Hot Sauce and Aspirin

Good afternoon, drunkies.  It’s Sunday, we navigated the first weekend of holiday parties, and lived to tell the tale.  Happy Hanukkah to any Jewish drinkers who may be reading today! This week, I dug deep (not really) and went with a pretty obvious solution.  Honestly, I was counting on it not working so I could try out a different cure I picked up this week, but that will have to wait until next time.  (That’s how I keep you hooked!)

This week I suffered from both allergies and a bad cold, which meant until yesterday I laid low, drank a lot of fluids, and spent an inordinate amount of time in the dark.  Sounds familiar, right?  It gave me the idea, the not at all original idea, the idea that is actually backed by science, that if fluids can expedite the curing of a cold, pushing all the germs and toxins out of your body, it would probably work for a hangover.  And I’m not talking pedialyte, nuun, gatorade, or smoothies.  I’m talking good old fashioned water.  Hangovers basically exist because we introduce toxins into our bodies, and our body uses all of our water to try to expel them, right? Sure, sounds like science.  So, the obvious conclusion is that if we give our body more water to use, it won’t have to use the fluid in our brain, stomach, liver, whatever.  Usually, we end up drinking all the alcohol and forgetting that we aren’t drinking any water, then we wake up and drink water, but the damage is already done, it’s too late.  That’s why we need the remedies, they help our body use the water efficiently an effectively, instead of just throwing it up.  So, the trick is to introduce the water while you are introducing the alcohol, not once it is too late.

It’s funny, I woke up this morning and a friend had tagged me on a Vox article, about a book called “Hungover” by Shaugnessy Bishop-Stall.  I was intrigued and ordered it on amazon, here is a link so you can check it out too, Hungover. He also tries to tackle the age old quest to cure the hangover, and coincidentally enough starts his search with dehydration too.  So, maybe we are all onto something!

Anyway, I was talking abut the beginning of holiday party season. Before that we went to 512 Brewing, where you get a glass and 6 8 ounce pours all for $12.  If you are in Austin, and haven’t been yet, it’s such a good deal!  48 ounce of beer and a glass for $12, unheard of!  Also, there is a cool art studio that shares the parking lot with them, so you can see a ton of awesome neon and metal art while you enjoy your beer.  So, already the day was off with a bang.  After our afternoon, we had some pizza, headed home, and started getting ready for the party.  While I was getting ready I drank a couple glasses of water, and made the decision that between every glass of holiday punch (Tito’s, cran-apple, ginger beer, ice and cranberries), I would drink 1 glass of water.  I repeated this process 7-8 times.  Understandably, I spent some time in the bathroom, but that seems like a good indication of hydration!  By glass number 4, it was hard to remember, and even harder to convince myself it was necessary to keep chugging that water, but I committed to it, for you, so I stuck with it.  When I got home, I drank 1 more glass of water, watched some TV, and went to sleep.

This morning, I opened my eyes, cautiously, warily, slowly, remembering all the Sundays past.  I was nervous, because I felt like I hadn’t really tried anything to prevent the inevitable hangover, and was steeling myself for the headache, the nausea, the doom, another day in a dark room testing weird herbal remedies.  Imagine my delight when I felt GREAT.  Not a hint of a hangover to be found.  No shaking, no sweating, no indication of inflammation, no dry eyes, none of it!  Could it be that since the vodka was mixed with juice, and was distilled and of decent quality, I would have been fine anyway? Not likely.  By now you have all seen me undone by as few as 4 drinks.  Drinking water between cocktails has a double benefit of drinking water consistently, and taking a quick break between drinks, thus probably drinking slightly less.  It’s definitely worth a try.  What can it hurt? If you live somewhere in the country or world where you have access to clean drinking water, it’s by far the easiest remedy out there.  If you want to help those who do not have such access, here is one link to some ideas, or write to your representatives and ask what they are doing to support people in your community.

Happy Holiday Season!  Everyone be safe this year, use cabs, or uber, or drink at hotel and then stay there, drink plenty of water, and fear not, just because I may have cracked the code, don’t mean I won’t keep trying new things!