Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Fact-learning!
Finally, it's time to continue with my AlcoholEdu-cation. I failed the pre-test for chapter 2, so I should have a lot to learn.
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First we get one of the parts I chose not to opt-out of: How is alcohol made? This is probably the most interesting and informative part of the entire course, which is why it was optional.
Let's learn about the "standard drink." The standard drink is a unit of measure that is used to bitch at people about their drinking habits quantitatively.
"If you're watching calories, don't think of light beer as a healthy dieting strategy."
Noted. Apparently, you should always know how much alcohol is in a drink before you drink it. To me, that relies on trusting the evil corporations who make booze, and I prefer to test it the old-fashioned way: with a large sample size.
Anyway, on to some stuff about BAC levels, brain activity, and all that. To be honest, I pretty much spaced out while most of it was going on. They didn't even have pictures of really drunk people doing stupid shit, which would have made it worthwhile.
Apparently, 1 in 100 people die with a BAC as high as 0.35. That's not bad. I think I can play those odds comfortably. So what influences BAC?
Weight. Whether you're fat, relatively (but not really) thin, or tall and black, weight will influence your BAC.
Sex. Suck it, men! I can get drunk cheaper than you! Check out this chart. In particular, pay attention to the oddly scaled ordinate. Sure, the intervals are the same visual size, but the first one is only half the length of any of the others. I guess some people just like their odd numbers.
Absorption. Mmmmmmm...
Elimination. If you get really drunk, the clock looks really really blurry. I'm not sure how that relates to elimination.
Some things don't work, though. Vomiting, for instance. But since I'll be vomiting to keep myself pretty anyway, there's no worry here. It's a little misleading, though. Vomiting won't affect your BAC, but it will prevent more alcohol from being absorbed. I mean, I guess if you love your statistics, this is accurate, but dudes. Seriously. If you drink and vomit immediately after drinking (preferably right back into the cup you drank from), you're all clear! Anyway, if that dude on the left is vomiting while lying on his back face up, he's in trouble. And the owner of that couch (perhaps the color-coordinated guy sitting on it) is going to be pissed.
Well, that section ended in mid-sentence, as they were about to explain the dangers of induced vomiting. I'll assume it's perfectly safe, then.
We were about to go to the case study again, but the system crapped out on me, so I guess nothing important happened.
Okay, now we've got it running again. It's Mike's birthday, and Nisha shows up with some beers and a really annoying voice, interrupting a group study session with Sam, Jason, Audrey and Jessica, who are worried about the chem exam. (disclaimer: I couldn't recognize the difference between the two generic white dudes Jason and Mike, but determined it was Jason from plot details.) Remember, Jessica is in Psych. Sam blows her off, but Nisha keeps whining and whining. Jessica and Jason cave in over the wishes of Audrey and Sam. Clearly whitey out-parties the competition. Oh, but Nisha doesn't have snacks. Uh oh! Absorption! Here comes Mike.
Now the voiceover narration. It's Thursday night. The bastard chem professor apparently has his test Friday morning. What will these people have to think about? What decisions influence their drinking? Does anyone even drink beer out of bottles anymore?
Now then, time to make a personalized BAC curve. Remember, I'm an 18-year-old female, and grossly underweight... uh, I mean, extremely attractive at 80 pounds. Remember, I drink 25 drinks in a typical night over 1 minute, though they only allow it in whole numbers of hours. To scale that, then, I guess I drink 1500 drinks over the period of 1 hour. Yet they only allow me to go up to 99. Who are these people? Well, then I guess I'll have to scale my weight down to 5 pounds.
Lessee... my peak BAC level is... 100.62. They say that's dangerous. Something's up with their server, though, because they won't display my curve.
Next we've got a map of U.S. drinking laws. Just like it's handy when you want to rape little kids to have the statutory rape map, we need a boozing map.
Journal time!
Do you think your academic performance has ever been affected by your drinking choices?
Well, I don't think I'd be performing all that well with all the other drugs in my body, so I figure drinking is just harmless fun.
Did you realize that alcohol was affecting your abilities at the time?
Hey, asshole, did you just hear what I said? It's not affecting me. It's not affecting me at all! I'll kill you!!!
"Let's face it, college can be hard. You have to do more than just show up, get the notes, and carry a laptop around."
In fact, in many courses, you don't need to do any of those three. Anyway, booze is like sandpaper, in that it "grinds the edges off motivation, attention, and focus." Bad analogies are also like sandpaper. Now it's time for them to try to convince me that boozing hurts my academics.
As a college student, you're constantly being bombarded with new information.
Hey, AlcoholEduDude! You're not helping! Drinking alcohol is "like interfering with the record button for new memories in the brain." Bad analogy count: 2.
Some stuff about blackouts, and how people who have blackouts are usually doing dumb things. To me, that seems like a negative feedback loop that takes care of itself. It doesn't matter what dumb things you did if you don't remember them, after all.
Blackouts don't just happen to alcoholics. They happen to these regular students. Those students look pretty happy, though, so I dunno what the concern is. (I also have to admit that some of these "myths" that they're breaking are ones that I'd never heard of before. You have to wonder...)
Blackouts occur more frequently if you drink quickly, like this dude. Seriously, though, if you were that dude, you wouldn't want to remember something like that.
There's some stuff about long-term effects, but all of the statements are qualified with "maybe," so I'm going to assume they're just full of crap and trying to scare people away from booze.
Now, another of those useless factoids that we can opt out of: Saving your fucking life by boozing. Yes, drinking small amounts can reduce risk of heart disease. But we'd better not mention that. And don't drink more than that, or you'll get breast cancer! (Seriously, they said that)
Okay, more judgment about my drinking habits from the lamers who write this course. Blah blah blah.
And back to the case study. They're partying it up, and the party seems to have grown in size, as other friends joined in. Well, actually, there's only one additional friend. He's the generic white pothead. While Mike, Jason, and Nisha are chilling and having fun, in the background you can see Sam, Jessica and Audrey still fucking studying. At one point, Jessica just sits up and stares smiling into the camera for a minute. Our visitor doesn't get a name or a mouse rollover, but let's see everyone else.
Jason, after drinking a bit, is suddenly very alert and notices Nisha leaving the party with some older guy he doesn't know. I want to stress that Nisha is still in the exact same frame with this comment.
Sam doesn't drink, remember, but he's getting pissed at the noisy "friends" who never seem to shut the fuck up. In particular, he thinks Mike is going to get them all into trouble, although no one explains how this is supposedly possible.
Mike the birthday boy is having lots of fun. His girlfriend stopped by, and he convinced her to stay with his pals. She's nowhere in sight, so is probably fucking the older guy Nisha is leaving with while not actually leaving.
Audrey is worried that Jessica "keeps disappearing into the bathroom." Apparently she'd prefer that Jessica puke all over their assignment. She's also concerned that if they get into trouble, she'll lose her financial aid, because that's what happens when the police find you studying in a room where other people are drinking but not doing anything illegal.
Nisha is smitten with the cute... dun dun DUN!!!... upperclassman her older sister knows. She doesn't know if he's interested, but she's curious as to "how the night will go." She's also stupid, and figures no one will notice her leaving with him. Sorry, bitch, Jason's already onto you! Oh, I can hear the rumor mill starting up now.
Jessica has more stereotypes to live up to. She hasn't eaten since breakfast, but one has to wonder why someone like her even eats breakfast. She's also going to get kicked out of her sorority for having shitty grades.
Exercise time! "What did you learn about learning?" Next post!
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