ANYBODY WHO KNOWS ME...
WILL KNOW WHAT A BIG THRILL IT IS FOR ME to have a chat with my readers. What is actually taking place here is that you are about to trail along with me as I battle my way to the conclusion of what you may or may not think is an inconsequential cock-and-bull story, so allow me to begin by stating that that some portions of what follows may be slightly out-of-focus, due to the alcoholic stupor I was in when many of these adventures were taking place. This also may be a complete fib, in fact. I ought to have said, "Were a guesstimate of what I thought might be taking place." First of all, you must realize that it is a very difficult and grueling and lonely business to write down everything you once did while you were boozed up unless you really, really, really want to do it...
...So I will begin by saying that I once loved Scotch in every way. I loved the way it looked in the bottle, that rich golden color; adored the names on the labels arranged on the shelf behind the bar - Johnnie Walker Black Label and Glennfiddich and Glenlivet Nadurra; and was stuck on the particularly smoky, peaty aromas of the single malts. In fact the only thing I didn't like about Scotch is that if I took the merest sip of the stuff it would befriend me and encourage me to drink more of it, and I would then begin to jaunt about in a very peculiar and somewhat offish manner, caroming into people and knocking over bar stools and howling at myself in the bar's restroom mirror; therefore, I knew I had to force myself to learn how to drink other intoxicants, because barking at oneself in a mirror would also cause me to say to my mirror image in a loud voice, "What in the hell are you barking at, you freakish oaf?" It would then take me about two-hours to figure out that I was talking to myself, and that I must immediately go forth and find the world's most boring drink, one which I could sip with no ill effects whatsoever...
...I soon gave a shot at sipping Margaritas, but they also made me do some far-out and freakish things. Whenever I had a few of them I would awaken in the morning with a jittery sense of apprehension as to where it was that I may or may not have left my pants and underwear; and the astonishing thing about that was when I happened to look down, I seemed to be still wearing them both. If my pants and underwear were still on, not only had I been on an injudicious binge, I had apparently failed to chalk-up a score with an itinerant female who was not only down on her luck, but desperate for love from any guy who happened to be reeling toward her along the dimly-lit street in the middle of Hell's Kitchen at three o'clock in the morning.
WILL KNOW WHAT A BIG THRILL IT IS FOR ME to have a chat with my readers. What is actually taking place here is that you are about to trail along with me as I battle my way to the conclusion of what you may or may not think is an inconsequential cock-and-bull story, so allow me to begin by stating that that some portions of what follows may be slightly out-of-focus, due to the alcoholic stupor I was in when many of these adventures were taking place. This also may be a complete fib, in fact. I ought to have said, "Were a guesstimate of what I thought might be taking place." First of all, you must realize that it is a very difficult and grueling and lonely business to write down everything you once did while you were boozed up unless you really, really, really want to do it...
...So I will begin by saying that I once loved Scotch in every way. I loved the way it looked in the bottle, that rich golden color; adored the names on the labels arranged on the shelf behind the bar - Johnnie Walker Black Label and Glennfiddich and Glenlivet Nadurra; and was stuck on the particularly smoky, peaty aromas of the single malts. In fact the only thing I didn't like about Scotch is that if I took the merest sip of the stuff it would befriend me and encourage me to drink more of it, and I would then begin to jaunt about in a very peculiar and somewhat offish manner, caroming into people and knocking over bar stools and howling at myself in the bar's restroom mirror; therefore, I knew I had to force myself to learn how to drink other intoxicants, because barking at oneself in a mirror would also cause me to say to my mirror image in a loud voice, "What in the hell are you barking at, you freakish oaf?" It would then take me about two-hours to figure out that I was talking to myself, and that I must immediately go forth and find the world's most boring drink, one which I could sip with no ill effects whatsoever...
...I soon gave a shot at sipping Margaritas, but they also made me do some far-out and freakish things. Whenever I had a few of them I would awaken in the morning with a jittery sense of apprehension as to where it was that I may or may not have left my pants and underwear; and the astonishing thing about that was when I happened to look down, I seemed to be still wearing them both. If my pants and underwear were still on, not only had I been on an injudicious binge, I had apparently failed to chalk-up a score with an itinerant female who was not only down on her luck, but desperate for love from any guy who happened to be reeling toward her along the dimly-lit street in the middle of Hell's Kitchen at three o'clock in the morning.
So I immediately took-a-turn at downing Stolichnaya vodka, in light of the fact that most of my fellow New Yorkers did so, and they were very smart and sophisticated and New Yorky, but, most important of all, it made me look as though I had couth, too; although I occasionally conversed in a rather rambling fashion when under the influence and generally found myself eventually talking only to myself, wondering why everyone else seemed to be sneaking off elsewhere at the very moment I began my usual blathering discourse on the comparative philosophies of Sophocles and Plato.
I then took-another-turn at a Bloody Mary or two, but only ever had them at brunch on a Sunday morning. I have no explanation for this, because it never occurred to me to have a Bloody Mary in the normal course of any other day, but put me in a restaurant on the Sabbath and I made for the Stoli and tomato juice like a nymphomaniac on the hunt for a one-legged man.
Much to my surprise, I then found myself having to beat the bushes for hangover cures, compounding my futility by making resolutions that I would never ever drink anything again and having them fail, relatively speaking, about one-hundred percent of the time.
Incidentally, am I alone in finding the expression "much to my surprise" to be incredibly useful? It allows me to make swift, succinct, and authoritative connections between otherwise unconnected statements without the trouble of explaining who your source of authority actually is. It's great. It makes me look adroit and agile, something every boozed-up lush I have ever known has always wanted to be.
I had slowly begun to realize that the brain actually is affected by alcohol. But there are different gradations to the effect, and therein lies the rub. The brain organizes its memories like a kind of hologram, to retrieve an image, you have to re-create the exact conditions in which it was captured. In the case of a hologram its the lighting, in the case of the brain it is, or can be, the amount of alcohol sloshing around in it at any given time. And that is what is known as a conundrum. I have found that these conundrums are completely beyond the reach of an abnormal, intoxicated mind.
Which is why, after some ill-advised evening out, I would seemingly be the only person in the entire room who was completely unaware of some boringly idiotic remark I made to someone whose feelings I cared about deeply, or even just a little bit. It may be weeks, months, or, in my case, exactly a year later that the occasion suddenly returned to my consciousness with a sickening brain-bonk and I began to realize why people I once knew and loved had been avoiding me or meeting my eyes with a glassy stare for so long, which often led me to say "Holy Christ" to myself in a loud voice and reaching for a stiff drink, which would, of course, lead me to the next point of inebriation, where I would cause fresh shocks to those around me and guiltily embarrass myself further by having some complete stranger come up to me, slapping me in the face over something I said, or giving me a swift kick to the groin over something I was about to say.
So what is the answer to this terrible, self-perpetuating problem?
Well, obviously, rigorous self-discipline. A monastic adherence to a regime of long walks, regular workouts, early nights, early mornings, and probably some kind of tomato juice or something. The thing we are most going to want on New Year's Day, and be desperately trying to remember how to make, is a good hangover cure, just in case you happen to fall-off-the-wagon again. The major problem is, we can never remember them when we need them, or even know where to find them. And the reason we can never remember them when we need them is that we heard about them when we didn't actually need them, which isn't any help, for the reasons outlined above.
I have found that nauseating images involving egg yolks and Tabasco sauce swill through my brain, and I am not really in any fit state to organize my thoughts, which is why my hangover cure is never effective, and that I somehow need to organize my brain while there is still time; which would be prior to my doing something else stupid, like settling for noxious cheap wine, which would make me feel as if I were a rat on a sinking ship. I still have yet to work out how this happens.
So, Dear reader, I have enjoyed this little chat, but must apologize to you, in that I have no answer to any of the above...and will get back to you as soon as I do...
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