Something about staring hazily into a toilet bowl at 3 a.m. really puts your life into perspective. Maybe it’s the feeling of stomach tearing itself to shreds while your limbs can’t seem to keep themselves together long enough to drag your sorry ass a few feet into bed. This is probably the lowest point in your college career (aside from that time you were locked out of your room, naked, when someone pulled the fire alarm). Within the next ten minutes you will swear to yourself seventeen times that you will never drink another beer for the rest of your life.

But what a night it was before all that, eh?

No denying that drinking can make people do some stupid shit. I’ve seen blitzed football players belting out Ricky Martin tunes – one guy knew every word on the album! I’ve seen fratboys dive two stories into a pool wearing their girlfriends’ miniskirts. I’ve heard trashed multilinguals freestyling in Latin and Swahili. Guys, I have seen upwards of four girls getting on each other at the same time. And yes, the pictures will cost you money.

I’m not trying to compare my best drunk stories to anyone else’s, I’m just illustrating the often hilarious antics we get up to with a few shots of Smirnoff coursing through our veins. We all have our infamous tales, our awful experiences, our compromising photos posted on the internet.

Somehow though, each instance of temporary insanity ends up making our lives a little bit better, giving us an experience to remember (or at least to hear about from friends during a massive hangover the next day). That ill-advised naked frolic in the poison ivy patch probably sucked for about a week (probably? Hell, I can’t imagine much worse), but these days I bet it makes a great excuse for reminiscing with your buds, or at least a good cautionary tale around the campfire.

I remember seeing one dude hopped up on acid, Everclear and some sort of fish paralyzer running around in his skivvies screaming "BEWARE THE FERRET!" to terrified passers-by. I created a comic book based on that one incident and sold the rights to Marvel for a couple grand. In fact if all goes as planned, The Scary Shiny Ferret-Thing will be in theaters next summer, starring Chris Tucker and Leslie Nielsen.

That said, don’t be fooled into thinking that inebriated states will ALWAYS be warm, fuzzy bubbles of comfort where everything is good and nothing can go wrong. Shit happens, a lot. Yes, I know you’ve heard this before, I know you’re old enough to know better. But last weekend some girl decided she wanted to dance on my friends’ glass table, somehow forgetting that a glass table is usually made out of, well, glass, and consequently broke the shit out of it (…can I say that? "broke the shit out of"?). Not to mention the hundreds of drunk-driving related accidents that happen all the time, which I’m sure you hear about. Anyway, enough of the sermon.

The point is, drinking is fun. I’ll be the first to admit it. Obviously that should be accompanied by "in moderation", although this advice also goes for pretty much every other activity on earth. You don’t have to go and drink ten shots of Everclear in twenty minutes (but if you can and survive, then hey, uh, mad props… you fucking psycho). Think of drinking more as an additive that helps other activities seem much more fun. Drunken fishing, drunken golfing, drunken lambada; hey, whatever you feel like. Hell, even classes are more fun with alcohol. Uh, so I hear.

Oh, but don’t go boating. Drinking and boating do not mix. KSPC told me to say that.

The straight deal is: it’s not about being popular, drinking Natty Ice because everyone else does (it’s not by choice, believe you me) or trying to down more shots than that dude with the massive glut at the other end of the table. It’s about having fun, going out and doing something you enjoy doing, just with a little extra kick. So go on out, have some beers, hit on that hottie by the couch, chill out with your friends, play some caps, go dancing, drink some more, lose your grip on reality, wander about aimlessly making nothing even remotely approaching any kind of sense.

Then, before you know it, you’ll be back in that familiar position, begging the porcelain god to make your ouchie go away, promising yourself for the eighteenth time that week that you will never even look at another beer for the rest of your life.