London 2017. Stereotypes strut the streets where individuals once strolled. We are all in the clasp of a thousand clichés and are somehow powerless to resist.
To be young and living in the capital is to have a Tinder chat-up line copied to your clipboard. It’s daily outrage at the lunchtime meal deal’s deliberately poor choice of sandwich. It is failing Stoptober because of a brunch invitation of bad eggs and inevitable regret. It is avoiding meeting eyes with the same faces on the tube every single morning, and still fantasising that you might one day be friends. It is laughing in the face of self-restraint on payday weekend and crying in its company for the rest of the month. It is the empty Gü pudding as vehicle for everything.
But nothing, NOTHING, is more painfully familiar to the modern Londoner than the workplace hangover and its many wicked guises. So, with that in mind, here are our 5 types of workplace hangover and their IDEAL cures.
THE SLOW-BURNER
‘Hey, I think I got away with that one’ you say. ‘I’m glad I stopped at the fifth’.
You might reward yourself with a pre-work Coca Cola and hope it knocks the lingering headache on the head (wait, that would exacerbate it. Editor?!). You wonder why you’re heading out mid-morning for an all-day breakfast sandwich, denial still in full swing in time with your stomach.
But with every passing minute you get more sluggish. Then post-lunch, you realise: You’re really bloody hungover. You have been for a while. The rest of the day is written off to procrastination; the energy spent earlier in denial now drained from you. An early night awaits you on the long tube ride home.
The Ideal Cure is surely pre-emptive; plenty of water, a couple of paracetamol and zero complacency.
THE STILL DRUNK
That spring in your step is an illusory stagger as you career through the office doors and slur your way through several ill-judged good mornings. It’s impossible to control the volume of your voice as you chat to the office bore for the first time in your life; he looks scared. You deliver uninvited anecdotes which you think are going great until the punchline is met with rolling eyes and tumbleweed.
Finally, an ally has a word and you slope off to buy some chewing gum and locate your dignity. You spend the afternoon napping in a toilet cubicle.
The Ideal Cure seems counterintuitive, but; set your alarm a little earlier than usual, take a cold shower and generally use the extra pre-work time to sober up.
THE FEAR
It’s a bad one and you know it. The walk to the tube stop is tentative and features a string of mini-embarrassments; bumping into someone, moving your arms too much as you walk, tripping on the curb; that kind of thing. You’re sure a fellow commuter just flinched at your exhale. Just keep your eyes firmly on the Metro….your red, tell-tale eyes. No amount of polos and fresh applications of roll-on will keep this one undetected. You spend the day in silence, fear and a tangible miasma of gin-cloud.
The Ideal Cure involves restraint on post midnight drinks. A 12am cut-off point on cocktail consumption banishes the next day’s alcohol aroma. If you’re going to drink hard, finish early.
THE SWEET SPOT
You know it’s one of those good hangovers when your commute music sounds great, not paranoia and headache inducing. You’re issuing out smiles and people are reciprocating their warmth. You might even be moved to help someone with a suitcase you’d usually resent for holding up the journey.
Yes, we all get them sometimes; those good hangovers where everything seems right with the world. You breeze through your day at work in a mellow-yellow-hued haze, productive yet carefree, suavely wishing everyone a fine evening as you stroll out of the doors and into an evening of great promise.
The Ideal Cure is more a warning; you’ve been a very lucky girl/boy. Don’t let this false sense of security carry you into another night of excess, for the hangover gods will reap their revenge twofold tomorrow.
THE NO-SHOW
Sometimes the hangover is so bad that your job is actually in danger if you go to work. You put on your best ‘ate something dodgy last night’ voice, whatever that actually sounds like, and hope for understanding. Better still, you text suspiciously late at night/early in the morning and wait in paralysed fear for a reply. The relief when one arrives almost makes you feel like you could go in after all.
The Ideal Cure; well, duh.