#ThatOffspringSongAboutHangovers

Here's the skinny-gritty, folks.  I have been slackin' on this here blog.  However, this week is a little something called Story Week at my school.  Kind of an Industry Week for writers, set in Chicago.  So rekindle this baby, I'm going to write a thing-a-day about various Story Week experiences, somehow tying them back to the subject I founded this blog on.  Also, putting up any other material I can think of.  So expect a couple two-a-day occasions.

I went to one yesterday, a kind of kickoff event at Buddy Guy's Legends with a reception beforehand.  I was hung over.  Piss off, it was St. Patrick's Day.  Also, I'm not the most social creature, something only made worse upon realizing that the reception was very much not for freshly-21-year-olds that aren't actually working the event.  These variables resulted in the following journal entry, written in order to have something to do with my hands:

"Here I am, back against the world.  Jesus Christ, I am out of my depth here.  I don't know where to begin, where to go, anything.  I must look crazy arrogant or psychotic or something in that general field of negativity.  I could order a drink, but I don't want a drink, not after last night.  Is that Mr. Bungle over the speakers?  Mr. Bungle in a blues club?  The hell?  I'm probably completely wrong.  So those are my options.  Order a drink, sit here and write, sit here and nothing, creepily, or try to talk to people and inevitably vomit forth my skeleton.  Brilliant idea, come with nobody.  I pick the most remote seat possible without literally sitting in the corner, and I'm still all the fuck in the way.  I'm gonna melt, I swear."

Ouch.

So that shit got me thinking about hangovers and, incidentally, the Offspring song "Worst Hangover Ever".  That above was not the worst hangover ever, not even second-worst in the history of me.  Worst wasn't even in this country.  I was Costa Rica last year, for spring break.  Second night in, my sister and I hit the town with some people we've met at our hotel.  I didn't actually get too blasted, I didn't black out or puke.  However, we had to be up the next morning, and I had to get some sleep.  So no time to reinforce the "one glass of water to every alcoholic drink" rule/best-advice-ever, just come home and flop dizzily into bed.

To this day, I'm shocked I never once yakked.  What did we have on the agenda starting early that morning?  A goddamn boat tour.  A goddamn boat tour that required like a 2-hour drive to get to, in the hot sun, 40 minutes of that being over a road bumpier than, I don't know, the bumpiest thing on the planet that isn't that road.  Seriously, you think we've got bumpy roads up in Chicago (I'm looking at you, North Avenue)?  Take every road-bump in Chicago and put it on this one goddamn shitty road and you've got a pretty clear picture.

So once again, that's:
Lots of alcohol + minimal sleep - food - water + 90-degree, sunny/muggy weather + all-day trip x stupidly bumpy road, throw in a double-shot of IBS = a solid case of Horrible.
Seriously, I don't recommend it.