The perils of drunk SMSing

So I’m sitting in a doctor’s waiting room waiting, as you do, for the doctor who is now over 20 minutes late, and I’m at a bit of a loose end. None of the magazines on the coffee table offer stories that will fill the gaping void in my sense of self, so I decide to fiddle with my phone instead.

Because there’s no Cell C signal, I can’t access data and therefore attempt to download email, so I have to content myself with going through my list of SMSes. The iPhone displays SMSes as conversations rather than “received” or “sent” items, which means that any correspondence between you and any of your contacts quickly becomes apparent.

As I’m scrolling down the list of people I’ve texted over the past week or so, something catches my eye. It’s a lurid green text box, which is how the iPhone lists SMS exchanges: green for your own messages, white for those from others. I notice this text box primarily because it shouldn’t be there. I distinctly remember clearing that conversation with that particular recipient and there should be no texts listed at all. So the fact that there is any text there at all is worrying.

I read what it says.
“Fine… whadeva…”
Sent, it says, on Sunday night at 9.38pm, which according to my calculations would have been after the ingestion over approximately two hours of one double gin and tonic and two small glasses of what was probably dooswyn — and yes, while Holland was playing Spain.

I am confused. Did somebody get hold of my phone? Was this message sent by the Tokoloshe? It can’t possibly have been me. Of all the SMSes I’m likely to type, “Fine… whadeva…” is not one of them. Even at my most inebriated, words like “whadeva” do not enter my vocabulary.

Nonetheless, it appears that a text was sent from my phone to this particular number, so some quick and dirty damage control is required. “Ummm… there’s a weird SMS to you showing up on my phone,” I type (or, more correctly, poke. I’ve never been able to type an SMS on an iPhone with my thumbs). “Don’t recall sending it so don’t read anything into it.”

“Err.. yeah I thought it was a bit weird,” the response comes back.

Oh sherbet. No, there’s no getting around this one. There can be no explanation for this other than the one I’m most keen to avoid: I typed this out, pressed “send” – and have absolutely no memory of doing any of it. Not only that, but I managed to message the worst, worst possible recipient: my ex boyfriend. Of all the texts, on all the phones, in all the world, I had to walk into this trap. I might as well be walking around Joburg surgically attached to a giant billboard displaying the word “Bunnyboiler” in sparkly lights.

If there is an irony in all of this, it’s that those words are something he might have written. Evidently in my intoxicated state I managed to channel him and convey him back to himself. No doubt my therapist would find the entire thing fascinating, and spend an entire session discussing it (at least medical aid pays).

Now, I very seldom, if ever, drink and dial (or drink and SMS, or tweet, or Facebook). So with the immortal words “Fine… whadeva…”, I have finally joined a club which boasts many millions of members worldwide. I already am a member, for example, of a French Facebook group called “Passé 3 verres, merci de me confisquer mon portable” which means, roughly, “After 3 drinks, please take my cellphone away”, but this was mainly to improve my vocabulary (I can now say, “I’m pissed” in French, which translates, again roughly, as “j’suis bourrée comme une truite”).

Recent British research has revealed that 20% of Britons have sent racy texts to the wrong recipient, and 10% have been caught sexting, and the amount of alcohol ingested probably has a lot to do with this. There are also several very popular sites devoted to drunken texts, although most of them seem to be texts about what you did while drunk rather than actual texts typed out under the influence.

I did quite like this one (even though it’s entirely possible that it was faked):

(303): (sent): DUDE! MY MOM GOT TAKEN BY ALIENS! (rec’d): lol wtf? (sent): don’t LOL. its 3am and shes not home. this has NEVER happened! (rec’d): its cool i just got a txt from them saying she’ll be home tmro. (sent): UR A F*CKIN LIAR! they cant speak english dumbass! (rec’d): iPhone translation. there’s an app for that.

Having subsequently conducted a forensic audit to determine whether I really did in fact send a drunk text, I can only conclude that the most likely explanation is that… I did. In an important breakthrough, investigations have revealed I was — according to witnesses — also given a shot of Jaegermeister – which would explain the amnesia, the bravado and, well, pretty much everything.

Drunk texting is a common side effect of a culture where alcohol and cellphones are frequently in close proximity, so there is nothing especially remarkable about what I did. Nonetheless, I am mortified. If only medical science could come up with a permanent cure. I’d spend a lot more than 20 minutes in a waiting room to get a prescription for that.