there are innocent bystanders EVERYWHERE

So tomorrow I'm going to a convention. Like, an important one. Where people will probably show up in slacks. The last time I went to a con people showed up in their underwear and body paint and posed for pictures and I was kind of belligerent for, um, the entire thing. I sort of wanted to step it up for this one... you know, leave the rum at home and wear pants. Little things.

I was even going to wear slacks until I realized that I had to do laundry to do that, since I wear slacks for my something-like-work. I'd had a shit day that day, in the sense that in the middle of a lecture I was giving I started cramping up so hard if I were a lesser person (and I am NEVER a lesser person) I would have had to cry. So I figured I still had clean capris, and that meant I wouldn't be wandering around in my panties, and that's about as good as it's going to get for these people anyway.

But I knew I still had things to do, which involved shopping. My only painkiller available to me right now is a little prescription for 'Percocet,' a bottle of close to 200 pills that I got as a gifty when I had a sunburn so severe I kept throwing up and couldn't get up to do so into the toilet. I figured my cramps, while not on that level, were still pretty bad. Blinded by pain, I took two.

Vicodin is a painkiller that just sort of makes me sleepy and does nothing to actually kill the pain. Percocet, on the other hand, not only makes the pain STFU and GTFO but I then feel the urge to giggle for about two hours and feel the carpet.

I believe the kids nowadays are calling that 'blitzed out of their mind.'

Remember, I still had things to do. This involved driving approximately five minutes, pulling into a parking lot, and the full effect of the pills hitting me while pulling into a spot.

I started frantically IMing with my friend on my space phone, having a mild panic attack as I remembered how to blink. I knew I was there to buy a shirt for my Halloween costume but I wasn't quite sure how to go about doing that. I still have no idea how potheads function if this is their life:

Me: I think I can make it into Ross.
Her: Alright, be safe...
Me: Fuck. I'm here. There are so many goddamn shirts.
Her: Take it one step at a time.
Her: How high ARE you?
Me: I can talk with you. And I can recognize the color blue. That is the level of my functioning atm.
Her: ...this is so very entertaining.
Me: Shit, where am I? Please tell me you know. There are shoes everywhere. I don't think I wanted shoes.

I did manage to find shirts of a sort. I also found gloves, pillows, the roof, and random strangers who spoke French. I think. At one point I sat down on a pillow and just stared, hoping a kind stranger would help me out. No such luck, I mean, I was in a discount store.

I did make it home. Driving through a parking lot while high? Jesus H. Christ there are at least five times more people around when you're high. And also it was 'drive like an asshole' day. Nobody told me, and it really sucks to be confused and trippin' balls. But I'm alive.

And sometimes it's the little victories you have to focus on.