Tag: Drinking

A (NOT SO) GREAT WAY TO SPEND A SATURDAY: HUNGOVER

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Another reincarnation of an older series I wrote a couple of posts for: A Great Way to Spend a Saturday. Typically, these posts outlined the joys of having the day off and planning something extravagant, or just enjoying time outside of the house. If you are tied down with work during the week, the weekend is when you can move around and do whatever.

This time it’s the antithesis: a (not so) great way to spend a saturday. 

So this is how not to spend a Saturday. As a man approaching his quarter life crisis, I have had many Saturdays in which I would have loved to spend them a different way. DMV days, long rides in the car, consequences from the night before, or just other random happenings that can throw a wrench in your Saturday are what we are going to chop it up about. Here’s just one.

Being hungover can be very painful, or also could be not so bad. The mellow ones are not the problem. These ones are cured by coffee and a simple surf. I swear I’ve said that exact phrase in so many pieces. As a resilient young man, I should be able to shake these off quite easily. As I am growing older, it is starting to take a little more. When I was younger, the majority of my experiences with hangover were limited. Yes, I got them, but they didn’t stop me from doing much. These aren’t terrible, as they go away by noon (or they used to). Eat something good and you feel alive again (one breakfast burrito, please). And potentially be inspired to run it back the next night (now a days this is a herculean effort). 

The type of hangover I am talking about is the one that throws off your whole day. You sleep in, crawl out of bed, and do little in the first part of your day. These can turn even the most morning-centric person out there shudder at the fact of doing things (and by things, I mean even the simplest tasks). With these, it is best to try to do something. I always believed the less you did when you are experiencing a severe hangover, the longer it lingers and clouds your mind. These are the hangovers coffee and surfing do not fix. But we can always try these methods to make them slightly more minute for the time being. The quick fix. There is nothing worse than having an obligation that you have to attend with one of these hangovers. For some time it would be class on certain days in college days, but thankfully this has been limited to purely weekend days of recent. Going to class was never that hard because mine were always later so I could surf beforehand, or in some cases have ample time to shake off the night before. 

As I grow older, they only get worse. I sound like a broken record, but shudder at the memories of going out so much at school. Nights in which I wouldn’t even flinch the next morning have become a little more groggy in the AM, and the times I anticipate a hangover the next day it is twice as bad as I would have imagined. It’s like every time I need to ingest a greasy meal to feel 100% again. It’s a rough life getting closer to 25 (I am exaggerating a little). And I can imagine it’s only going to get worse. So that is one way not to spend a Saturday. I’d have to assume 95% of the eyeballs skimming through this post have been in this position.

Spending a Saturday hungover is a spend. But it depends how you look at it. If the night before was worth it, you might bask in the hangover and relive the debauchery with your friends. Plenty of times the amount of fun had justified the punishment. On the occasion it maybe didn’t live up to your expectations, I feel like this just amplifies the hangover. But it’s Saturday, and you can turn a shitty morning around if you try hard enough. Either way you splice it, we most likely get more done and have more productive Saturdays when we are not hungover. 

However, it is the weekend so it does beckon a little freedom to do nothing. And that’s just fine.

This is sometimes the icing on the cake below: thinking you will not be hungover and setting an alarm just to be woken up early and be even more hungover due to an early wakeup. That is an awful sentence.

A GREAT WAY TO SPEND A SATURDAY: DEL MAR RACETRACK

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Another series to start: I give some awesome ways to spend a Saturday, whether it’s the middle of the summer or the dead of winter. This is installation one of many.

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It was a gloomy Saturday morning. I would wake up a little dazed from the night’s debauchery that ensued. I knew I had to hustle: It was already 8:30AM and a bust day was ahead of me. I would rally my roommate and descend upon free coffee and a fun peaky chest-to-head-high session at the local watering hole. After some good wholesome fun, it was time to hop out and get into the meat and potatoes of this send Saturday (thanks Nyjah).

The game plan was chug on down to north county SD and hit the Del Mar racetrack. The game plan was to take the 1:30PM train to get down there for ~3PM. We would bet on some ponies and stick around for sunset and a set from Iration (this being my 3rd time seeing them). Sounds like a pretty fun day, eh? It is for sure a marathon, but we had a crew of relay runners ready to get the job done.

My house and I were pretty put together: we kept the pregame to a minimum and hopped in the Uber to the train station at 1 o clock. This was ideal as the station was around twenty minutes away. Also to help paint a picture, we all were clad in white pants and collared shirts. I was sans collared shirt, but was rocking white jeans and a white jean jacket. A snow white Canadian Tuxedo.

We pulled up to the station with perfect timing. We had around 5 minutes until the train would arrive. Everything was going according to plan, except for the fact all our friends were missing. Luckily for them, the train would be delayed 30 minutes, and they would arrive in time for the newly timed train. We made a friend while we waited, and him along with one of my pals walked to a nearby gas station for more booze. It was time to hop on the train. All of us would soon realize this train was far from empty.

There wasn’t a single set of seats next to each other. Some awkwardly sat next to people far less energetic than us. We would eventually all stand in a circle near the caboose of the train, in our own little zone trying to be as orderly as possible. All of us with drinks in hand, decided to kill the time being with some conversation. 1 hour did not go by fast nor slow, probably the perfect pace.

Upon exiting the train, it was time to hop on another vessel of transportation: the shuttle. It would take us from train station to track. Super easy and we got right on without waiting a single minute. Fast forward 10 minutes and we were at the gates of paradise. We would have ample amounts of time to place bets and sip drinks, which we did plenty of both. Everyone lost money, whether form one or the other. In most people’s cases: both.

We would post up in the grand stands with our heavy wrecking crew, enjoying smiles and shouts. At one point a pal and myself found ourselves in the owners box. We cheered for the horse as if it was ours, because if we didn’t the jig might have been up. It was a short-lived stint, and we scurried back to our zone as if nothing had happened. Because nothing had happened! It was hard to think guys dressed this good couldn’t be in the mix. The day would go on, and the last horse race would ring in Iration.

We made our way to one more drink and mobbed the stage for a glorious sunset. It only felt right that a concert of this vibe would have a rifling sunset behind it. The sun would set, and the darkness would ensue around the crowd. Even though the sun still was in the sky, it was a cloudy sunset. I mean, it’s a reggae concert so you knew there would be some big smoke from the rastafari’s. It comes with the territory at these types of tings.

As summer nights finished up and a few songs were left, it was time to take on the trip back. An uber of epic price proportions would be in our future, but when split between four people was almost as affordable as the train. The only downside, you might ask? No music was played and it was a long hour. I decided to pull the power move of taking a snooze, waking up right when we pulled up thanks to a nice alarm clock named Wyatt and Lucas. Inside our crib we would go, and was in my bed in less than 5 minutes. A day well spent.

Curing a Hangover in Stages

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There is certainly an agenda when thinking of how to cure a hangover. First and foremost, you need to do some damage control and assess the situation. Then, you can truly prescribe yourself the “cure” for your morning haze. I am about to give you an inside scoop on the hangover to cure ratio and give you a doctors notes for prescription. You are welcome in advance.

“I’ll just have one beer.”

I swear sometimes even a little bit of alcohol can deal you a hangover the next morning. While equally as shitty as a normal hangover, this one can get served the easiest of cures to be fixed. All it takes is some coffee. Obviously, hydrating the night before can prevent this one overall, so you’d best not get this one often.

Pre-gaming an event.

At any time you are “pregaming” an event, you are just throwing yourself into the ring. A hangover is on the horizon. While sometimes one that feels like the one above, it often is a little worse. Most of the time, a coffee and snack can turn this one upside-down. This is strictly in relation to a “casual” night out, and not to be confused with pre-gaming before a send to the bars (the cringe). This one relates more to events, rather than bars (some events definitely excluded). A good combo to work with the coffee is a surf. And this is where we kind of go on a tangent————-

Surf and coffee has eliminated some of the most lethal of hangovers, and is for sure the go to for me when needing a quick fix. There are some things to make note of, before heading into this sort of ritual post party. First, the actual surf is very important to factor in. While it can’t be too small to where there will be no fun had, if it’s really on the cook a lot of things can go wrong. The sweet spot is probably 2-3 occasionally 4 and occasionally 5. Enough for insiders to be mellow, but also enough size to get a cover up and also do some proper turns. While waves being on the cook can cure a hangover, often the floggings when blowing a wave tend to sting extra (and happen to occur often when hungover). Whether it getting vaporized by a set or just blowing a lot of good waves, know that the pumping surf hangover cure is a toss up. Stay in the “couple fun ones zone” and you’ll be in the clear.

—–This is where I had to retire writing for the day to engage in Cinco de Mayo—–

Ok, I am back. Let’s get back to this diagnosis. (I know I screwed up, this post coming in a day late.)

A Night Out on the Town.

This is when we are all linking up and hitting the bars. Often with some sort of debauchery in mind, this one can for sure get dangerous. If you have gone out on one of these missions the night before and had a coffee and a surf and still feel the haze around your head, the next logical step is to get some food. While lots of options are out there, there is an apex of the food pyramid. This would be the breakfast burrito. With some greasy meat, flour from the tortilla, and gooeyness from the cheese-potato combo, it is almost a foolproof way to fix you. The best part: they typically are cheap, so your wallet will say thanks after opening the bank safe last night at the bar.

Ouch. This isn’t fun.

This is pretty much the final stage of the hangover scale. From here nothing new really comes into the equation, everything just can get amplified. The times when you sleep in later than you wanted, probably didn’t drink any water before bed, and wake up to texts from other people who stayed out longer than you. These might cause a giggle, but you soon remember how hungover you are. This is when you make a break for the holy grail of hangover cures, pedialyte. Slug one of these on top of the coffee surf and breakfast burrito and you are ready to rock and roll. If a hangover still persists after this concoction of medicine, you are just going to have to tough it out. Feel free to bookmark this post and refer back when you wake up and ache a little.

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