The Common Hangover: Play the Percentages
If we consider feeling 100% is to feel basically in normal health, as in ‘I feel fine’, or ‘I am currently unaware of health as a concept’, and we consider 0% as having a very bad hangover, then here is a recipe of possible accumulative amerlioration methods. The percentage values refer to how much better you will feel after the initial ‘I feel like a pig just shat in my head’ stage.
4% - have a shower (I know you can’t be arsed but it’s worth it)
2% - cup of tea with milk and two sugars
1.5% - scrambled eggs
3% - brush your teeth (surprisingly effective)
1% - pint of water (this, however, will have an effect that appreciates over time)
3% - glass of fresh orange juice
5% - fresh smoothie
A bad choice - milk
0.5% - hoch a mad wallop of phlegmy spit
0.5% - clear your nose into the sink / toilet / shower / out the window
0.5% - listen to Belle and Sebastian or something equally inoffensive
20% - be with your pals who are also hungover
1% - full Scottish breakfast (seems like a good idea at the time, but any positive impact will be nullified by the ‘Full Scottish Breakfast Hangover’ that will surely follow)
2% - roll and sausage / BLT
50%* - cold can of Irn Bru (*unfortunately, the wonderful effects caused by this sugar rush will wear off at a rate of 10% a minute starting from the first sip)
15%* - cup of coffee (*again, unfortunately, it has similar depreciative effects as Irn Bru). Other caffeinated drinks such as Relentless, Monster, and Red Bull, all fall under this category, but not Coca Cola cause it’s pish. These drinks may also leave you wired to the moon, and the moon is pure far away, so watch out.
3% - watch Planet Earth or another BBC Natural History documentary (you will need to avoid being guilt tripped by the fact that we are destroying our beautiful planet as this will nullify any benefits you receive from watching a snow leopard maul a mountain goat)
1% / -8% - have a wank to some dirty internet porn (you will feel 1% better during the wank and then 8% worse after you have finished and have to clean up and delete your web history while remembering how you have contributed to the exploitation of women)
3% - go outside! (if it’s sunny) / don’t go outside! (if it’s rainy)
2% - go for a cycle (this is debatable, but has been known to have marvellous results in some particular cases)
90% - dive off a boat into the shining Andaman Sea (admittedly, most of the time this option is not always available)
90% - start drinking again, aka: hair of the dog (this is, in fact, the one of only two medical cures for a hangover, as your body will recycle the evil poisons. Of course, this cure has been known to lead to alcoholism in 99% of cases). The other medical cure is:
100% - get your stomach pumped and your veins filled with vitamins and endorphins (only in rare and extreme cases is this option available ... also, you might die)
-100% - go to work. Don’t do it man, fuck em. The Man will stay rich and you will always be his slave if you go into work or not.
0% - stay in bed and do nothing (contrary to popular belief, this does not actually help at all)
-15% - clean
0.6% - make pointless lists
0.1% - Rennies indigestion tablets
0% - Berocca tablets, paracetamol, ibuprofen, aspirin etc. (they just don’t work on hangovers)
5% / -20% - exercise. It can go either way.
11% - get some good pumpin done with someone you actually like.
As you can see, with the right measures taken in the correct order and dosage, in a normal situation, it is possible to cure your hangover by up to 51%, which, I think you will agree, is quite a result!
After waking up, your hangover should naturally recede after about 6 hours at a rate of 7.2% an hour. However, in many Scottish males over the age of twenty one, a two day hangover has been known to occur. To prevent this: never go to Scotland.