I drank drove (sort of) but I didn't know what else to do. There's a (not v good) diagram.

[Uriahsnose]

I drove to my local pub like I do a couple of times a week. If I am having alcohol, I leave the car there and collect it the following day.

The other night, my neighbour/friend came in, was sober and offered to drive me home in my car-he only lives around the corner. As this is safer for me than walking home I agreed.

Some houses on my street have front gardens, some have drives. I have a front garden as does one of my next door neighbours. Terraced, narrow, village one way street-parking can be a bit awkward but the houses that don't have a drive all have a designated parking space.

So my friend goes to park my car and it transpires that he doesn't know how to reverse park. He tried to drive into my parking space but the NDN with a drive's car was sticking out of their drive, and the other neighbour (in front of where my car would go) is parked outside her house. So it ended up with my car sticking out at an angle, blocking the road. I told my friend 'you'll need to reverse park, you can't leave it blocking the road'. He tried but couldn't do it-kept saying 'I can't because I can't see!' And 'will that do' (no, it wouldn't!) so in the end I told him to get out and I parked it myself.

I was so nervous-even though I wasn't drunk (I'd had three of those mini bottles of wine) and I knew I couldn't hurt anybody, but It's still illegal isn't it?

AIBU to think that if you can't reverse park, you shouldn't be driving a tonne of metal?

(Just realised I haven't accurately depicted the gardens in my diagram but the basic set up/situation is the same)!

> if you have driven on a road or public place.

Sorry read again, it was illegal, as a private road is a public place, to be legal your road would have to be fenced off or otherwise inaccessible to the general public.
Same goes for supermarket car parks, leisure parks, etc. Still an offence.

Why is not drinking seemingly not an option? If you're so concerned for your personal safety, being sober for when you walk home late will probably assist. Even if the biggest risk of you driving in this case was "just" hitting someone else's car and potentially damaging it, that's a selfish thing to do.

He was insured third party.
I didn't take over the driving, I parked the car.
I couldn't have been prosecuted, albeit I hadn't thought of that until this thread.

But is he fully comp AND covered to drive other vehicles? It isn’t automatic

It is an option and one I take often.
I am concerned but not enough to not go out.
I didn't know I'd have to until I was already home-I accepted a lift as I felt it was safer than walking.

Why the chuff would I walk home if I was sober 😂

Well exactly, so being sober is the solution.

But why did you let someone whose driving ability you are unsure of drive your car? Did you even check that he had insurance?

You posted on here and the majority of the people who have responded have told you that you were irresponsible. Take from that what you want, but plenty of people are in the same situation as you every day and they manage.

You're not the only woman who has ever needed to get home from the pub, most of us manage to make responsible plans, but you just sound like a child. If you're old enough to have a car and go to the pub then presumably you are an adult so you need to behave like one.

Solution to what? Until this happened there wasn't any problem and there won't be one again now I know what he drives like.

Don't believe you regarding the insurance.

Neither of you are fit drivers.

And FYI you're coming across as an absolute jerk on this thread because of your inability to accept you did something that could have killed someone.

It's not just about your ability to reverse the car - it's all.the other stuff, like being sufficiently aware of anyone walking around your car, or other road users and pedestrians and then able to react quickly enough if a issue arises.

We all have different levels of alcohol we can tolerate but the legal limits are there for all and that line would have been breached with what you had drunk.

Don't do it again.

Lots of people get in cars with people who have driving licenses all the time, I don't think there's some way of checking their abilities first? We all accept lifts from a friend/relative for the first time.

I know he has insurance.
I've accepted that I should have had him drive the car back to the pub rather than parked it myself.
I do make responsible plans and have for the last decade, I just accepted a lift on this one occasion and then realised there was a problem.
I am not sure how I do not behave like an adult.

If he's only insured to drive your car third party, would you be happy if it got written off? I get this is extremely unlikely but weird shit happens sometimes.

You're not behaving like an adult because you were in control of a car whilst inebriated and seem to be refusing to accept that you did anything wrong or that there was any alternative.

There is always an alternative.

A bottle is 750mls, mini bottles are 187mls so you had about 3/4 of a bottle.

Which is too much to be behind the wheel of a car. You may feel you are okay, but most drunk drivers do think they are okay, few are blind drunk. Its not about your view of your ability, it's about blood alcohol levels.

Seriously, any booze and stay away from a car. He could have parked elsewhere and you could have moved it in the morning.

I really don't think I could have killed someone. I accept it was the wrong thing to do, but I don't accept that apart from in VERY exceptional circumstances (someone randomly sneaked up behind me in dark clothing at midnight on a road that hardly anyone ever accesses anyway, and I didn't see them and they sat down behind my car right as I reversed? Maybe).

You don't believe he's insured? Why?

Wouldn't give it a second thought. Private land. Moving car a few feet.

You accept that it was the wrong thing to do. But you don't think any harm could have come of it.

So why do you think it was the wrong thing to do?

I have (several times) accepted that what I did was wrong. I think what I should have done is made him drive it back to the pub.

This is a complete non issue. Why would you come on here and deliberately subject yourself to loads of judgement?

Because as others have said, I could have bumped someone's car if I was more inebriated than I thought.

I understand that-I guess accidents can happen to anyone.

You were not on private land, you said the car was blocking the road.

Why did you post here? You moved a car a couple of feet on private land. Your friend's driving would concern me though, driving on the other side of the road and can't park? Are you sure HE wasn't drunk?

3 mini wines is about 7 units, so you were definitely over the limit.

A relative of mine lost their licence after sitting in the driving seat with the keys in their hand while drunk. They were booked into a hotel and returned to the car to collect something. That was enough, even several decades ago.