Hangover Ratings

Hangover Ratings
(Courtesy Chris B.)

* 1-star hangover
No pain. No real feeling of illness. You sleep in your own bed and when you wake up, there are no traffic cones in there with you. You are still able to function relatively well on the energy stored up from all those vodka and Red Bulls. However, you can drink 10 bottles of water and still feel as parched as the Sahara. Even vegetarians crave a cheeseburger and a basket of fries.

** 2-star hangover
No pain, but something is definitely amiss. You may look okay but you have the attention span and mental capacity of a stapler. The coffee you chug to try and remain focused is only exacerbating your rumbling gut, which is craving a full English breakfast. Although you have a nice demeanor at the office, you are costing your employer valuable money because all you really can handle is some light filing, followed by aimlessly surfing the Net and writing junk e-mail.

*** 3-star hangover
Slight headache. Stomach feels like crap. You are definitely a space cadet and not so productive. Anytime someone walks by your desk you gag because the perfume/aftershave reminds you of the random shots you did with your alcoholic friends after the bouncer kicked you out at 1:45 a.m. Life would be better right now if you were in your bed with a dozen doughnuts and a two-liter bottle of Coke, watching daytime TV. You've had four cups of coffee, a gallon of water, two burritos, and a two-liter bottle of Diet Coke, yet you haven't peed once.

**** 4-star hangover You have lost the will to live. Your head is throbbing and you can't speak too quickly or else you might spew. Your boss has already lambasted you for being late and has given you a lecture for reeking of booze. You wore nice clothes, but you smell of socks and can't hide the fact
that you missed an oh-so crucial spot shaving. Your teeth have their own individual sweaters. Your eyes look like one big vein and your hairstyle makes you look like a reject from a second-grade class, circa 1976. You would give a week's pay for one of the following: home time, a doughnut and somewhere to be alone, or a time machine so that you can go back to last night and change the fact that you went out. You scare small children in the street just by walking past them.

***** 5-star hangover
You have a second heartbeat in your head, which is actually annoying the employee sitting next to you. Vodka vapor is seeping out of every pore and making you dizzy. You still have toothpaste crust in the corners of your mouth from brushing your teeth. Your body has lost the ability to generate saliva, so your tongue is suffocating you. You'd cry but that would take the last drop of moisture left in your body. Death seems pretty good right now. Your boss doesn't even get mad at you and your co-workers think that your dog just died because you look so pathetic. You should have called in sick because, let's face it, all you can manage to do is breathe... very gently.

****** 6-star hangover
You arrive home and climb into bed. Sleep comes instantly, as you were fighting it all the way home in the taxi. You get about two hours of sleep until the noises inside your head wake you up. You notice that your bed has been cleared for takeoff and is flying relentlessly around the room. No matter what you do now, you're going to vomit. You stumble out of bed and now find that your room is in a yacht, fully sailing. After walking along the skirting boards on alternating walls, knocking off all the pictures, you find the toilet. If you are lucky, you remember to lift the lid before you spontaneously explode and wake the whole house up with your impersonation of walrus mating calls. You sit there on the floor in your undies, cuddling the only friend in the world you have left (the toilet), randomly continuing to make the walrus noises, spitting and farting. Help usually comes at this stage, even if it is short-lived. With your stomach totally empty, your spontaneous eruptions have died down to 15-minute intervals, but your body won't relent. You are convinced that you are starting to turn yourself inside out and swear that you saw your tonsils shoot out of your mouth on the last occasion. It is now dawn and you pass by your disgusted partner getting up for the day, as you try to climb into bed. She abuses you again for trying to get into bed with lumpy bits of dried vomit in your hair. You reluctantly accept her advice and take a shower. Work is simply not an option. The whole day is spent trying to avoid anything that might make you sick again, like moving. You vow never to touch a drop of alcohol again, and who knows, for the next two or three hours you might even succeed.