Drinking Habits of a 24-year-old

It’s Sunday morning and I’m not hungover.

Not even a little bit.

When did everyone start drinking craft beer at parties? When did they start caring about IPA’s versus lagers? Where the hell did all the everclear-laden pink panty droppers and date-rape drinks go? I swear, I drink beer to sober up after a long night of boozing. Beer is just bready water after all (or watery bread?). 4% alcohol? Pshawww. That’s like my shampoo…

These days, my friends pop Advil like it’s their job the morning after a rough night. They chug water, lie in bed, and moan about not being 18 anymore. Really, guys? Weak.

I guess my semi-small stature prevents me from consuming especially large quantities of any type of liquid, but I do think I’m better equipped to handle alcohol than the average 5’3 female. In four years of college, I never once vommed mid-party. But now, with everyone around me acting all subdued, I don’t want to be the wacked out drunk girl doing shots from 3-year-old bottles of Jaeger.

So, I sip my chilled beer calmly and engage in pseudo-intellectual conversation with skinny-jean-be-clad hipsters. I’m enjoying myself, sure, it’s just that now it’s in a mature, dare I say, adult manner? I guess a diminished alcohol tolerance is just one of the many signs that I’m finally starting to grow up.

I'm Stupid When I'm Single

I’ve never really been good at acting like a normal, functioning adult when I’m boyfriend-less, but lately, let me just say - UGHH I HATE SINGLE ME.

Single me does stupid stuff for attention. Single me wants every weekend night to become an awesome story, or a better-than-average blog post, or a fogged over memory of epic-ness. Single me encourages my friends to booty call randos they don’t really like just so I can live vicariously through their drunken, horned-up exploits. It’s not that single me can’t have sexploits of her own, but single me has to be careful. Single me doesn’t want to get a reputation or anything.

Single me wakes up with a hangover at 2 pm with an entire Sunday gone and a craving for Shake Shack that borders on desperation. Single me looks like a hot mess after a night of partying and passing out in my bed with a made-up face and lips swollen from making out with someone I don’t remember. Ok, confession – I just don’t want to remember. Single me prays to black out and misremember a night but usually, thanks to an ever-climbing alcohol tolerance, single me’s adventures just get blurry around the edges – like an instagrammed snapshot of the evening. Only worse.

Single me awakes to an iphone crammed with texts from worried friends – did you get home ok? How did your night end up? I'm fine guys. I'm always fine. Single me looks at the old family pictures on her bedroom wall shamefully, wondering if she’s dishonored the lineage. Single me shuffles blearily into a kitchen of pregamed chaos. Limes and sticky solo cups lining the counters and chairs in disarray. Single me drunk-eats leftovers at 3 am if she doesn’t make a stop at jumbo slice first. Single me eats jumbo slice. Although, come to think of it, non-single me eats jumbo slice from time to time too.

Single me is the worst version of me. She’s the one who drunk dials ex-boyfriends in the middle of the night just to hear a familiar voice even if she regrets it the next day. She’s the one who thoughtlessly gives her parents cause for concern. She’s the one who favors reckless decisions over rational ones.

So, despite the outrageous amounts of fun that single me has, it is certainly time to become non-single me. I can’t take much more of this.