point, Kakali came out to join us, and we were all pretty buzzed. I had decided at that point that I probably should stop drinking, estimating that I’d had three glasses of wine (plus the beer earlier). But somehow, that didn’t happen, and Chris kept using her blond wiles to get more wine from the bartender. We had originally intended to leave the reception early so we all could work on our presentations… but that plan got scrapped when it became obvious we were all more into the wine. I stayed about one glass behind Kakali and Chris, and we had a rollicking evening. I kept stealing Chris’ cigarettes and lighter, which gave me great amusement, and frustrated her in (what seemed) a hilarious way, particularly the first time when she tore her purse apart for twenty minutes before accusing me of nicking them. I gave them back, but not her lighter. J When she came around the table to get her cigarettes and was reaching for my pockets, I remember carefully grabbing her hand in a wristlock and pinning her up against the wall! (WARNING: I DO NOT ADVISE THIS AT ALL. DO NOT USE KARATE WHEN DRUNK.)
Another part I recall is that somehow, both Chris and Kakali had decided that I don’t swear enough, so were trying to get me to say “fuck” all evening. I think I swear plenty, and I’m sure I’d sworn in front of them, even, but the fact that suddenly they were trying to get me to swear was a challenge to keep my language really clean and this became a joke for the rest of the week, actually. Every time I said something… erm… colorful… they would shoot significant looks at each other.
When the bartender came over to clear glasses, both Chris and Kakali flirted with him, giving him their business cards, and Chris started telling him that she’s a DJ, were their good clubs in Brisbane, and could she get drugs there(!!!!). I couldn’t tell if she was serious or just putting him on. He obviously recognized the fact that all of us were drunk, and when they asked him for another glass of wine (having not finished what they had), he asked if they wanted water instead. They said no, but I said yes, please, water would be great. He brought water over, much to their disappointment. Right about then, the only other people sitting outside, a table of women including Jenine, also all drunk, invited us to join them, so we did. One woman commented to Chris that she had finally found a fellow smoker, and I took the woman’s pack of cigarettes when she wasn’t looking. I had already taken Chris’ again.
(Continued 28 November 2004)
(I asked Chris if yesterday (Saturday) if she remembered any of what led us to be drunk on Wednesday night, and she said that she had just gone in for one more glass of wine and was going to have one more cigarette and then we were going to go, but when she got to the bar, Tom pulled her aside and told her how much he really liked her paper. And in the 15 minutes he was talking to her, she had drunk her glass of wine, so grabbed another one for her and for me, and came back outside, but then Kakali was there, and we just kept going.)
But now back to the story…
Chris and Kakali went inside to go the bathroom, but neither of them made it out of the room, since Chris started talking with Tom again and Kakali with Lyn. After ten minutes of unusually gregariousness from me with the group of women I didn’t know, many of whom had flown in that day, so were repeating that they weren’t drunk, just jetlagged, I excused myself, collected Kakali and Chris’ bags and belongings and went to find them to just go back to the hotel. It was easily 11:30 at this point. I grabbed Chris’ arm and said “Come on; we’re going,” and she said something about wanting to shake Tom’s hand, but that Tom had said handshakes weren’t her style – so they hugged. (This was later a source of slight embarrassment to Chris, I think…) I joked to Tom, “Do not tell Michael about this [my being drunk].” “Tell what to Michael who?” he said. I escorted Chris out the door, despite her protest that she had 3/4s of a glass of wine not yet finished. I told her she had finished it. We detached Kakali from Lyn and both Chris and Kakali stopped at the bathroom. I stood in the hall with their stuff. I wanted to go to the bathroom too, but was worried they’d wander off if I wasn’t there!
Thus began the stumbling journey home. I was hoping that being outside in fresh air might clear my head some, but no luck. I was clinging to the last edges of sobriety, and trying to herd them both home. Chris repeated a few times that her shoes were “lesbian academic” shoes, and she kept stopping to show us them, so I told her that that was all fine, but now we were headed to the “lesbian academic bedroom” just to keep her moving! She counted each stair on the way down on the path, holding on to the rails on both sides. Kakali was complaining her bag was heavy so I took it from her. All I wanted to do was get everyone home safely. We approached the highway we needed to cross, and I warned them that there were cars and it was dangerous so we’d have to proceed carefully. Chris told us that we’d wait for the “green man” (on the crossing sign) and we agreed that was a good idea. We held hands crossing the street. I felt like they were little kids. Got across the street and headed toward the hotel, me walking on the outside nearest the traffic, just in case. Kakali kept stopping to pick flowers from the gorgeous huge bushes peeking over the fence on the other side of the sidewalk (footpath).
We took Chris to her room, and she and Kakali collapsed on the bed as I rushed into the bathroom. I heard this tremendous crash and hurriedly came out to find Chris on the floor after having fallen off the bed! I grabbed her camera and took a picture. She managed to get back on the bed, and, unable to find cups, I took two bottles of water out of the minibar and gave one to each of them, demanding they drink. Both took one mouthful and lay back down. No no, I said, have more water. They refused, so I said okay, each of them needed to have one more big drink and then I’d leave them alone about it. They did, and I suggested to Kakali we leave Chris to go to sleep. That took some convincing since Kakali had decided she was going to stay at Chris’, but I said that wasn’t an option and finally she got herself off the bed and toward the door. I agreed with Chris that I should take her room key, just in case I needed to get in in the morning – or later that night if something went wrong, I thought. I left the bottle of water for her next to the bed, said goodnight, and turned off the light.
Kakali needed to get stuff from her parents’ room, which I thought wasn’t a great idea, given her state, but she said she could act sober (yeah right). We arranged to meet again in five minutes on the stairs, and I went up to Reception to book our shuttle for the next morning. I didn’t realize how inebriated I was until I was trying my best to pretend I wasn’t in order to get the shuttle arranged with the clerk there. I did manage it, but I was suddenly noticing I was having problems seeing straight; my eyes felt like I didn’t have them open all the way, and they felt dry, whereas my jaw was really hurting whenever I tried to talk. (Mom, Dad – I’m sure you’re both horrified right about now, but believe me when I tell you this is TOTALLY unlike me and not something I’m likely to do a lot in future. I didn’t drink at all in college, and this experience, which generally happens to everyone else much earlier in life, probably had to happen to me eventually!) I met Kakali again and we walked to our suite, me releasing my grip on sobriety for the walk so I could ramble to Kakali, exaggerating my shuttle arrangement experience just to crack her up. We entered the suite quietly so as not to wake Lyn and Tom, but they weren’t back yet. Kakali crashed onto her bed, and I got her a glass of water, putting it on her nightstand and telling her to drink it. She grabbed my hand and thanked me for taking care of her, and I turned out her light and closed her door.
I brushed my teeth and washed my face, thinking how strange it was that the two girls had just wound up in bed, and here I was doing my evening ritual like everything was normal. Lyn and Tom came in, and my first thought was to just avoid them and go to bed, so I said goodnight and slipped into my room. Then I had this thought that maybe they’d want to know we were okay, so I went back out into the hall, and walked up to Tom. I have this impression that I was standing much closer to him than usual, looking up at him. I phrased my words carefully and slowly, “I just thought you’d like to know,” I said, “That we’re all here and safe.” “Thank you for telling us,” he nodded solemnly, “Goodnight.” I went into my room, opened my bottle of water, procured from my plane flight weeks ago, and had a big drink, then lay down, room spinning.
I slept a few hours, but woke up at 2:15 feeling very ill. Worse, I knew that even getting sick at that point wasn’t going to clear the alcohol from my system. I drank more water and made a few trips to the bathroom, sitting up in my bed in between. I couldn’t find a washcloth and my head was hurting so I drenched a towel and put that on my head. At one point, I was in the bathroom thinking maybe I’d just have a little lie down on the floor since the tile looked so cool and inviting. (Later, Chris would tell me that that’s a really good way to know that you’re definitely not okay – at no other time would lying on the bathroom floor seem like an attractive thing to do.) I also wondered if the platelet donation system would be able to be set up to filter alcohol out of one arm and give me back the clean blood in the other. Unfortunately, I hardly slept again that night.
Lyn, on Tuesday night, had asked my plans for Wednesday. When I told her we were going to the Gold Coast, she grimaced. “Ugh, why?” she asked. “Because I’ve never been there,” I replied. “Ever been to Miami?” she said, obviously making a comparison. “No,” I said. “Why not?” she said. “Because I can’t drive there, or take a bus,” I said. “Most Australians consider the Gold Coast to be a blot on the continent,” she said. “I’ll let you know if I agree with them tomorrow night,” I replied.
Although I related the story to Chris on Wednesday morning, it did not put us off our day trip. We called a cab from reception to take us to the place from which Chris had rented a car for us, and soon after, found ourselves in a car smelling very much of B.O. The driver didn’t speak very good English and seemed to not know where he was going. Chris had a map and the two of us in the backseat kept referring to it to try to figure out if we were at all headed in the right direction. The cab driver pulled into a building parking lot and said he wanted to change cabs, something wasn’t working right in that one, and indicated we should get out and wait at the curb. We got out and he drove into a big garage, which I now noticed did have the name of the cab company on it. “Thought something really dodgy was about to happen there!” Chris laughed to me. A few moments later, the driver came back in a different car that smelled a little less, and we climbed back in. The rental place ended up being not as close as Chris had thought, and we paid about A$30 just to cab there.
The rental place co-existed with an Ampol gas station. I wandered around inside while Chris filled out the paperwork. Our car was a little white thing of a variety I have never seen before. With less than 500K on it. (That would be 500 kilometers, not 500,000.) For a “new” car, it certainly drove loudly. It was a manual, which was all good with Chris, except for the fact that the directional lever was on the opposite side from what she was used to, so several times, she turned on the windshield wipers instead, much to her surprise, and my continual amusement. I was to be the navigator so we consulted the thick book of maps we’d gotten from the rental place, and chose our route: down the M1 to the Gold Coast Highway, which would take us within blocks of the beach, and then pulling over to see whatever beaches struck our fancy.
This week had the disadvantage to be “schoolies week”, meaning all the “schoolies are on leave”. This translates in English to the senior high school class being on break. This causes an annual traditional rush of the 18 year olds to the Gold Coast, generally with them getting plastered every night (drinking age here is 18) and spending all day tearing up beaches on the Gold Coast. Surfer’s Paradise is their center of operations, and that was precisely where we were heading.
I got us on the M1 and we soon found the Gold Coast Highway. Both of us were badly in need of coffee, but decided to drive to a beach first and get coffee and watch the ocean. We stopped at nearly the first beach we came to, Harrington, parked the car, paid extortionate prices for two coffees, and sat in the sand marveling at our good fortune with the weather (not hot, but warm and mostly sunny), and remarking on the colors of the water. The beach seemed to be moderately active, with maybe 20 people in our sightline. This is the definition of a crowded beach in Australia.
We got back in the car, and meandered along the main road a block out from the ocean, keeping the beach to our left until we reached Surfer’s Paradise. By this point, we were both quite hungry, so once we found the center, we parked the car as soon as we could, and walked back to see what we could do about breakfast. Surfer’s Paradise was definitely hopping. The average age was probably 18.5, and that would have been the mode too! Schoolies everywhere. The “main drag” in Surfer’s Paradise is a short, sort of half block that is pedestrian only. It ends on the beach with the famous Surfer’s Paradise sign (which you’ll see in my pictures). We got some money from the ATM, and found an outdoor café from which to get breakfast, both of us selecting the typical Aussie breakfast of eggs, toast, and bacon which was the special. (Yeah, yeah, I know. Bacon.) We also had fresh squeezed orange juice. We sat people-watching and got into a very interesting discussion about racism.
After breakfast, we walked along the beach for a few blocks back to the car. We had already decided to keep driving to find a quieter spot to spend an hour or so, and we dodged schoolies left and right as we trudged along the beach. Although we were not interested in fighting them off now that we’re o-l-d, how cool must it be to be 18 here, out of school, rent a cheap apartment with five or six friends, and spend a week on the beaches?
I directed us to Nobby Beach, partially because I liked the name, and partially because it looked a little smaller than some of the other beaches on our route, so I thought it might be less crowded. It turned out to be beautiful. Three guys were para-surfing, and a few other people were around, but all in all it was lovely. We lathered up with sunscreen and tested the water temperature. WARM. After a few minutes, we stripped off our shirts and waded in, Chris a lot faster than me because, on that walk to the water, I’d spotted a jellyfish on the shore, about the size of a tennis ball. “Oh, it’s just a baby,” Chris had said, and went on in. I rationalized, “Well, there’s only one, so it probably just got lost.” Eventually, the water won me over and we spent a little while wave jumping and mucking about. Proper swimming was impossible since the current was too strong and the surf too high. The other strange thing was that the level of the sandy bottom changed constantly. You’d be up high so that the water was only ankle height, and then take a step and fall in to your waist. It was very strange. But that still meant that we didn’t venture too far out because the signs warned about getting too far out of your “depth”. (And yes, we were taking care to stay within the lifeguard flags.)
Eventually, we got out, wrapped up in our towels and took a bit of a walk up the beach. Suddenly, we were passing loads of beached jellyfish, some small blueies, most the tennis ball sized clear ones like we’d seen before, and then we came along a melon-sized blue one. I was very glad we’d gone in the water before we took our walk, or else I knew I wouldn’t have gone in!! We walked back to car, pulled on some clothes, dropped our towels in the trunk, and walked to the store on the corner to get a cold drink. As we sipped our beverages, we walked a block further inland and wandered up the road along the highway, stopping in a second-hand bookstore, and briefly contemplating postcards in a window. As we walked back to the car, Chris said she’d like to drive inland to see the countryside. That was fine with me; I was just happy to be out and about. As I tossed some trash into the bin, she browsed the map, and selected the destination, a lake 40-ish kilometers inland. We chose the route, and my navigating began again. We drove through beautiful country vistas on rolling hills for the next half an hour. It was amazing how quickly the scenery changed from beach to lush green. Intrigued by a road called “Panorama”, we turned off our route and found ourselves on a very steep incline. Up and up we drove, until we could see the most amazing skyline of the buildings in the towns along the Gold Coast. The view was incredible. We pulled over several times to take tons of pictures.
After a brief debate about how much time we had left (we needed to be back by 5, we figured, so we could shower and attend the pre-conference reception at 6), we drove on to the lake, having lunch at a café overlooking it. Right on schedule at 3:30, we got back in the car, and drove over the dam, to take a different route back. After a while, we were back on the M1 heading north toward Brisbane. Chris had wanted to take a bigger loop to get back, but time constraints didn’t permit it. We stopped at the supermarket across from the car rental place and I bought the groceries Lyn had suggested (bread, milk, OJ, tea). Then, we dropped the car off, had a taxi called, and were back at the hotel minutes shy of 5 PM. It had been a great day. Chris said it was her favorite day since she’d arrived.
We headed back to our own rooms, showered, and then met up to sit by the pool for a few minutes. We each had a beer from Chris’ mini-fridge. Shortly, we joined Kakali and Kakali’s mother and headed to the reception. The reception was at Griffith University, the site of the conference, which is five minutes down the road from the hotel and across the street. Apparently, we’d just missed the shuttle going there, so we decided to walk. Once on campus however, we found ourselves walking on a steep path through the bush, and had no idea where to go. We found a security office with no one in it, and called security on an information phone. They didn’t know where the reception was. No signs were posted either. We used the payphone to call the hotel, who had, 20 minutes previous, not known where the reception was either, but now the shuttle bus had come back and said that it was in the “Club Room”. Asking people on campus where that was was no use, so we called security again, and they directed us. We arrived around 7.
Beautiful bags with various junk and conference information were distributed. I chose the last with sulfur-crested cockatoos on it, stealing it out from under Chris’ hands. She took one with other birds, although I know she had wanted the cockatoos, but had complained to me earlier in the week that she was never going to use the bag anyway (since it promotes QSR), and so therefore, I felt justified! I will use mine!
The initial idea had been to go out to dinner with Supriya, the woman chairing our panel, but already Chris and I knew we didn’t want to do that, having been out all day. So when that idea surfaced again, we politely declined, agreeing instead to a “huddle” later on. We accepted glasses of red wine, grabbed some hors d’oeuvres and attempted to socialize. We met Jenine, the conference organizer with whom I’ve corresponded a lot. She was completely unlike I’d envisioned her, much younger and more smiley. I quizzed her about my set-up for the presentation the next day, and Chris cornered her for other things. I met Leonie Daws, whose name I’ve always heard tossed around, but who I had never actually met. It is some of Leonie’s data that made the Bush Schooling tutorial in NVivo. Our huddle was less than satisfactory, since, although I was able to tear Dan away from Tom, Lyn seemed reluctant to join us, and came into the conversation late. Finally Supriya agreed to give Chris seven minutes to present her paper, the basis of our panel discussion, for Kakali to have five minutes, and for the rest of us to have two minutes. The order would be Chris, Kakali, myself, Dan, and then Lyn. Remember the details of this because this will reappear in tomorrow’s journaling.
What happened between that point and the end of the evening I don’t have a good memory of, so the following are just impressions I had, with some very specific things that I do recall. I ended up outside with Chris who was having a cigarette, and we tried to make plans for Thursday and Friday. Except it turned out that as soon as we made plans, we had to change them because of the conference schedule not working the way we needed! We’d originally thought about bailing on the conference after lunch on Friday, missing just a couple paper sessions to head into Brisbane instead. But then it turned out that Kakali’s paper was on Friday afternoon, so we didn’t want to not be there. (My paper, btw, was FIRST up on Thursday morning.) Second plan was to bail on Thursday, after the panel, only missing one session, and go into the city, have dinner there. But we’d forgotten about the conference dinner in Brisbane on Thursday night for which we were all registered. So we decided we’d go into the city after the panel and meet up with the group again for dinner. I got the information from Jenine (who seemed a bit drunk) while Chris got us more wine. At some point, Kakali came out to join us, and we were all pretty buzzed. I had decided at that point that I probably should stop drinking, estimating that I’d had three glasses of wine (plus the beer earlier). But somehow, that didn’t happen, and Chris kept using her blond wiles to get more wine from the bartender. We had originally intended to leave the reception early so we all could work on our presentations… but that plan got scrapped when it became obvious we were all more into the wine. I stayed about one glass behind Kakali and Chris, and we had a rollicking evening. I kept stealing Chris’ cigarettes and lighter, which gave me great amusement, and frustrated her in (what seemed) a hilarious way, particularly the first time when she tore her purse apart for twenty minutes before accusing me of nicking them. I gave them back, but not her lighter. J When she came around the table to get her cigarettes and was reaching for my pockets, I remember carefully grabbing her hand in a wristlock and pinning her up against the wall! (WARNING: I DO NOT ADVISE THIS AT ALL. DO NOT USE KARATE WHEN DRUNK.)
Another part I recall is that somehow, both Chris and Kakali had decided that I don’t swear enough, so were trying to get me to say “fuck” all evening. I think I swear plenty, and I’m sure I’d sworn in front of them, even, but the fact that suddenly they were trying to get me to swear was a challenge to keep my language really clean and this became a joke for the rest of the week, actually. Every time I said something… erm… colorful… they would shoot significant looks at each other.
When the bartender came over to clear glasses, both Chris and Kakali flirted with him, giving him their business cards, and Chris started telling him that she’s a DJ, were their good clubs in Brisbane, and could she get drugs there(!!!!). I couldn’t tell if she was serious or just putting him on. He obviously recognized the fact that all of us were drunk, and when they asked him for another glass of wine (having not finished what they had), he asked if they wanted water instead. They said no, but I said yes, please, water would be great. He brought water over, much to their disappointment. Right about then, the only other people sitting outside, a table of women including Jenine, also all drunk, invited us to join them, so we did. One woman commented to Chris that she had finally found a fellow smoker, and I took the woman’s pack of cigarettes when she wasn’t looking. I had already taken Chris’ again.
(Continued 28 November 2004)
(I asked Chris if yesterday (Saturday) if she remembered any of what led us to be drunk on Wednesday night, and she said that she had just gone in for one more glass of wine and was going to have one more cigarette and then we were going to go, but when she got to the bar, Tom pulled her aside and told her how much he really liked her paper. And in the 15 minutes he was talking to her, she had drunk her glass of wine, so grabbed another one for her and for me, and came back outside, but then Kakali was there, and we just kept going.)
But now back to the story…
Chris and Kakali went inside to go the bathroom, but neither of them made it out of the room, since Chris started talking with Tom again and Kakali with Lyn. After ten minutes of unusually gregariousness from me with the group of women I didn’t know, many of whom had flown in that day, so were repeating that they weren’t drunk, just jetlagged, I excused myself, collected Kakali and Chris’ bags and belongings and went to find them to just go back to the hotel. It was easily 11:30 at this point. I grabbed Chris’ arm and said “Come on; we’re going,” and she said something about wanting to shake Tom’s hand, but that Tom had said handshakes weren’t her style – so they hugged. (This was later a source of slight embarrassment to Chris, I think…) I joked to Tom, “Do not tell Michael about this [my being drunk].” “Tell what to Michael who?” he said. I escorted Chris out the door, despite her protest that she had 3/4s of a glass of wine not yet finished. I told her she had finished it. We detached Kakali from Lyn and both Chris and Kakali stopped at the bathroom. I stood in the hall with their stuff. I wanted to go to the bathroom too, but was worried they’d wander off if I wasn’t there!
Thus began the stumbling journey home. I was hoping that being outside in fresh air might clear my head some, but no luck. I was clinging to the last edges of sobriety, and trying to herd them both home. Chris repeated a few times that her shoes were “lesbian academic” shoes, and she kept stopping to show us them, so I told her that that was all fine, but now we were headed to the “lesbian academic bedroom” just to keep her moving! She counted each stair on the way down on the path, holding on to the rails on both sides. Kakali was complaining her bag was heavy so I took it from her. All I wanted to do was get everyone home safely. We approached the highway we needed to cross, and I warned them that there were cars and it was dangerous so we’d have to proceed carefully. Chris told us that we’d wait for the “green man” (on the crossing sign) and we agreed that was a good idea. We held hands crossing the street. I felt like they were little kids. Got across the street and headed toward the hotel, me walking on the outside nearest the traffic, just in case. Kakali kept stopping to pick flowers from the gorgeous huge bushes peeking over the fence on the other side of the sidewalk (footpath).
We took Chris to her room, and she and Kakali collapsed on the bed as I rushed into the bathroom. I heard this tremendous crash and hurriedly came out to find Chris on the floor after having fallen off the bed! I grabbed her camera and took a picture. She managed to get back on the bed, and, unable to find cups, I took two bottles of water out of the minibar and gave one to each of them, demanding they drink. Both took one mouthful and lay back down. No no, I said, have more water. They refused, so I said okay, each of them needed to have one more big drink and then I’d leave them alone about it. They did, and I suggested to Kakali we leave Chris to go to sleep. That took some convincing since Kakali had decided she was going to stay at Chris’, but I said that wasn’t an option and finally she got herself off the bed and toward the door. I agreed with Chris that I should take her room key, just in case I needed to get in in the morning – or later that night if something went wrong, I thought. I left the bottle of water for her next to the bed, said goodnight, and turned off the light.
Kakali needed to get stuff from her parents’ room, which I thought wasn’t a great idea, given her state, but she said she could act sober (yeah right). We arranged to meet again in five minutes on the stairs, and I went up to Reception to book our shuttle for the next morning. I didn’t realize how inebriated I was until I was trying my best to pretend I wasn’t in order to get the shuttle arranged with the clerk there. I did manage it, but I was suddenly noticing I was having problems seeing straight; my eyes felt like I didn’t have them open all the way, and they felt dry, whereas my jaw was really hurting whenever I tried to talk. (Mom, Dad – I’m sure you’re both horrified right about now, but believe me when I tell you this is TOTALLY unlike me and not something I’m likely to do a lot in future. I didn’t drink at all in college, and this experience, which generally happens to everyone else much earlier in life, probably had to happen to me eventually!) I met Kakali again and we walked to our suite, me releasing my grip on sobriety for the walk so I could ramble to Kakali, exaggerating my shuttle arrangement experience just to crack her up. We entered the suite quietly so as not to wake Lyn and Tom, but they weren’t back yet. Kakali crashed onto her bed, and I got her a glass of water, putting it on her nightstand and telling her to drink it. She grabbed my hand and thanked me for taking care of her, and I turned out her light and closed her door.
I brushed my teeth and washed my face, thinking how strange it was that the two girls had just wound up in bed, and here I was doing my evening ritual like everything was normal. Lyn and Tom came in, and my first thought was to just avoid them and go to bed, so I said goodnight and slipped into my room. Then I had this thought that maybe they’d want to know we were okay, so I went back out into the hall, and walked up to Tom. I have this impression that I was standing much closer to him than usual, looking up at him. I phrased my words carefully and slowly, “I just thought you’d like to know,” I said, “That we’re all here and safe.” “Thank you for telling us,” he nodded solemnly, “Goodnight.” I went into my room, opened my bottle of water, procured from my plane flight weeks ago, and had a big drink, then lay down, room spinning.
I slept a few hours, but woke up at 2:15 feeling very ill. Worse, I knew that even getting sick at that point wasn’t going to clear the alcohol from my system. I drank more water and made a few trips to the bathroom, sitting up in my bed in between. I couldn’t find a washcloth and my head was hurting so I drenched a towel and put that on my head. At one point, I was in the bathroom thinking maybe I’d just have a little lie down on the floor since the tile looked so cool and inviting. (Later, Chris would tell me that that’s a really good way to know that you’re definitely not okay – at no other time would lying on the bathroom floor seem like an attractive thing to do.) I also wondered if the platelet donation system would be able to be set up to filter alcohol out of one arm and give me back the clean blood in the other. Unfortunately, I hardly slept again that night.
posted by Jen at 7:28 PM
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