Like a lot of people that were social in their 20's I went kind of off the rails when I was in college and a few years beyond as far as partying was concerned. When I think back to the rather legendary amount of booze I would consume at those points in my life it is pretty amazing to me that I didn't get seriously ill. I think about how I would start drinking at around 9pm and often continue doing so until the sun came up the next day.
My "passion" for drinking continued well into my adult life as I had a kind of party job when I first moved to Thailand and was working as a scuba diving guide where it was expected of us to drink and party with the customers after a day of diving. As time went on I got a bit more serious about life and thought twice about getting drunk.
But now that I am in my 40's I really don't handle even a mild hangover very well and I was briefly re-introduced to this feature in my life in the past two days after a rather heavy partying day on Sunday.
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I'm old enough to know better and have plenty of experience so I am pretty disappointed in myself for allowing this to happen but at least it was for a special occasion.
A friend of mine that I don't really get to hang out with all that often told me that an important boxing match was going to be on TV and asked if I wanted to go with him to see it. When I had accepted his offer I was unaware that it was going to begin at around 4am. I am a man of my word though, so I set my alarm and met this guy at the pub at that ungodly hour.
I wasn't going to drink but he walked up to the bar and came back with 2 beers, one of them was for me. I sighed as I took the first sip realizing that I was going to be in for a long day.
I should have seen it coming but as it turns out there was ANOTHER sporting event later on that morning for the UFC, which is something I used to pay a lot of attention to but don't really anymore. The funny thing about the boxing match is that we were late to the start of it and arrived at the end of the 2nd round. The fight resulted in a knockout and was over just 2 and a half rounds later.
Now it is 5am or so and I am in a bar having already consumed a couple of beers. It's too late to go back to sleep... right?
Well as it turns out I really should have gone home and gone back to sleep... haha
Thankfully, this friend of mine is one of the more physically active people that I know so when I suggested that we take my bicycles around the town and explore a little bit he was all for it! This resulted in us getting around the town before all the people were out and about and it was actually really nice.
However, the time grew nearer for us to meet with other friends for the other sporting event so I figured, why not get Nadi involved? She always enjoys going on a little adventure and since she is calm, the bar didn't have an issue with her hanging out although it was a bit too crowded there for this event.
I didn't really know who was in any of the fights but that wasn't really the point. The point was to be around some friends and Nadi just enjoys going to do anything other than be in the house by herself so I guess it was a good time.
Here is the issue though. I am a borderline alcoholic and am incapable of having just a few drinks. If I have one I am going to have them all and the next thing I know it is getting dark outside and I have been drinking for over 12 hours straight with a little break in the middle for some bike riding. I suppose it is a very good thing that we did that bike ride or things would have been much worse.
I went to bed really early but the damage was done and when I woke up the next day I was in for a world of hurt. I was nauseous, had a banging headache, and just felt achy and terrible. It was so bad in fact, that even though I spent all of Monday not drinking alcohol and having a ton of healthy drinks and whole foods, I still managed to feel like crap again on Tuesday an entire two days later.
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For the most part I have embraced the fact that I am in my 40's and this sort of partying all day nonsense is well beyond my capabilities anymore. That was an absolutely horrible two days of suffering just to participate in watching some sports that I don't really care about anyway.
I hate to be a downer but I think in the future when my friend asks me if I want to go watch a 4am boxing match that I am going to decline. I simply cannot handle it anymore and well, there's only 7 days in a week and 2 of mine were completely wasted. I accomplished nothing on both those days and am just now starting to feel well again.
I see some people my age or even older that are out drinking every day and honestly, I don't know how they can do it. I suspect that they dodge hangovers by simply getting drunk again and well, that's not a good way to live your life either now, is it?