Marc Spitz

watching the coverage of Ted Kennedy’s memorial and funeral service this weekend, i began thinking about hangovers. a journalist friend of mine forwarded me this link to a vintage GQ story by Michael Kelly (a write around, without kennedy’s approval or involvement but vivid enough to suck you in and make you upchuck in your mouth a little) and after reading it i was amazed that the guy got anything at all done, much less a thousand pieces of legislation over 46 years.

Link

http://men.style.com/gq/features/landing?id=content_5585

i wondered if perhaps he was one of those drinkers who never get hangovers. i know only one. a bartender and an actor. i once asked him to recommend a hangover cure as he frequently recommends unusual cocktails and occasionally, modes of behavior (solid bartenderly advice). he turned to me and said “I don’t get hangovers,” like he was Quint from Jaws. can you imagine Quint hungover? i can’t vouch for my friend, but Quint obviously had a death wish and death had clearly stalked Ted Kennedy for much of his life (John Kerry was on Meet the Press this morning explaining that Ted spent much of his, now a bit more understandably dissolute, middle period assuming that he would be next to be assassinated). maybe if you have a death fetish thing going on, it’s possible to negotiate a relationship with the demon alcohol where the morning after effects just stay away. i am not talking about hair of the dog. i’m talking about “beware of dog.” like the hangover is just like “leave this one alone. he’s wayyyy too intense. let’s go fuck with Spitz” i drink, see. i still drink. i drink about half of my week nights now. used to drink a lot more than i do now. i used to drain a half pint of Jim Beam alone in my apartment before even going to the bar. i used to smoke indoors then as well. this has all changed. the man at the liquor store in my new neighborhood could not pick me out of a line up. the old guy knew my name and used to ask me about new bands. not only do i get hangovers, but i think hangovers have ultimately saved me from dying young(er). if you don’t already have the fear permanently (in which case, you just drink and drink and drink until you’re numb and somehow, legislate and accomplish the like) hangovers give you the fear. i get them bad. i was never good at downing a pitcher of water before passing out. i just surrender. and often wake up at three or four in the morning feeling like someone has jammed a compressed air bicycle pump up my nose and blasted away. like my brain has shrunk down to the size of a dessicated lentil and the empty space in my skull has been filled in with concrete. someone has replaced my tongue with a long neglected AC filter and my blood with Red Devil hot sauce. i have no energy. i can’t write. i can’t think. i cancel all plans. I lay in bed for a day, eating hot and sour soup from Sammys on sixth avenue (really the only thing that comes close to a cure) and sticking my swollen face in a Con Air steamer (stolen from my ex-girlfriend and meant, i think, for do it yourself facials). after the age of 30, i’ve experienced, essentially HALF of my days, as the day after a long night at the bar is a fucking wash. i have gotten quite a lot done with the other half, the productive daylight hours BEFORE going to the bar and a full day before the 14 hour hangover. but if i drank every day, and smelled like someone had washed my hair in Jack Daniels (as Michael Kelly, the GQ writer described Ted) i would not even be able to start or finish this blog, or the last blog, much less write five books and i don’t know how many magazine articles and a dozen or so plays. i am not sure if this is a strange way of saying RIP to Ted, or hats off, or respect. i already lifted a drink or two to the Senator last night at Black and White Bar….

now I’m hungover. can write no more. maybe tomorrow when it’s the other half’s turn.