Sorry everybody, with everything that’s happened in the last few weeks I can’t think of anything funny. Steve won’t let me leave this space empty so until I get my sense of humor back, you’ll have to settle for `Smoke your breakfast Classics.’ Leftovers never tasted so good.
Living in pain
We all know how you get a hangover, mostly from Jagermeister and Tequila, whose names actually mean “liquid Satan,” in the countries from which they are imported. It is possible to get hangovers from other alcoholic beverages, but you have to try harder. Beer is usually safe if you drink it in bottles, but on draft you’re just asking for trouble. Those big old kegs of microbrew go bad very quickly. I would recall an experience with a month old keg of Black Bear Porter if the details were printable. Red wine is also a bad one, it tastes so good going down, but when you get to the third bottle, it can actually burn craters in your esophagus.
The focus here is to deal with the symptom, not the cause. Everyone and their grandma has a patented hangover cure. Personally, I have a slow re-hydration method. Keep a few bottles of water near your bed, and take a swig every time you can collect enough energy to reach and lift. After a few hours you should be fine.
The key here is not to consume a whole glass of water at once. Doing so could shock your fragile system and inspire regurgitation, which is really just working backwards. In severe cases when you can’t keep anything down try pressing your right cheekbone and eyebrow against cold linoleum, never fails.
The hair of the dog system is an old standby. This one doesn’t really work if you have to work the next day, unless you have the coolest job in the whole world.
Bloody Marys are the best. There are so many vitamins in the tomato juice that you are bound to get some form of nutritional value from them, and the horseradish has a cooling and clearing effect similar to Vaporub. The only time that the hair of the dog method doesn’t work is when you are trying to self-medicate with the same type of beverage that you consumed the previous night. Don’t drink orange juice if you got tanked on screwdrivers, and never ever try cranberry juice if you’ve been hitting the Cape Cods. What your salty old grandfather always meant was the hair of a different dog.
Tylenol Migraine is the bomb. I have friends that are able to hold steady jobs for the first time in years thanks to this marvel in pharmaceutical advancement. The only problem with painkillers is that they do have a tendency to chew holes in your gastrointestinal walls. Not cool. I actually had to go to the emergency room last August, when I thought that I had broken my ribcage, only to find out that I had consumed enough vodka and Advil over the course of the summer, that I could have lost a limb or two and never noticed. Be careful with painkillers.
My grandmother always swore by gingerale, but it never really did anything for me. Diet Coke, on the other hand, should be celebrated as a medical miracle. Not only does the flavor of Nutra-sweet completely counterbalance the taste of day old liquor, but you can also use the can to massage your temples.
Finally, breakfast is the best way to cure the hangover. It is a proven fact that grease from bacon and eggs chemically rebuilds the fatty walls of your stomach, counteracting the effects of the alcohol, absorbing dangerous toxins, and getting you ready to hop back on the Mad Dog train. If you really couldn’t get out of bed in time for breakfast, (you must be in really bad shape because most places serve until two in the afternoon,) then try a burger, it works almost just as well.
The real key to curing hangovers consistently is to rotate your methods. If you use Tylenol or Advil one day, try something else the next, because unfortunately the same hangover cure used too often will be rendered useless eventually.
Get creative, you never know what’s going to make you feel better until you try it.