Not so random thought
I’m not saying that I’ve been drunk for four days straight, I’m just saying that if my mother hadn’t been as strict as she was when I was growing up, I would have been dead at 17.
I’m not saying that I’ve been drunk for four days straight, I’m just saying that if my mother hadn’t been as strict as she was when I was growing up, I would have been dead at 17.
February 19th, 2008 at 5:22 pm
For a girl who never gets drunk, that’s a lot of drunk.
February 19th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
I’m not saying I was drunk.
February 19th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
I’m not saying you’re a liar, but you sure do tell some lies.
February 26th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
[...] Hi, I’m Dusky Winters. I used to have my own blog. But it was deemed “too dark” and shutdown after only two posts. Two really good posts. Anyway, Dawn evidently still has political aspirations and didn’t want to lose the electoral vote heavy states of Florida, California and Texas, though I can’t imagine the plastic surgeries she’s got planned in order to win Texas. So, she thought it best that I do the post about our trip to Mexico for Elena’s wedding. And since it’s not like I’m busy doing anything but google stalking the people on my enemies list, I said I’d do it. So, Elena’s getting married and she’s chosen a destination wedding. Great. Unfortunately, Dawn is a lazy two-bit procrastinator, so she didn’t even rsvp for the wedding until receiving threatening emails from Elena about being served the vegetarian meal and the peanut butter penuche bar dessert. (Funny story: Dawn worked in the college dining hall system for oh…something like 3 days, four hours and 19 minutes. During this illustrious career in food service, not only did she get in daily fights with self absorbed lazy obnoxious over privileged students in her dining hall (not that she has anything but respect for the lazy, self absorbed obnoxious over privileged, to the contrary, she aspires to be them herself one day and believes in them and everything they stand for …right up until the point that she has to clean up the remains of their chocolate milk/coke/fillet of fish food fight to the death which has left ammo smeared across the dining hall tables, floors and walls.) On one occasion, she was put in charge of the dessert counter. After putting out the cups of Jell-O and slices of pie, she was asked to cut peanut butter penuche bar squares. This was a lot harder than it looked. The knife just wouldn’t make straight lines through the hardened sheet of penuche bars. Instead, she kept getting oblong chunks out of the pan. She would manage to salvage a few normal looking squares, but for the most part, she was left with jagged chunks of unappealing penuche bar in her hands. Now, rather than admit that she was having trouble cutting squares of dessert, she decided to hide the evidence of her incompetence the only place she could. Up her ass. No, I’m just kidding. I’ve got Pulp Fiction on in the background and that Christopher Walken just cracks me up. No, no. Dawn ate them. She’d take the non squared pieces and shove them in her mouth. I think she damn near ate half a sheet of penuche bars before realizing that she was struggling to breathe and had broken out in hives from the main ingredient in said penuche bars. Peanut/peanut butter. One epee pen shot later, and a couple of hours on an oxygen tank, she realized the service industry was not for her. She quit the next day. And by quit I mean she never went back, which was awkward because it was actually her dining hall and she had to eat three meals a day there because that’s where she lived.) But back to the story I have actually been hired to tell. Dawn rsvps to the wedding a week and a half before, she tries to get Binda to book a hotel room and plane tickets for her, but Binda being the little plan aheader that she is, has already booked hotel and flight for her and her boyfriend a good two years prior. Even before Elena met her husband. That’s just how good Binda is. Dawn on the other hand, is now scrambling for flights to Mexico, on Valentine’s Day weekend, in the dead of winter. So, basically, she paid a fortune for a seat in the bathroom on a flight which connected in nine different cities. It took 12 hours to get from NYC to Cancun. TWELVE. We arrived in Cancun international airport and a Mexican man stops us as we deplane to ask us for our custom’s ticket. We show it to him and he says we need to fill out the bottom half and sign our name. We step out of the way of the other passengers deplaning behind us and kneel down at a window and complete the rest of the form. “Wow, who knew Mexico had laws,” I thought to myself. Me, Dusky that is. Dawn has nothing but respect for the proud Mexican people and their noble homeland. Done, we walk to the escalators. They are out of order. As is the elevator. We are glad that we managed to shove all of our belongings in one carry-on this time. Something about hearing the disembodied voice of Mary laughing in our faces inspired us to simplify, simplify, simplify. We pick it up and walk down the escalator. The sight downstairs is horrifying. There are hundreds, perhaps tens of hundreds of people standing in a line that snaked around the entire perimeter of the Mexican immigration area. It seems to be divided into two lines, but since they’ve basically melded into one at the tail end, which is most definitely where we are thanks to having to fill out the rest of the form upstairs, it doesn’t even matter. Of course, by applying my rudimentary knowledge of Spanish, I could see that in between these two lines was a column reserved for “Mexicanos.” This line had a dedicated agent and a sign that said “Welcome Home,” in Spanish. This line was empty. After standing on the immigration line for two hours and moving perhaps a foot in total. I was getting more and more impatient staring at the empty “Welcome Home,” line. Of course, that freaking line is empty. Once the Mexicans get out of this place, they aint coming back. Now, if the line had said “Welcome U.S. dollars from your under the table wages,” that line would snake around the whole fracking country. After standing on the immigration line for four hours, I started to get impatient with Mexico as a whole. Dude! What the hell? How are they going to get anything done at all when all they’ve got left are the people who aren’t smart enough to get a coyote to smuggle them into the U.S.? Again, these are my own opinions and do not reflect the opinions of the wholly tolerant Dawn Summers who has long admired the Mexican people and their beautiful countryside. Finally, we get to the front of the line. The Immigration guy stamps our passport and we’re in. In the Customs area that is. Now there is another line, perhaps half as long, but still long, for immigrants to go through Customs. I am now livid. My carry-on, though singular in number, has gotten infinitely more annoying to wheel around. I am wearing winter clothes and the oppressive Mexican heat is stifling me. And then my Nano battery died… (Though I can’t be mad at its impressive 12 hour plus of play stamina). With no music, I lost the will to live. And apparently no longer feared being imprisoned in a Mexican jail as much as I did when I kneeled down by the window to fill out those forms. Because now I was willing to pay whoever I needed to pay to get the hell out of this airport. “Senor, que paso con esta…um…linea?” I said in that accent that used to make my cousins point and laugh and call me gringa when I was little. The little man in the uniform took my passport and asked if I came from Miami. Honestly, we had stopped in so many cities on our way down to Mexico that I couldn’t remember what the last one was, so I said “No. Nueva York.” He said “Ah, okay, come with me.” I was taken to a line about half the size of the line I was on and told to wait. Now, I don’t know if what I’m about to say is a breach of Mexico’s foolproof security system, but here’s what their custom’s process is: “Hello. Please press the green button.” [After one has pressed the green button] “Thank you, welcome to Mexico.” For this I stood in line for forty minutes. My word has this country got a brain drain crisis on its hands. Again, that’s just my opinion. Dawn on the other hand, does not cast any aspersions on the intellect of the Mexican people. Mostly because if she did, she would be hard pressed to explain how she ended up being tricked into a time share scam not even five minutes after passing through customs. A young Mexican lad, wearing a brown uniform and an ID badge asked her if she needed help. She had just waited on the line at the American Express Bureau de Change for twenty minutes to change the $200 she had in her pocket into Mexican pesos. She now had exactly an hour and a half to get from Cancun to Elena’s rehearsal dinner party in Playa del Carmen. The hotel said they were sending a shuttle for her, but our planes were hours late and she figured that the shuttle had left. So when this young man asked her if she needed help she said: “Yes, what’s the best way to get to Playa del Carmen.” “Oh, that is a beautiful city, not as beautiful as you are, but very beautiful.” “Tee hee.” “Come with me and I will show you the map and how to get the shuttle.” “Okay.” Dude, he didn’t even have any candy. For the love of God, how did Dawn survive this long in New York City? Dead at 17, indeed. “Is this your first time in Mexico?” “Yes.” “Ah, well welcome to paradise…How old are you?” “How old do I look?” “23…24?” “I’ll take it. Anything in the twenties.” “Ah, are you single?” “Yes.” “Here or everywhere?” “Tee hee, everywhere.” “Well, while you’re in Playa del Carmen, would you like to enjoy one of our complimentary tours?” “Sure!” “Great. We offer breakfast at this hotel at the Southern tip every morning from 9:30-12 or lunch from 2-5. After the presentation, you will get your complimentary pass for anyone of these exciting tours.” “Umm…okay…” “So, what is your name.” “Dawn Summers.” (Dude, she actually spells out her name for this guy…I mean, her real actual name. Insert head shake.) “Okay, now…it is a requirement that all our members be over 30 and have one of these major credit cards…do you have one of these.” “Um…yeah.” (Okay, true story, really she still didn’t realize anything was up until right now when she was thinking…wait a minute…over 30??? Who you calling over 30, pendejo.) “Well, we’ll need to take an impression of the card just to reserve your –” “Look, actually, I’ve got to go. I’m late for a wedding, sorry,” she said wheeling her bag in the direction of the sliding doors. She got a seat on one of the passenger vans and when she was told the fare would be $24, she asked “um…pesos?” The driver laughed and said “No, American dollars.” Oh great, I’m so glad I waited on line for half an hour, paid a currency exchange fee, just to go out into a country that accepts American dollars everywhere. In fact, they probably sell their middle and youngest children just to get their hands on an American dollar. Bastards. The van ride was interminable. We sat at the end of the first row, so we had to get out every time the shuttle stopped at another hotel to drop off passengers. Finally, the only passengers left were us and a couple from Chicago. We were staying at the hotel del Cielo. So, when the shuttle pulled into a driveway with a huge engraved marble sign with the words Hotel del Cielo and the silhouette of a moon carved in, we started to get our stuff together and make for the door. That’s when we noticed that while the sign was lovely, all that was behind it was a dirt road and two Mexicans with a wheelbarrow. The Chicago couple started to laugh. “Looks, like you’re a couple of years early for your reservation.” Now, Dawn has made some vacation planning blunders before, but she’s pretty sure that her reservation is for 2008. She starts to rifle through her purse for the confirmation printout. Whew. The driver comes back on the bus and says “Hotel del Cielo esta en Playa del Carmen?” “Si!” Dawn confidently answers. “Um…estamos aqui in Playa del Carmen,” she asked way less confidently… “No,” the driver said and they were off again. I don’t know where we were at that point, but it took another hour to get to Playa del Carmen. And even then our driver had to ask three separate times to get directions to our hotel. He finally decided to drop the Chicago couple off first and put off the search for the elusive Hotel del Cielo till later. “Goodbye,” the Chicago couple said to us as they took their bags off the bus and looked at our sad, sweaty, dejected faces, “if he can’t find your hotel, you’re free to crash here with us.” Dawn quickly wrote down the name of the hotel, because even if they were joking, we were so coming back here if the hotel del cielo didn’t exist. Teach them to make an offer to a stranger. The van weaved its way through a few more streets and then came to a stop at a pedestrian plaza. “No, cannot go through. We walk.” The driver said getting out. Awesome. We were still dressed in jeans, a sweater and a Winter coat, so walking was so very appealing. Happily, the driver took our bags and we found the hotel a short way into the pedestrian plaza. It was, quite literally, a hole in the wall. We booked the reservation at this hotel because that is where Elena and her husband were staying and much of the wedding day activities were going to take place there. Now, let me tell you something about Elena and Gustav. They are..um…how do you say…“active,” Dawn and I…not so much. These are people who don’t mind roughing it. On the other hand, we do mind. A lot. They are the “oh, who needs running water when we have each other?” types. We have no one and want a toilet that flushes as many times as we would like it to, damn it. All this to say, be careful about who you take hotel recommendations from because you will find yourself staying in a hotel with no elevator, no phone and temperamental air conditioning. Dawn asked about the dinner party and she was told it was on the roof, in ten minutes. A very nice Swedish man helped carry our luggage upstairs. We spread out on the bed before remembering that our formal dress for the wedding was currently crumpled in a ball at the bottom of the carry-on, in our effort to consolidate everything. “But it will get wrinkled!” Dawn cried in protest. “Dawn. We are going to Mexico. It is the land of women who can iron your clothes for you…by the bucketful, for pennies,” I replied. I mean we saw El Norte six times in school for goodness sakes. We dug out the dress and spent a hilarious five minutes with the desk clerk that went something like this. “I need to get my dress pressed.” “Okay, I will send for the hotel iron.” (THE HOTEL IRON. THE.) “No, no umm…I don’t want to press it myself.” “Oh, okay. So what do you need?” “I need to get it pressed…by…um…someone else…for money.” “Oh, you want to pay someone to iron it for you?” “YES!” “Here?” “Um…no…do you have dry cleaners…but instead of cleaning…they just iron?” “Ah, dry cleaners! Yes, two blocks that way.” We followed his directions to what can only be described as a space in between a bar and a farmacia, with washers and dryers. There was a woman sitting at a long fold out table. We reached into the depths of our mind and searched and searched for the word for ironing in Spanish. “Hola, Senora. Puede planchar mi…dress…o?” The woman nodded yes, took the dress and spread a cloth over the table. We started looking for a price list and we saw a sign which read planchar $20. Now, this could either mean 20 dollars or 20 pesos, which is like $2. We didn’t want to ask, lest the woman realize that we were willing to pay $20 for a service that she valued at $2. Plus, I didn’t want Dawn getting outwitted by any more Mexicans. So, we came up with the genius scheme of paying her with a 50 peso bill. Either she would immediately start getting out change, or she’d stare at us waiting for more money. Happily, she immediately started getting out change! We got a formal dress ironed, while we waited, FOR TWO DOLLARS. What a country! We tipped her two more dollars, because that’s how we roll and skipped back to the hotel. We changed into our rehearsal dinner clothes and looked quite smashing, if we say so ourselves. The party was nice. Dawn was worried about getting my drinks with ice, so she drank wine and beer before trying regular drinks. “The water is fine,” Binda assured us. “Bing and I have been here three days and we aren’t sick at all.” Elena had set up a ‘get to know you’ game where she put a bunch of questions about the guests on a sheet and everyone had to figure out who was who. Binda and Dawn decided not to play. Dawn wouldn’t even put on a nametag. But the Swedes…oh, Elana’s fiancée is Swedish, were very friendly and came right up to them and asked the sheet questions. Yes, they live in NYC and yes, Dawn knows how to use a Chinese calling card. Though I still don’t know why that was quite so special. In the end it was deemed that Dawn Summers was basically the answer to all the questions. I mean she can write a medical prescription if she absolutely had to. Then there were all these questions about the couple like how did they meet and how he proposed and Binda and Dawn were like “dude, we have no idea…we might just be the worst friends ever…how did we not ask how he proposed…I think that’s standard protocol for the ‘I got engaged’ ‘oh, congratulations’ conversation.” Dawn met Gustav for the first time that night and he informed her that while they had never met, he evidently had impersonated her. “We were at a restaurant where they gave at 25% discount for lawyers. And we were like, we hate lawyers, why should they get the 25%…so I told them I was a lawyer and started to make up a card. But Elena had your card in her wallet and since your name is like a man’s, I used that.” We stayed at the party for a few hours before the festivities were moved to the beach, where we watched fire dancing. It was a beautiful night, Dawn had one more week working at the law firm and as she watched the fire dancers contort their bodies and play with fire, she thought…hmm…I could probably learn to do that. To be con’t. [...]