It’s a sad fact that I’m long past the age when that question should be on my lips. It’s also a sad fact that I asked myself that very question this New Year’s Eve.
I only had three pints. Honest. And I was home by 9 PM.
In my defense, I was fighting a cold, and I didn’t feel much like eating. Many people would consider it unwise to start slugging down beer when one’s entire food consumption for the day has been two slices of toast, an apple, a granola bar, and some guacamole. Apparently, I am not one of those people.
The beer was very tasty. I had good intentions to anchor it with a pizza, but the pub cook dropped my pizza in the kitchen (no, I’m not making that up). So they had to make it again, and by the time it arrived, I’d already downed a pint.
Let’s just say it was a very effective pint. I strive for efficiency in all things, and in this case I outdid myself. By the time the pizza arrived, it was far too late to act as an anchor. All it did was bob like a pathetic dinghy in the rough swells of my second pint.
The third pint was, frankly, unnecessary. But oh, so tasty.
At approximately 1.2 pints, I achieved the correct level of intoxication for shooting eight-ball. Anything under a pint, and I’m trying too hard. At the magical “optimum beer saturation level” (OBSL), pool becomes easy. I can still triangulate with both eyeballs. I effortlessly calculate angles, the cue feels like an extension of my own arm, and I sink balls one after the other, swaggering around the table with only a tiny bit of cockiness to clear the table and sink the eight-ball.
The problem is, it’s impossible to maintain OBSL. Exactly one game after achieving it, it slips away again, at which point I might as well try to guide the cue ball using the Force. ‘Cause I sure as hell can’t guide it with the cue anymore.
We rang in the New Year for St. John’s, Newfoundland at 8:30 local time (thank goodness we live in a multiple-time-zone country), and headed home. Walking, fortunately. At least the cold didn’t bother me.
I went upstairs to change my clothes.
I couldn’t find them.
I stumbled around the bedroom, looking in all the usual places. Closet: Nope. Bathroom: Nuh-uh. Chair in the corner: Not there either. At last, I discovered them cleverly hidden in plain sight, lying on the bed. (It was dark in there. Never mind.)
I’m a little foggy on how that could have happened, because when I know I’m going to put the same clothes on later, I usually leave them where I removed them. The walk-in closet and the ensuite bathroom are the usual locations. If I had actually taken off my clothes beside the bed, I’d have been mooning the neighbours. And that was when I was sober.
I guess I’ll never know for sure. But if the neighbours avert their eyes and snicker the next time they see me, I’ll have a pretty good idea.
Happy New Beer!
Author Diane Henders 
Pingback: A Mashup Of (Mostly) Food | Diane Henders
Happy New Beer, Diane! 😀
Unfortunately (or fortunately) I think my OBSL kicks in with the first sip, and leaves again at the second. I have (had) some pretty nifty tricks when I used to play pool that always seemed to impress whoever I was playing, and then I would lose. Every time. And I don’t play sober…
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Never mind. I win exactly one game. No more, no matter how many games I play in an evening. Unless, of course, I zoom through OBSL *during* a game. In which case, I win NO games.
The only nifty trick I seem to have is scratching on the 8-ball. That one usually impresses my opponents. (Don’t know what your pub rules are there, but here in Canada, that’s an automatic loss of game).
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At slightly after midnight at the first New Year’s Eve after I got married, my husband, who had been standing on our apartment balcony, said he just saw a naked woman walking across the parking lot. I asked him if she was wearing shoes. She was. This was a relief, as I of course I could not let that be my husband’s most memorable sight for New Year’s Day. So I stripped off my clothes and stepped out onto the balcony- shoeless! lol
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LOL! Crisis averted. Thank heaven for your seductive toe cleavage (I’m sure that’s what he was looking at). 🙂
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“Seductive toe cleavage”! An epiphany. I do indeed have cleavage. No wonder my husband prefers me sans socks at bedtime! XD
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I’m so glad it’s not only me that this kind of stuff happens to. All. The. Time.
Happy new year to one of my favorite fellow bloggers! You make blogging fun, Diane!
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Thanks, Sierra! Happy New Year to you, too! 🙂
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Oh, the magical OBSL, how we love thee! It’s good for pool, bowling, piano evidently – I just wish it were better for writing. I don’t know how those old guys did it – they talk about Hemmingway drinking like a fiend. After 2 beers, the only plot I can think of involves another beer, and after that one my working title becomes “the case of the missing beer.” Needless to say, the morning usually sees the title, um, shift a little.
Happy New Year! I am, right now, about to start Chapter 18 of NSS (book one). I have to tell you, first, in my head your protagonist looks just like the picture at the top of this page, and second, you are now one of only 2 or 3 authors who’ve gotten me laughing hard on the Copyright page…
I suppose someone was already doing business as “One Dee, Ten Tee Publishing”? 😉
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I hear you about the OBSL versus writing. I actually wrote the draft of this post while inebriated, and let’s just say the revisions were… substantial.
Happy New Year to you, too! I’m laughing – not many people catch the in-joke, but I should have known you would. ID10T seemed just a little too obvious. 🙂
Hope you enjoy the book.
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A good laugh Diane. I, too, have struggled with that perfect moment where beer relaxes your worries just enough to allow you to focus completely in pool without the slightest effort. My time in that realm is limited to about two and a quarter minutes and one sip of beer, after that I’m as likely to put the ball into orbit as get it in a pocket. You’d think I’d learn about this, but after a few more pints I can’t remember anything. Fortunate I can almost always remember where I put my clothes after pool. Almost.
Cheers!
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Ah, you’re one step ahead of me then. And I prefer to think of our repeated efforts to achieve OBSL as “persistence” and “dedication”.
Thanks for visiting and commenting! 🙂
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Found you when I was reading Not Quite Old. So glad I did. Your post is hillarious.
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Thank you! And thanks for visiting and commenting. 🙂
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I really, really, really, really wish I didn’t identify with this post. The OBSL also works with piano recital. And the consequences of missing that golden five-minute period are tremendous. I haven’t actually misplaced my clothes in a few years. The consequences of that, to the viewing public, would be tremendous now, too.
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Ooh, piano recitals. Ouch. I never actually attempted OBSL for mine; I just botched them all on my own. Maybe I should have tried it. It probably wouldn’t have improved my playing any, but I might not have cared…
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LOL! (Man, I feel like I type that a lot here.) So true about the OBSL. Or, in my case, the OMSL, the “M” standing for either Manhattan or martini. Easy to reach, tricky to maintain. Alas.
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But I think more research is required. It’s obviously an important issue. I’m willing to sacrifice myself for the good of the scientific community.
Ya think we could get a research grant?
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Now, there’s an idea with possibilities. Definitely worth pursuing!
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