There’s a lot of really stupid writing about drinking out on the web.  From idiotic lists of shots with mayonnaise in them to assholes telling you to drink antifreeze to people telling you to pour alcohol into your asshole, drinking advice on the web ranges from retarded to downright life-threatening.  Nobody seems interested in achieving and maintaining a high-quality level of drunkenness (or what I call Perfect Drunk).  They all want to make sure you’re so wrecked you puke all over your now-former fiancé and wind up naked on the front lawn spooning with a VERY unhappy neighborhood dog.  That is not what this article is about.

It IS, however, about this: tips on how to get to your personal Perfect Drunk as quickly as possible while keeping comfortable and minimizing chances of making yourself sick.  So it is with much fanfare and rapturous applause that we present:

Part 1: The Setup

So…you’ve decided that you’re going to get shithammered tonight.  Good for you! To start your night off right, you need to kickstart your system with something.  We suggest:

1. A Shot – Duh.  The less sweet and the fewer mixers, the better.  No point in starting your stomach off with a nasty syrupy mess.  Booze is going to make sweet sweet love with your stomach tonight, so the two might as well get acquainted now.

2. Pound a Beer – If a shot doesn’t meet your fancy, kill a beer.  Doesn’t matter how you do it –funnel, shotgun, Bierstick or a plain old CHUG– get that sumbitch in your body as quickly as possible.  You’ll have plenty of time for leisurely sipping later.

Dirty dishes, shmirty shmishes…you’ve got drinking to do!

Part 2: The Steady Drink

You should always have at least one drink in your hand, if achieving Perfect Drunk is your mission.  This will be your sipping drink throughout the night.  Always keep it full, and always keep sipping on it.  You have a few options:

1. Straight Alcohol – With Perfect Drunk as your goal of the evening (or morning, we don’t judge), diluting your alcohol with a mixer is keeping you from your goal.  So if this is what you choose, be it martini or wine or bourbon, keep on sippin’.  However, if you’re not able to stomach straight booze, you have another option…

2. Booze and Diet Soda – No, this isn’t about keeping your girlish figure (stick to the salad if that’s your concern).  Research shows that mixing a drink with a diet soda boosts alcohol-to-system ratios by as much as 50%.  Something in the diet drink chemicals actually increases the alcohol absorption to your bloodstream.  Bonus! However, you may not prefer straight liquor or sweetened libations, in which case…

3. Beer and a Shot – If beer is your preferred method of intoxication, give it a boost with a shot of hard alcohol (also known as a sidecar or a depth charge).  In Russia a beer with a shot of vodka in it is called a Yorsh, and the flavor of the vodka is barely noticeable.  I personally love a Boilermaker, which is a beer with a shot of whiskey (preferably bourbon).  Pick a medium-dark beer like Newcastle or Amber Bock for the best flavor combination with the whiskey*.

Holy shit…can they really do that?  Is that technology out there?

Part 3: The Build

If you just start with a shot and then keep drinking, you may eventually get where you want to be, but we’re trying to fasttrack this bitch.  You’re going to need to punctuate your sipping drinks with other drinks.

1. Take Shots – Noticing a trend?  One or two shots per sippin’ drink that you go through should be adequate, but use your discretion.  You may want to ramp up even faster in the beginning.  Listen to your body (trust your hips, I’ve heard they don’t lie).

2. Play a Drinking Game – Doesn’t matter which one really, but playing a game is obviously going to speed up your drinking while being a fun way to pass the time.  This does not mean you stop drinking your Steady Drink; whatever it is, keep drinking it regularly. Your drinks in Asshole, beer pong, Brooklyn or whatever are merely boosts to your main drinking.

What are you thinking about you toolbag?  It’s not like there’s skill involved.  Pick a card and drink already.

Part 4: Maintaining the Buzz

Hooray, you’re drunk! You’ve done it!  Resist the urge to call your parents to let them know of your great achievement (they won’t be nearly as proud as you are).  But you’re not done yet…keeping yourself in the state of Perfect Drunk is serious business, so here’s what you do:

1. Keep Drinking - But tone it down a notch.  It’s not easy, because you’ll want to keep taking lots of shots because some stupid part of your brain figures that if This Much Booze = Perfect Drunk, then MORE Booze = MORE PERFECTER DRUNKerEST (don’t even try to tell me that’s not the kind of words your brain makes up with when you’re PD).  This is not how things work.  You’ll have to keep drinking to stay at the level you are, but reel it in a bit.  Remember that alcohol doesn’t work immediately, and it needs time to work through your system.  Not that you’ll remember this when you’re PD, but at least I can say I tried.

2. Eat Something Occasionally – Remember, this is about keeping a solid buzz for a long time.  Having a little food in your stomach to soak things up will keep you from rounding the corner too quickly and skidding off of Happy Drunk Drive and careening headlong into Pukesville Gorge.  Keep it simple: chips, pretzels, pizza bagels, etc.  Leftover sushi is not your friend right now.

3. Do Something – Sitting there and doing nothing but drinking is an easy way to go over your limit without realizing it.  We’ve all had that moment where we’ve been sitting for a while and drinking, then go to stand up and say “Whoa!” as The Drunk clops us right in the chops.  Moving around, talking to different people at a party or whatever will help you keep tabs on just how inebriated you are and allow you to gauge your intake.

“What do you mean there’s nothing left to drink?  I had like 10 bottles!”

Part 5: Denouement

Eventually, your blissful journey will have to end (unless you’re a very successful hobo or an incredibly wealthy person without responsibility).  It was a great ride while it lasted, but let yourself down easy:

1. Drink Water – The single best hangover prevention/cure.  Change out your sippin’ drink to water when you’re starting to wind down to make the next morning a little easier.

2. Go to Sleep – What better way to end a night of pure joy than with good old fashioned SLEEP.  If there are repercussions to pay for your wanton consumption, let them wait until morning.  End the evening on a high note and sleep the sleep of angels.  Maybe even with an angel, if you’re lucky.

This picture is titled “Sleep Little Angel”.  That’s friggin’ hilarious. Shame about that beer though.

The fine art of getting sublimely hammered is not an easy one.  It’s very easy to oversteer in one direction or the other, so hopefully this guide will assist you in your journey to Perfect Drunk.  Have any tips you think we missed (highly unlikely), leave them in the comments!

Another blissful night of debauchery ends with you straddling some fence.  When will you ever learn?

Some final notes:

• Don’t try to take shortcuts like drinking on an empty stomach, sleep deprived, or mixing booze and pills.  This is not Drinking to Puke or Endanger Yourself, so don’t.
• This is not an article for new drinkers or people who rarely drink.  This is for those of us who drink on a fairly regular basis and have a medium-to-high tolerance level.  Get your game up, NEWB, then come back.
• You may not need to try all these methods at once.  Try them out one by one and see what works for you.
• Know your own limits.  Don’t drink more than you know you should just because it says so here.  You know you, so don’t be stupid and have your jerk family members come and sue us after you die of alcohol poisoning because “Derrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr…. DrinkPlanner told me to do this!”.  You’re an adult, and responsible for your own decisions.  To put it plainly for the super-dense: DrinkPlanner is in no way responsible for any injury or illness you incur while drinking.  Don’t be dumb.

*For a truly brain-melting experience, pair this up with a maduro cigar.  Seriously, these three flavors were born to be together.  Dark, smoky, complex and sweet…I’m telling you, if you’re a cigar smoker you should make this happen.  And if you’re not a cigar smoker…what have you been doing with your life?