Brain Poops

Author note: The title is intentional. I snobbishly thrust my nose up at those of you who don’t “get it” and stroke my writer ego.

It’s one of those mornings. Those of you of drinking age know exactly what I’m talking about when I say that perhaps that last half dozen shot’s worth of liquor was ill advised.

Trapped in the pseudo-hangover limbo. The alcohol is burning off leaving me woozy, hot and staring into the distance like a catatonic with the wrong meds. Too tired to stay awake and too woozy to fall asleep. I am the walking dead now, and there’s not a brain to munch on in sight.

Imagining my stomach doing wobbly hula-hoop loops around my waist.

Imagining what it’ll be like to have a bathroom reunion with last night’s tuna and buttery rice mix.

And thinking about the first time I ever got drunk.

Now the first time I got seriously, belligerently wasted was, of course, on my 20^th birthday. Of course, I can’t advise drinking before the lawful age in your country. Not because I’m particularly fond of those laws in general, but instead because of the completely horrible experience I had.

It started, like the worst drinking sessions do, with a foolish decision to “get totally hammered,” in celebration of another year survived on our whirling ball of clay. Why anyone would want to celebrate survival by throttling your innards is something that remains a mystery to me (and doubly so, since I still damn do it).

Screwdrivers were to be the favored sugar in my gas tank that evening. I had OJ in the fridge and more than a fair amount of vodka chilling in the Chukotka winter of the freezer. A six-pack of Budweiser tall-boys was provided by a friend of mine who was celebrating with me, and was to provide crucial back-up in case the threat of sobriety became real.

My two friends and I clinked glasses, toasted, and drank the first stiff drinks down like our throats were aflame. We were the gasoline firemen, and our petrol was as smooth as water. We quickly fixed another round of drinks and got down to the serious business of not being serious.

See, the big problem with drinking is that regardless of how educated we might be on the speed at which the body metabolizes alcohol, we all inevitably drink too fast. The first drink goes down, and within 15 minutes or so we get a delightful comfortable feeling and think Well that’s nice. I think I’ll have another.

By the time we have the second drink down, we only feel the full effects of the first and only some of the most recent one. Oh I’m quite fine. Let’s have another round!

On and on ad nauseum infinitum until you are so many drinks in that you realize that the earth does spin on it’s axis and that at this point you should stop doing shots and hold on for dear life. The kicker? You probably still have drinks queued up in your stomach like the alcohol DMV and they are very VERY cross. Dear god why does the ceiling have to move like that?!

A few hours into the whole shebang found me not doing well. I say this based on the evidence that came later in the form of drunk testimony from friends and frighteningly physical proof left over.

I was told that for quite a while I sat on the couch with my head moving in that manner particular to cats that have been spun around in a pillowcase for a few minutes and then dumped out onto the linoleum. My body had stopped taking me seriously and decided that if my brain put us in this mess, perhaps it’s not the right candidate for leadership at that moment.

Yum. Regrets.

Now being born in the 80s, I had quite a few drawbacks from the get-go: Zebra-print spandex tights and Kenny Loggins. John Lennon assassinated, 1980. Three Men and a Baby. And, of course:

The Cold War.

I was too young to fully appreciate the bad vibrations and understand the principles of the Cold War. It happened around me, not to me, and long before I was old enough to have a righteous misplaced sense of rebellion and outspokenness.

That night I got an intimate education on the conflict. It was the hardest class I can somewhat remember taking, especially considering that I didn’t enroll willingly.

We had abandoned the empty husk of vodka and were now slamming back tallboys with the determination of what I imagine alcoholic elephant linebackers might have. PSHKT! *gulp gulp gulp* SLAM, CRINKLE (slight pause, catch breath) PSHKT!

If I had been born perhaps a decade earlier I might have known better that Americans and Russians have had some pretty bad international disputes. If I had known better, I might not have put the Russian “Hammer and Sickle” vodka in the same organic shoebox as the heady “Red White and Blue” of American beer.

They agreed to have a brawl in my stomach. It became Thunderdome, but without any inclination for “one man leave.” Well… not at first.

That, for the most part, is all I can write with any sort of confidence. The rest of the night went the way of Jack Kerouac, Billie Holiday and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Continue to Part 2!