Hot People Clean Up Their Acts

Once upon a time, about a year and a half ago, I excused my drunkenness and the occasional resulting blackouts by saying that...hey, I remember the IMPORTANT things. I think I continue to excuse that behaviour in my slightly-younger-than-now self because it was occurring at a time in my life when I was emerging from a lengthy period of hazy mediocrity and the fun I was having on those evenings was bordering on legendary. And, to be honest, it was shortlived; I think that was the last (or at least, amongst the last) time that I blacked out.

Until last weekend. And for some reason, I'm not really inclined to excuse myself from that particular blackout. Perhaps because I'm slightly older...but probably not. It happened innocently enough. I accepted a few drinks made by a trustworthy friend (I say trustworthy to absolve him of any culpability here. Everything that happened here is my fault). I knew what was in them...including the sizeable shots of tequila. I also, in an effort to be gregarious, imbibed one or two shots of tequila. And then we cabbed to the dance bar. And then I don't remember anything afterwards. The rest of my night has been pieced together by a series of witnesses. And it causes me to shake my head. Vigorously.

A friend demonstrated my dancing (?) that evening. Face. Palm. I like to think of myself as a pretty good dancer. And when I'm in my usual state of comfortable buzz at the bar, I frequently enjoy myself by laughing at people who just haven't got it going on. Examples of this might include the cougars two-stepping to Will.i.am last Friday, or the trio of girls awkwardly grinding with each other when my boyfriend and I went to hear the final performance of one of the djs in the area we think is kinda fly. Those are the people I laugh at. And I became one of those people on that decidedly uncrowded Saturday night.

Also, I drunk-dialed my boyfriend who was sleeping soundly after a hard day of work while I pickled my liver and gyrated awkwardly. I think I did this from a snowbank I'd fallen in. I suggested that if he were awake, then he should call me. If he were not awake, then he should remain asleep and forego the phone call. Clearly, I'm a genius. I may have waited for him to call back for a few minutes. Thank goodness I gave up and walked home, because if I'd waited there all night, I'm sure the blue-haired biddies tottering off to church the next morning would have discovered a splayed-out Miss T Popsicle.

The pièce-de-resistance of the whole evening, thank goodness, was witnessed only by my cat. I vomited. But where? I'm actually too ashamed to say. Rest assured, though, that it was not in a garbage can or a toilet or any other receptacle appropriate for vomit. I don't remember the actual act of vomiting, but I was horrified to find it when I woke up. Ugh.

And this is what I KNOW happened. To whom did I speak? WHAT DID I SAY TO THEM? Gawd! When I was doing my undergrad, a guy I knew in residence produced a number of business-card-looking things. They were apology cards, with a generic apology to account for the usual amnesia associated with the binge-drinking. And I feel like I need a stack of them right now. And I don't think that's acceptable. Or hot.

Now, the general response to an evening like this is the ol' faithful "...and I'll never touch another drink ever again." I think we all know that would be false. But I think a certain amount of responsibility is in order so that I can maintain that comfortable buzz without the uncomfortable awkwardness I'm feeling every time I see someone who might have been there. I hate weeks like this.

Hot People Plan for the Future

Ok, before you start thinking that my penultimate post actually had some truth to it, stop panicking (like I would be). It's just that it's January, folks. Time to evaluate the past and plan for the future, hotness-wise.

It seems I was once again a steaming pile of failure at keeping my New Year's resolutions for 2010. Of the 5 that I had made, I managed to ACTUALLY only keep one - be employed. I've already discussed my feelings about plan ab-tastic and how it will continue into the future, but the remaining ones were sorely neglected. I can neither speak french fluently, nor reliably play any songs on my guitar. And though I downloaded all album suggested last year, and enjoyed them, I still have a soft spot in my heart for the truly terrible. Matchbox 20 and Hootie and the Blowfish still command a few bytes of space on my ipod.

But instead of abandoning these resolutions and languishing in my continued failure at being hot, I've come up with a cunning plan for this year's resolutions. I had some drinks with a few friends just over a year ago, and one of them finally said to me, "You know, the only thing that all hot people have in common is that they mostly just do whatever the hell they want." As a result, I've come up with 4 new resolutions that will catapult me, hopefully by January 2012, to a state of extreme hotness (or, doing-whatever-the-hell-i-want-ness). They will also, I believe, help me achieve those failed resolutions from last year as well.

1. Drink more. I have a two-pronged attack here. First of all, drinking more really means drinking more things that I like (and consequently, less of what's just ok). So, no more Rye & Diet Coke at the dance club in town just because it's an easy thing to remember. 2011 will usher into my life more wine, hard cider, and vodka/soda/lime. Prong two will involve making more cocktails at home in an effort to find my own signature drink. Plus nothing's hotter than a well-stocked bar, no? My liquor cabinet already features 4 different kinds of scotch. What else is a must-have, I wonder?

2. Eat more. This may sound counter-intuitive; just work with me here. I've spent much of the last year almost literally run off my feet. As a result, I make very few of my meals at home. As a further result, I have no leftovers to take to work. And as a concluding result, I frequently eat gross microwaved dinners for lunch, thus consuming pounds and pounds of salt and chemicals on a daily basis. So when I say eat more, I actually mean eat more FOOD. Like, food in the Michael Pollan sense of the word. This will be difficult, since, as I've mentioned, I'm pretty much run off my feet. Sooo....

3. Do less. The last 10 months, since moving to Northern Ontario, have been a massive exercise in insinuating myself upon the community. I did this by not saying no to anything (except the pipe band...and a few dates). Unfortunately, when you say yes to everything, people continue to ask you to do things, and you are often expected to continue to say yes. And the result is that you have NO TIME TO MAKE FOOD OR SLEEP OR WASH YOUR UNDERWEAR***. When all of these things happen at the same time, the result isn't hotness, as I'd hoped. It's usually that you walk around like a cranky-faced zombie all the time. Therefore, I've resolved to commit to only 3 regularly scheduled weekly events at a time, and will evaluate one-time offers on an individual basis, giving preference to those things that I REALLY REALLY WANT TO DO (I'm looking at you, dragon boat festival). Hopefully, this way, I'll have more time for cooking real food, doing real exercise, and wearing clean underthings.

4. Do more. I know what you're thinking..."isn't that in direct conflict with resolution #3?" Well, no. This one is about something different. In searching for that quest for hotness I've really had to consider whether an item or an activity was generally regarded as hot, or if it made me feel hot when I had it/did it. And when I considered it, I generally found that when I felt hot, other people found me hot as well. The necessary conclusion here is that I should do more things that make me feel hot. Like this:

<---- And also ziplining. And also skiing. And also making brownies. And since I've set aside time by doing less, I should have more time to do all this stuff. In conclusion, I'm a genius and I'll be hot in no time.










SERIOUS FACE -->


***Note: I've not yet worn dirty underwear. I HAVE stayed up till 3 a.m. doing laundry on a weeknight so I wouldn't have to wear dirty underwear though.