Hangovers

No known cure

Mary Wakefield

IN front of me, in a plastic beaker, sat three inches of a grey-brown liquid with the consistency of mucus: a large treble of raw, beaten egg, Worcestershire sauce and cayenne pepper. I could no more drink it than inhale it.

A jolt of pain through my right eyeball coincided with a spasm of nausea as a truly appalling hangover began to show off its range of special effects. According to Bertie Wooster, Jeeves's pick-me-up will 'produce immediate results in anything short of an Egyptian mummy'. Nowhere in feeves Takes Charge does Wodehouse reassure me that these results do not involve prolonged vomiting.

Nonetheless, in desperation, I downed it. The sun did not immediately shine in through the window, nor, as in Bertie Wooster's experience, did hope dawn once more, but the after-effects of Jeeves's concoction were not all bad. When the feeling of having swallowed a huge slug marinated in Tabasco had subsided, I was left with a sore stomach but, unexpectedly, feeling less inclined to put my head under a bus.

Which, as regular victims soon learn, is the best they can hope for. Pain is the least of the effects of a bad hangover. Even after three Nurofen gel capsules have glued themselves to your throat, and the stabbing and aching have died down, there are still innumerable symptoms beyond the reach of conventional medicine.

There are no pills to prevent the floor from tilting around like the bottom deck of a ferry, or objects in one's peripheral vision from doing unexpected little jigs. There is nothing to stop the overhung holding forth, incoherently, on the minutiae of their physical symptoms or to keep at bay the tide of tea-time paranoia. Nor has there been invented a better way to block out last night's mortifying memories than stuffing your forefingers into your ears and singing 'La, la, la'.

Nothing beats bingeing on whisky or cheap red wine for an utterly suicidal morning-after. In the interests of knowing the enemy, I have discovered that this is because of a collection of chemicals and higher alcohols collectively called congeners or fusel oil. Fusel oil? These occur naturally in all fermented drinks, but in greater concentration in darker booze. While this won't stop anyone polishing off a bottle of Bell's in front of Open University on a Friday night, I've found some morning solace in imagining the bloody massacre of whole villages of happy little congeners.

The same goes for songbirds who, between 4 a.m. and 7 a.m. in summertime, are in cahoots with the congeners. Lying awake at dawn, sanity stretched tight as a drum over an exhausted mind, prevented from losing consciousness by irregular bursts of exuberant tweeting, no serious sufferer can have failed to smile weakly at the thought of snapping a handful of tiny, oscinine bones.

So it's reassuring to find that hangover cures throughout the ages have smacked of similar desperation. Many of them seem more like exorcism or penance than medicine. The early Romans recommend ed swallowing six raw owl's eggs in quick succession, Haitian voodoo practitioners still swear by sticking 13 black-headed pins into the cork of the bottle that gave you the hangover, and 19th-century chimney sweeps would warm a cup of milk, then add a teaspoon of fine soot from the nearest chimney. Hardwood soot was considered the best.

A traditional cowboy remedy is said to involve collecting plenty of well-dried jackalope droppings, making them into a strong tea with hot water, straining and then drinking every 30 minutes. Perhaps this is a comment on the futility of pitting one's wits against a hangover: a jackalope is a fictitious cross between a rabbit and an antelope, invented by cowboys to confuse gullible newcomers.

My favourite remedy indicates the almost religious contrition that dehydration and fusel oil can invoke: the ancient Greek solution was to flagellate yourself until you have drawn plenty of blood and then continue until the hangover is gone.

When possessed by a demon hangover, overreaction and hysteria come naturally. A colleague of mine, for whom cheery, hydrated mornings are a childhood memory, recalls waking up with one of those whisky heads that involve Catholic levels of self-hatred. On his way to the Tube, head in hands, he muttered out loud, 'Oh God, I wish I were dead. Today I really will kill myself.' Then he noticed his neighbour, an old lady, standing behind her garden hedge, staring at him in bug-eyed horror, obviously on the verge of running inside to telephone for an ambulance. Only one solution presented itself. Beaming at his neighbour, he clapped his hands in apparent joy, shouted, 'I'm so happy! What a wonderful world! Hurrah! 0 happy me!' and skipped off down the street doing occasional sideways froggy kicks in the manner of Gene Kelly.

Of those who have read this far, half will be irritated, wondering, 'Why do it? If hangovers are that bad, why keep getting plastered?'; the other half will be clutching a glass of warm tap water fizzing with Alka Seltzer and, while their lips will have mouthed each word, won't have understood a single sentence. What they would say, under other circumstances is, 'Well, what else is there to do?'

A friend and I recently made a concerted effort to think of recreational activities other than going to the pub. After ten silent minutes, we came up with bowling. Since leaving lie-ins. kebabs, Frisbee, emotional dilemmas and proper, carefree fun behind at university, drink has become as essential to life as scratch-and-sniff stickers used to be. And, oddly, just as I can't conceive of a good evening that doesn't involve drink. so I often get bored and frustrated in the mornings without a hangover to tend to.

Still, I expect one day I'll grow up and find myself overwhelmed by an urge to spend my beer money on cat food and garden gnomes.

Mary Wakefield is assistant editor of The Spectator.