When I was in college we drank often, and sometimes to excess. I remember drinking shots and slugging down awful-tasting concoctions mixed in garbage pails . . . and regretting it all profoundly when I woke up with my head on the toilet seat the the next morning. All of that drinking, of course, occurred by slurping and swallowing the contents of cups, bottles, or cans raised to my lips.
Apparently we’ve crossed some new frontier in collegiate drinking excess, because some students are experimenting with alcohol enemas. This practice involves placing a tube in the keister and pouring alcohol into the colon, where it is absorbed directly into the bloodstream. As a result, the enzymes in the stomach and liver that break down alcohol are bypassed, and the drinker (I’m not sure that’s the right word, given the circumstances) gets drunk quicker. In fact, the recipient (I’m not sure that’s the right word, either) can get much drunker, much faster. A recent incident at the University of Tennessee saw one student hospitalized with a blood alcohol level of .40, which is five times the legal limit and in the range where people can die of alcohol poisoning.
This might just be a weird incident at one school that shouldn’t be assumed to be a trend. Even if alcohol enemas are just limited to the University of Tennessee, however, what would possibly motivate a kid to drop trou, stick a hose up his butt, and ask another person to do the pouring honors? Is getting drunk as fast as possible really so important that you would do something so outlandish, disturbing, and dangerous? I’ve got to believe that any student who has experimented with alcohol enemas has some very serious problems.
Oh, dear gawd. Bad idea. When I was young it was fun to drink yummy concoctions that tasted good and achieved inebriation. I’m not sure a pina coloda, for instance, would provide the same satisfaction going in the out door.