Did you wake up with a hangover on New Year’s Day?
1940s-era revelers recover from New Year’s Eve
celebrations in New York’s Grand Central Station Did you wake up with a hangover on New Year’s Day? Tell the truth!
I read the following article in Time magazine and thought “hangovers” might be a good topic for a poll, particularly at this time of year.
Give your response to the poll above and tell us if you have any tried and tested hangover cures.
Here’s the Time magazine article, written by Claire Suddath:
"Whatever your reasons – celebration, loneliness, attempting to figure out what “Auld Lang Syne” actually means – if you drank too much on Dec 31, you probably rang in the New Year with a pounding headache and regular trips to the bathroom. If so, don’t worry; you wouldn’t be the first person to endure a hangover, and although it may feel like it, you won’t be the last.
When the ancient Assyrians felt the painful aftereffects of excess merriment, they consumed a mixture of ground birds’ beak and myrrh. In the Middle Ages bleary Europeans munched on raw eel and bitter almonds. Mongolians ate pickled sheep’s eyes, while the Chinese went with a more palatable dose of green tea. The German ate Katerfruhstuck, a post-binge breakfast of herring, pickles and goulash. Russians don’t eat anything at all; they jump into the sauna and sweat it out. In 1845, Italian Bernardino Branca developed a cure-all he called Fernet – an 80-proof concoction containing myrrh, rhubarb, aloe, peppermint oil and opiates – to treat ailments like hangover and cholera. Fernet is still available (now opiate-free), although it’s usually served as an after-dinner drink. Here are a few more exotic cures:
* 4th Century B.C. – Greek poet Amphis recommends boiled cabbage for overindulgers.
* 1853 – London’s D.R.Harris & Co markets the Pick Me Up herbal tonic, which is still available.
* 1916 – For his first day on the job, P.G.Wodehouse’s famous fictional valet, Jeeves, whips up a curative of Worcestershire sauce, raw egg and pepper, and is hired on the spot.
* 1972 – Kingsley Amis publishes the book “On Drink,” featuring a hangover remedy called the Polish Bison (beef paste and vodka). Actually, many of the book’s suggested cures involve more drinking.
American remedies typically include tomato juice and occasionally a raw egg (for protein), although the past decade has seen the debut of pills that supposedly help the liver by absorbing toxins. But alcohol’s by-products are only part of the problem: dehydration and out-of-whack electrolytes can’t be fixed with a pill. A traditional Japanese remedy, umeboshi (pickled plums), is currently touted by Hollywood nutritionist Esther Blum. But whatever your tonic of choice, remember that it probably won’t work. Hangovers exist for a reason: your body is telling you that you drank too much."
