March 16, 2010

St. Patty's Day Advice: Avoid a Hangover

As you know, tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, one of the biggest amateur hour drinking nights of the year. It's when the folks who only trot out their binge drinking on big holidays head out to the bars, put on a stupid hat, and pretend to be Irish. These folks aren't worthy to shine Shane MacGowan's tooth, but that doesn't mean we want them to feel sicky-poo from green beer on Thursday morning.

We know St Patrick's is mid-week this year, but all the same we put together a digest of our favorite advice for how to beat a hangover.

Before You Drink

Eat: Eat something that has vitamin B and C such as fruit. If you are going to an after hour party, you should eat early dinner before you go to the party or eat while you drink. The fructose in foods will help absorb alcohol.

[via Cocktail Times]

Hydrate. Drink lots of fruit juice and water now. Think of it this way, for every glass of non-alcoholic beverage you drink now you will save yourself from having to drink two glasses in the morning.

[About Cocktails]

While You Drink

Don't mix it up: Make it a beer night, or a wine night, or a vodka night, but don't make it an "anything goes" night. For one thing, you'll end up drinking too much. But let's face it; most drinks don't mix too well with each other. Your body is going to have a hard enough time handling that rum without you throwing in some gin.

[Men's Health]

Drink water in between alcoholic drinks to prevent dehydration.

[eHow]

After You Drink

Keep a large bottle of water by the bed you're crashing/sleeping on. When you'll wake up during the night or in the morning, you will be craving for water, but the headaches or someone throwing up in the bathroom will keep you from getting up or walking to get your water. Water by the bed is comfortable and makes the morning a lot more pleasant.

[WikiHow]

Before Bed: Take two aspirin with a full glass of water - The prostaglandin inhibitors in the aspirin can decrease hangover severity. In the Morning: Take two more aspirin with a full glass of water - This has been shown to minimize headaches as well as decrease inflammation from leftover prostaglandin. Take (a) multivitamin: Replenishing C and B vitamins in particular can help get rid of the rest of the toxins.

[ Liquor Snob]

That's right, we quoted ourselves - what're you going to do? It's our blog. And we know you'll forget most of this advice by the time you're in the trenches with food dyed miller lite (the most Irish of all drinks) but if you lay the groundwork before you go out you should be able to at least avoid yuking on your boss's shoes. Happy St. Patrick's Day!