Someone Else's Vomit

I'd like to start by pointing out that some truly amazing and gifted people have choked to death on their own vomit. Jimi Hendrix. John Bonham. Tommy Dorsey.

But I'd also like to point out that, in addition to being amazing and gifted, these people are also dead because they choked on their own vomit.

Outside of Spinal Tap, nobody ever chokes to death
on someone else's vomit. Because there really are things
that people simply won't do, and gargling with
another person's upchuck thankfully is one of them.

On a different note, I'm pleased to announce that, after a brief reunion with vodka this week, I'm back to not drinking.

No, I'm not pleased, exactly. I'm fucking relieved. This morning I threw away the bottle of vodka I had purchased on Monday. I didn't even pour out what was left, just chunked it in the garbage can outside . And the instant I did, I felt a huge sense of relief that it was out of the house and I wouldn't be drinking any more of it. Just like in a horror movie when the people finally ditch the haunted doll or cursed box or creepy painting that's been bringing the spooky down on them: Everybody smiles and hugs because the evil has been banished, and no one gives a damn about the poor bastard who accidentally digs up the haunted thing 20 years later when he's putting in a swimming pool and reawakens the malevolent spirit just in time for the sequel.

Maggie Smith/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I believe that's how "19 and Counting"

came about.

That's how I feel. Someone, somewhere surely is going to get polluted tonight, but it ain't gonna be me, and that feels great.

Back to the vomit.

It seems improbable that someone could be so out of it as to throw up and not be conscious of it or do anything keep from asphyxiating on regurgitated stomach contents. I mean, it sounds pretty goddamn horrible and terribly sad, too. You're dying in your sleep, which generally speaking is the preferred way to go. But you're dying from something you could likely prevent if only you were awake. That's not peacefully slipping away; that's being oblivious to the fact that death is coming for you, and it's only coming because you summoned it in the first place.

hyena realty/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Dear Alanis Morrissette: That's slightly more ironic than

rain on your wedding day.

So the world lost its greatest rock drummer because John Bonham drank so much that he a) passed out and b) threw up. Both of those things are normal consequences of consuming mass quantities of vodka in a short period of time. If he'd done them in the opposite order, he'd still be alive.

Or, you know, if he slept on his stomach instead of his back.

Witthaya Phonsawat/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

This iguana understands the effects of gravity

better than the average dead rock star.

But for a fluke of sleeping position, Jimi and Tommy and Bonzo might have awoken to a wicked hangover and a bed full of puke. But they would have awoken. They might have repeated the get wasted-pass out-throw up exercise a day or a week or five years later and lost the stomach-sleeping lottery the next time, sure. Or maybe the sight of vomit in their sheets and on their clothes - and the thought of what could have happened instead - would have made them reconsider their life choices.

But those guys never got that second chance.

It's the kind of flukey shit that makes you think.

Anyway, it's a wonderful feeling to go to bed knowing that you're going to be clear-headed and sober in the morning. And fairly certain that you're going to be around in the morning.

Don't you think?