How to beat a hangover

Last night, while he was out, H. sent me a text ("Miss you") for absolutely no reason at all, and even called once to ask "how I was doing," something he never does, at least by phone. It was pretty cute, until I remembered that H. dislikes electronic communication (instant messenger, internet phone, video chat, phone calls, etc.) and therefore he must either be drunk or otherwise not in his right mind. Indeed, I later found out that H. had knocked back three mugs of beer, three shots of whiskey, and four shots of Chinese liquor that night&#8212and that was just up to the point where he could still count reliably. Which somehow made it all the more endearing, that the man could be sloshed out of his mind and still think of me.

'Did you know that having a hangover is not having enough water in your body to run your Krebs cycles? Which is exactly what happens to you when you're dying of thirst. So, dying of thirst would probably feel pretty much like the hangover that finally bloody kills you.' ~ A Beautiful Mind

So anyway, knowing H. would pay for his overindulgence heavily the next morning, I went about getting him something for the mother of all hangovers that I knew would be coming. I've reached the&#8212informal and personal&#8212conclusion that the most effective food cures for hangovers across cultures are the ones laden with the water and electrolytes your body pissed away trying to flush out the alcohol you inflicted on it the night before: egg-and-bean-sprout-and-pollack soups in Korea, rollmops in Germany, salt-preserved watermelon in Russia. As for me, VitaminWater has helped me through many a foggy, soggy morning-after, and I've ever since been grateful to the friend who let me onto that tip. Since potassium is the first electrolyte to go whenever there's an electrolyte imbalance in the body (usually), I opted for the potassium formulation. The artificial "fruit punch" syrupy flavor of which I detest, but I'm not the one drinking it, neither am I the one who visited throbbing pounding wrath on myself through my own immoderation, and H. likes nasty fake fruit flavors anyway.

These are also a new discovery: Tex-Schmelz "traubenzucker" candies, which piqued my interest on a trip to the pharmacy months ago. I'd read hypoglycemia might be responsible for some of the nasty effects of hangovers, and I figured it would be a good excuse to actually try them. No different from an oversized, overpriced roll of Smarties, or maybe Necco wafers, but intensely sweet and powerfully scented of fruit. They're also crumblier, probably because of the monomeric nature of the glucose, for which reason H. bet they would dissolve quite well in liquid. He proved his point instantly by dropping a candy into the "fruit punch."

Times like this, I feel like I should act above it all, feign appropriate dismay, or at least annoyance... but of what? Of childish impulses to play with food? I couldn't resist the temptation to peek in the bottle. Sure enough, tiny bubbles were gathering around the tablet, and it seemed as if H.'s "hypothesis" had been proven right. So much for acting adult... I wouldn't know what to do with someone utterly practical and responsible anyway.