This is exactly why I shouldn't drink.

Have I mentioned that I'm not much of a drinker? Well, if I haven't, I'll say it now. I'm not much of a drinker. Even way back in high school when my friends would decide to have a drink (which was rare as we were nerds who had more fun being sober and playing D&D so we could remember how far our quests got) I abstained. Partly because it was illegal for me to drink, and partly because I just don't enjoy the taste of alcohol. I think most people probably don't, but they enjoy the sensation of being buzzed or drunk, so they do it anyway. For me, it's all about being able to enjoy things that I eat and drink. If it tastes bad, I don't want to have it. 

But a strawberry margarita made the right way doesn't taste like alcohol, so every few months or so I'll have one now that it's legal for me to do so. It doesn't take much of it to get me tipsy, though, so the cut off is usually one. There have been two instances where I've had two, and both times resulted in me slipping off of my barstool. It was amusing to Padawan and Roommate, but not so much for me the next morning when I was remembering it. 

Well Wednesday night Padawan and I finished looking around for costumes (we're leaning towards Alice and the Mad Hatter after much deliberation, but it's not final yet) and decided to go have dinner. I'm still not drinking soda, but I wanted something to drink with more flavor than water, so I got a strawberry margarita to enjoy with my dinner. The glass it came in was closer to the size of a fish bowl than a drinking glass. I'm pretty sure that if I had been so inclined I could have worn it on my head as a helmet and it would have fit nicely.

Obviously, I didn't finish it. I drank maybe half of it and gave the rest to Padawan, who mocked me mercilessly throughout dinner for drinking it so slowly and hinted frequently that he could drink it way faster and that I was disgracing the drink. Of course, he knew that mocking me wouldn't change anything. I only turned the tables on him and mocked him for drinking his beer too fast.

"Wow, you're really downing that, Padawan. If I drank like a fish would it make you feel like less of an alcoholic?" 

Of course that only made him laugh.

Despite drinking less than half of that stupid thing, I was tipsy when we left. It caught me off guard, of course, because when I stood up my legs felt like red jell-o and I had to lean on Padawan to keep from sitting down again. But nothing eventful happened on the way home. 

We parked in the garage and I stood to watch the garage door go down, as I always do. But after it closed I noticed a lizard crawling around in swirling patterns across the door, and rather than go inside, I stood and watched it for a minute or two until Padawan, needing to go relieve himself in the facilities but unable to because I dislike walking across the parking lot from the garage to the apartment by myself after dark, finally called me away and we made our way across the lot.

Navigating the sidewalk was easier than the lot, so I pushed Padawan slightly ahead of me so that I could go up the rest of the way by myself. But I wasn't walking straight and veered off the center of the pavement to the left edge. And this resulted in a tragic accident.

As I was taking a step, a baby lizard ran out from the grass. I was inebriated, and uncoordinated, and though I saw it coming my reaction time was slowed and I didn't have time to correct my foot placement. My flip flop landed on his poor little lizard self with the full weight of my body, and the resulting squelching, squish noise echoed in my head.

I felt horrified. I pulled my foot away too late, and I saw the mangled little body squished to the concrete, and I lost my mind. I sank down next to him and I started crying.

Bawling, actually. Broken hearted, the world is ending sobs. And it had only been a matter of seconds. And Padawan, who was only a couple of steps ahead of me, turned around in complete confusion because he had no idea I had just destroyed a young life. All he knew was that one second I was fine, and the next I was sitting on the sidewalk crying for absolutely no reason.

He asked me again and again what was wrong. And finally I managed to point at the dead lizard, and I kept saying, "I couldn't stop my foot. It was too late, I couldn't stop! He just ran in front of me!" 

After a few minutes he finally figured out that I had been too tipsy to be able to stop myself from squishing the lizard, and that it had made an awful sound, and that I felt completely horrible for killing a baby lizard. By that time I was babbling about how if I had not stopped to watch the lizard on the garage door, or if I had stayed and watched it just a few seconds longer, then my path never would have crossed the baby's and it would have ended well. 

I give Padawan credit for this. He did not laugh at me. He did understand that I was sincerely upset about the whole thing. I don't squish any living creature, ever. I don't even squish crickets. It's a cruel, horrible way to kill something, and I'd rather just run from things anyway. 

He could only pick me up and take me upstairs and tell me that it was okay, that it was an accident, that it hadn't suffered, and that if it hadn't been me who had squished him, it would have been him. He might have thrown in something about how it was meant to happen.

It didn't really make me feel better so I was still crying by the time we got to the third floor where we lived, and he sat on the bed inside and rocked me back and forth and kept trying to make me feel better. Eventually I had to stop crying, though, and I resolved to go down the next morning to bury him.

But he was gone the next morning, having been eaten by ants or some other unholy desecrater or vulture of the lowest order of life.

So here I am, wallowing in guilt two days later, because his family is probably wondering why he never came home and he probably felt a lot of pain before he died, and he was only a baby and had many lizard years left to live where he could frolic in the trees and eat whatever it is that lizards eat.

I am guilty of manslaughter for walking alone while in a sorry state of inebriation. I have learned my lesson: if I drink, don't walk, make Padawan carry me.

P.S. What's really sad here is that when I woke up the next morning and remembered what I did, after feeling bad all over again, I sat there and thought, "Well, it'll make for an interesting blog."