Liquor Lecture
Temperance
by Lex Marburger
Illustration by Eric Johnson
It has come to the attention of Lollipop that many of our readers enjoy imbibing an alcoholic liquid every now and again (and again…). In the public interest, we offer a Lollipop guide to Liquor. Please note: We are trained professionals and the “experiments” that follow were not attempted by “casual” or “social” drinkers. Lollipop assumes no responsibility for the actions of any drunk person, including its own staff. And ask Mom first, okay?
Geez, maybe I’m getting old. After years of wallowing in drink, might I be floating to the surface of sobriety? Could the terrible phrase “growing up” actually apply to me as well?
Nah.
Still, there comes a time in my life when I just don’t have the kindheartedness to forgive the slovenly drunk, even though I have worn that hat on much more than one occasion. Case in point: New Years’ Eve. My girlfriend was throwing a party with her flatmates, and being as it was an occasion, I decided to go formal. Luckily, I wasn’t the only one. Now, her flatmates, though they invited almost 200 people (not all of them showed up, thank god), didn’t really do much in the way of “preparation.” You know, cleaning up the living room, getting anything breakable out of the way, hors d’oeuvres, etc. But that’s not the point. I was making martinis, as I had received a beautiful set of glasses that Christmas (a few weeks later, I broke one of them falling down the stairs, but that’s not the point either). Some of the guests brought their own alcohol, always a polite thing to do, and one of them decided to mix up a huge batch of “Sex on the Beach.” Now, for those of you who don’t know, this is a horribly sweet and fruity concoction usually made as a shooter, for it’s 100% liquor. As you might know, I’m generally against these kinds of drinks merely on principal. But even worse is the fact that rather and try to get the proportions right, as when making a small drink, with just a touch more ??? or a dab extra of ???, this guy was dumping in bottles of ???, ???, and ???, enough to kill a goat.
Okay, the party continues, midnight rolls around. We open dozens of bottles of champagne, make sure everyone has a glass, etc. The party has started to degrade at this point. A couple of people were making out (and more, from the sound of it) in the closet, a lesbian kissing circle had started in one of the bedrooms, that rather large batch of Sex on the Beach was just about gone, and I had run out of lemon rind. That’s when it happened.
There was some commotion at the doorway, and a rather large girl stumbled out of the apartment and made her way downstairs. On her way down, she lost it. The champagne, the wine, the beer, and a large quantity of Sex on the Beach. Her copious stomach couldn’t hold the amount of poison she’s consumed, and with little grace, it adorned the stairs and walls. A momentary hush fell over the crowd. This was pretty vile, after all, and someone was going to have to deal with it. With a mix of a sigh and a groan, I took of my blazer, rolled up the sleeves on my tux shirt, and, with a roll of paper towels in hand, set to the task at hand.
Let’s just say it wasn’t pretty.
Dizzy from the effort of wiping and scrubbing while trying to hold my breath, I heard the door to the street slam, and the sound of heavy footsteps climb the stairs. As she turned the corner to climb the next flight, this flight, the flight back to the apartment, things seemed to slow down. I could see her face, a mixture of sorrow, nausea, and shame, tinted an eerie shade of green. She was mumbling something to herself as she tried to climb the steps. Then she saw me, staring at her approaching mass. She looked at me the way a puppy does when it knows it’s done something wrong but can’t help itself. She said “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry – ” and her hands lifted to her mouth. I knew what was coming next.
Liquid, not words, issued from her lips then, deflecting off her hands, grey-pink globules spurting into the air or running down her shirt. The vomitus on her I didn’t care about. It was. The. Bile. Coming. At. Me. There was nothing I could do. I felt the splatter on my shirt, the wet sewage kiss of her stomach on my cheek. She looked at me in horror, my replying only with a stony “I can’t believe what just happened” gaze. She turned and ran back down the stairs. And I stood there for a second, not knowing what to do. Gagging a moment, I turned back to my unpleasant labor.
It cleaned up well, as did I, and the party continued at a relatively normal pace, if you consider 4:30 AM a “normal” time to break up a party. But that image dominated and haunted my thoughts for the rest of the night. It wasn’t the first time someone had thrown up on me. It probably won’t be the last. Hell, I’ve thrown up on myself dozens of times. But there was just something about this time that jarred me. It simply offended me that someone could be invited over to a party, not a “kegger,” or a “bash,” but an honest-to-god party, and not know their limits, or at least be able to wait until they were completely outside. And then to come back in, before they were done voiding their dinner (actually, I don’t think she had eaten. There weren’t many chunks). And finally, of course, to lack the self-control and puke on one of the party’s co-hosts.
Please, I urge you, all you heavy drinkers out there (and we are Legion), know what you’re doing. I’m not advocating an anti-drinking stance, far from it. Go and get righteously sloshed if you want to. But at least have the common courtesy to know when you’re going over the limit, and what to do about it. Hosts from all over the land thank you for it.
If you have a tale to tell, and know how to operate a writing implement, send us your chicken scratch and we’ll decipher it, translate it, deem it immature with poor use of punctuation, throw it away, and then steal your idea for our own purposes. C’mon, it’ll be fun!
