Friday, August 19, 2005

Anatomy of a Night Gone Wrong (or working with a hangover)

Few things suck harder then going to work with a hangover. I've been drinking for a number of years and I know both precautions one can take when drinking on a work night. They are, in no particular order:

drink water
eat food

I consistently manage to do niether of the above. Here's how the events typically unfold. You leave work with a glint in your eye and a little hop in your step, hey, you're going to drink booze! Usually this occurs with friends or co-workers. If it doesn't involve friends, relatives or strangers at a bar and you're drinking alone, in a dark room, you may be an alcoholic. At that glorious point in the evening, just before the first drop of sweet sweet liquor touches your lips, you don't have any desire to eat. Before you realize it, your cubicle mate is offering to buy the group's fourth round and you're on your way. After the sixth Goose and soda time starts to lose its meaning, what once was 7 pm is now 10:30. Eight deep and you begin telling stories that never seem to get anywhere remotely close to finished; your story's point is the sun, you're pluto. And so on and so on. Until you're reeling out of the bar at about 2:30 stumbling towards a bodega like an extra from Dawn of the Dead. Now you want to eat, nay, you must eat! At this point, the only thing that food will do is slightly mitigate the hangover you're going to experience in about four hours. After you tumble out of the cab and stiff your driver you spend about six minutes trying to force your office key into your apartment's front door. After finally getting inside you manage to set your alarm before passing out fully clothed (oddly except for one shoe, it's always one shoe).

Dang a lang a lang a lang!!! That's the wake up call for the hounds of hell to start raging in your cranium, good times are here! You awake and are convinced for literally three minutes that it's Saturday. As the reality slowly hits you that it is not in fact Saturday you are assailed with a one two punch combination of a dome splitting headache and gut busting queasiness. You concoct no fewer than six different stories you can tell your boss to get out of work. As you hit the snooze button for the third time you realize you're screwed and you've got to pay the piper. You stumble towards the shower and begin to assess just how bad this hangover is going to be. Ooofa, it's going to be a bad one, you're actually still drunk. As you open the front door to your apartment you're immediately blasted with the devil's breath that is a NYC summer. Great, you've sweat through your shirt by the time you stagger onto the L train and quickly plot your most direct route to the train's door "just in case." As you arrive at work, only 37 minutes late, you quickly dive into Duane Reade to buy some Pedialyte (sounds awful, works great).

Your morning consists of attempting to look busy (looking intently at your monitor while scratching your chin works really well) and drinking as much water/Pedialyte as humanly possible. Frequent trips to the bathroom are also in order. If you're lucky enough to have a boss that isn't too conscious of your whereabouts, you can use these bathroom breaks to catch a quick nap. But be careful, it's always awkward walking back to the office with both legs asleep. Has the demon lock on your brain loosened just a bit? Hmm

You've made it to lunch, this is the watershed moment of your day. What you decide to eat and how quickly can determine your fate for the rest of the day, choose wisely, friend. The greasier the better, and yes, wolf it down, let it get to work forcing that dirty alcohol right out of your body (yes, more afternoon trips to the bathroom will be in order). At about 4:30 you begin to feel vaguely human again. Wait, did the clock just go from 4:30 to 4:29?! Crap! After your 37th glass of water and your 14th trip to the bathroom you can actually operate your phone and the computer at the same time, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. 6 pm arrives. Hey! Anyone up for a drink? Of course you are! Yes, you are an idiot.

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