Eventful

Wayne's birthday was a few weeks ago. To celebrate he bought himself some Red Stripe and, for me, a small bottle of tequilla. I'm not a fan of tequilla per se, but one time I drank it and we had a long interesting talk about monkey toupees (there were sketches involved) and since then he's decided that's my drink of choice. I don't actually drink much at all. I've never been a fan of the flavor, unless we're talking Malibu + Sprite or Buttery Nipples. In fact, the last drink I had was some fruity wine cooler thing back in July. I don't avoid alcohol because of the flavor (as I said the night of the monkey toupee - the first half of the bottle tastes terrible, but the second half is pretty good!) or because of any moral issues. I avoid it because it makes my face really hot. Sunburn hot. Not pleasant and, when drinking in public, a little embarassing.

Over time it occurred to me that I must be mildly allergic to alcohol, hence the face hotness. When I felt the urge to drink, though, it never really bothered me. A few drinks in and it would go away (or at least I would forget about it). Lately however, I've been having weird allergic reactions. Two different kinds of medicine and some random-as-yet-unknown-agent have made me break out in hives.

So on Friday, when I finally decided to have a shot or two of that tequilla, I jokingly told Wayne to call 911 if I happened to go into anaphylactic shock. I opened the bottle and took one swallow (yes, straight from the bottle cause that's just how I roll) and a minute or two later I started feeling the burn. My face felt super hot. HOT! I waited a few minutes to make sure my throat wasn't going to close up. When I happened to pass a mirror a couple minutes later...! It was crazy. My face wasn't just red - it looked like I'd smeared red lipstick all over my face. Even my ears and my neck were red. My face was puffy. I had huge splotchy hives all over my neck, back, side, ELBOWS. Strangely enough the area around my scar (from recent shoulder surgery) was red, too. I decided it would not be the best decision to keep drinking at that point. I took some benedryl instead (after only ONE gulp of alcohol, mind you). After an hour or so I was (mostly) back to normal and very sleepy.

You know what the worst part is? I was that person who never had a hang over. Now I'll never have a hang over, but for all the wrong reasons.

(And as an unrelated side note... Saturday night I broke the hell out of my tooth while eating some crab rangoon. It wasn't the food's fault, though. It was my tongue ring. I bit it. Chomped it, really. Those things are dangerous. Granted I'd had mine for almost 10 years before I did any damage, but still. I took it out and now it feels weird. Phantom barbell syndrome. Is that a thing? I wouldn't doubt it.)