Firewater
November 23, 2011 2:58 PM   Subscribe

There's a fairly old urban legend [Snopes; pop-ups galore] regarding the feasibility and/or incidence of young people getting drunk via the insertion of tampons that had been soaked in vodka into body cavities. Snopes was skeptical of the claim, but apparently no one had gone on record as having tested the method... until Danielle Crittenden stepped into the breach. (HuffPo)

Crittenden, the wife of David Frum, described the experience as "a very inefficient, not to mention unpleasant, way to get drunk." (Snopes notes that the ostensible purpose for using the delivery method--avoiding alcohol on the breath--wouldn't work in real life, as alcohol is excreted in breath from the bloodstream.) The sherry enema story, on the other hand, seems to be real.

(Previously on the blue)
posted by Halloween Jack (127 comments total) 13 users marked this as a favorite
 
> Then sit back and laugh.

Way ahead of you, ma'am.
posted by The Card Cheat at 3:04 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


This is the pride of Canadian conservatism: too profoundly stupid to realize that alcohol and mucous membranes don't mix.
posted by maudlin at 3:08 PM on November 23, 2011 [8 favorites]


Vodka eyeballing. It's a trend!
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 3:09 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]


Huh... I once tried something similar but with the other variety of genitalia, yes there is a story.

So the local Grocery Outlet had this booze, it claimed to be port, for really cheap called Cockburns. So a good friend of mine, and roommate at the time, who loves port got a bottle but decided he hated it and so gave it to me. He handed it to me with a glass and so I promptly began to happily drink it, our accounts differ as to how much I had actually consumed before the ultimately eponymous act, but I was soon dead set on testing the accuracy of the name.

I can roundly confirm that Cockburns is an excellent name for the liquor and state that I have no intention of repeating the experiment.
posted by Blasdelb at 3:10 PM on November 23, 2011 [52 favorites]


The shit scientists do with liquor...
posted by Blasdelb at 3:11 PM on November 23, 2011


OW OW OW OW OW OW OW

Admittedly in my personal case it's only an untested assumption. But it is the sort of untested assumption which clenches my muscles so tightly that I cannot uncross my legs. Because OW.
posted by Because at 3:11 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


Wow. The ad at the bottom of the article for her book "WHAT OUR MOTHERS DIDN'T TELL US: Why Happiness Eludes the Modern Woman" makes so much more sense now.
posted by maudlin at 3:12 PM on November 23, 2011 [6 favorites]


Natural Selection: It works.

She and Frum have had three kids already. Too late.
posted by maudlin at 3:14 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I don't get the snark here: usually we're ragging on (sorry) journalists for being lazy, not thinking critically and not checking facts. She actually did an experiment here that debunked a story that's been uncritically picked up by lots of media. She shows how blindly parents tend to believe stupid scare stories about teens and drugs. And it's actually funny.
posted by Maias at 3:15 PM on November 23, 2011 [87 favorites]


Next we're gonna see a 'journalist' cut a hole and fuck a half-frozen watermelon to write about it.

I'm surprised it hasn't already been done.
posted by asnider at 3:17 PM on November 23, 2011


Next we're gonna see a 'journalist' cut a hole and fuck a half-frozen watermelon to write about it.

Nonsense! You microwave a melon slightly, to warm it up. Half-frozen? You'll freeze your dick off!
posted by kafziel at 3:17 PM on November 23, 2011 [8 favorites]


She should have measured her blood alcohol level to have empirical evidence of how drunk she was getting so we wouldn't have to rely on anecdata beyond "It burnt! Then I felt warm! Wheee!".
posted by John Shaft at 3:19 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]


OK what's with the Frums lately? Is there a new book out? Are they making a large purchase?
posted by Hoopo at 3:19 PM on November 23, 2011 [6 favorites]


Seriously, people are also claiming boys are doing this (which is even more profoundly unlikely both due to homophobia and um, anatomical issues).

Anything that helps people think skeptically about claims made about teens and drugs is helpful as far as I'm concerned.
posted by Maias at 3:21 PM on November 23, 2011 [5 favorites]


I believe the male version of this is called the Grey Goose.

I'm terribly sorry.
posted by Awakened at 3:27 PM on November 23, 2011 [26 favorites]


I work at a newspaper. Next time a bunch of our journalists get laid off I'll think of this and weep an extra tear.
posted by ladygypsy at 3:30 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]




Boy that's some bad writing about a stupid subject.
posted by timsteil at 3:31 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Since other people have covered the story itself, I'll tackle this:

The sherry enema story, on the other hand, seems to be real.

Seems? It's part of a whole subculture, man. With forums and meetups and...just google.
posted by StrikeTheViol at 3:33 PM on November 23, 2011


"It looked slightly more engorged at the tip, like it was about to be sick."

Worst mixed metaphor ever.

And by mixed, I mean mixed.
posted by iamkimiam at 3:33 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]


Incidentally liquor up the ass actually works quite well. If you ever get methanol (wood alcohol) poisoning the standard of care had always been use whiskey to flood the system with ethanol (booze). My understanding is that this changed a bit when ERs got swamped with drunks claiming to have stills for the free whiskey, and so they cleverly ended up using the opposite route of administration as it was safer, being more predictable, and worked as an effective deterrent. It is a much faster route of admission and so can be very dangerous from FPP if you don't know how to do the math on what will hurt you. Liquor up the ass is a real thing.

Methanol is chemically very similar to ethanol only it gets you about a tenth as drunk and breaks down very differently. Most people produce an alcohol dehydrogenase enzyme designed to break down ethanol into acetaldehyde which then gets processed by your metabolism in a very water dependent manner (where hangovers come from). It works pretty great for addressing ethanol toxicity so long as you arn't to dedicated to it, but the problem with methanol is that it works pretty great on it to, only it makes a very different product with the same reaction, formaldehyde. As nasty as ethanol is, it isn't formaldehyde and so the idea is that if you flood the enzyme with ethanol, it will act as a competitive inhibitor of the methanol to formaldehyde reaction by getting in the way. This gives your body some extra time to secrete some of the methanol through other, slower but much healthier, mechanisms.
posted by Blasdelb at 3:34 PM on November 23, 2011 [17 favorites]


Whatever happened to Jello Shots? That's the way to go if you ask me...
posted by blaneyphoto at 3:34 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Next we're gonna see a 'journalist' cut a hole and fuck a half-frozen watermelon

Hasn't this been done by Barbara Amiel and Conrad Black?
posted by benzenedream at 3:36 PM on November 23, 2011 [7 favorites]


"Next we're gonna see a 'journalist' cut a hole and fuck a half-frozen watermelon"

The apple pie story is 8 layers down.
posted by iamkimiam at 3:38 PM on November 23, 2011


Someone did, in fact, send me this story via Facebook. It contained the following:

If you're a parent of a teenager, what can you do to make sure tampons are used for the job they're intended and nothing more?

"Well then you need to get involved," Thomas said. "Stop being your kid's friend and be their parent first."


As a parent, I have never been more disconcerted by the suggestion that I "get involved."
posted by Clyde Mnestra at 3:40 PM on November 23, 2011 [13 favorites]


No. Thats how it will work with adults who would rather take a shot instead.

With kids, some kid will read this article, and talk to someone else about it not relaying the main points, then another person and another. And inevitably, someone will really get fucked. I'm not saying stop the information, but that when adults do stupid shit as a 'don't do this kids', it will come back at them 10 fold worse. They WILL do it regardless of the consequences.

Adults, they won't. But I bet you weren't thinking about stuffing a vodka soaked tampon up your hoo-ha anyways.

So it really didn't alter your behavior, just the potential for kids to do this shit.


Writing about how you can still get pregnant after sex even if you do jump up and down for 10 minutes helps advance science.

This shit is a *dare* to female teens. Great.


Um, no. It's not. Because it looks stupid and is stupid AND ACTUALLY WASTES THE ALCOHOL AND DOESN'T WORK. Research shows that giving teenagers accurate information about risks helps them make better decisions. If no one was covering this idiocy, there would be no need to debunk it. Since they are, debunking is useful.

I'm a former teen drug user and this is what I can tell you about teen drug users: they typically want to actually get high and do so safely and without looking like an idiot. This does not meet that standard.
posted by Maias at 3:44 PM on November 23, 2011 [37 favorites]


With forums and meetups and...just google.

Meet-ups? You know, I'm all for people getting down however, with whomever and whatever they please, but... I'm just imagining someone getting their social networks mixed up and thinking that they're going to a wine-tasting.
posted by Halloween Jack at 3:44 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


> ... called Cockburns

See, if you pronounced it right, you wouldn't have been tempted. It's Coburns.
posted by scruss at 3:47 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I'm so glad someone finally had the guts to try this out and write about it in public. It's like everything I love about Mythbusters, and everything I love about Penn & Teller's Bullshit, all in one article!

Everyone who is scoffing her work has no doubt also been scoffing at the news stories about teens and their vodka-soaked tampon parties. Which, you know, good for you. But a LOT of people have been taking the stories at face value. Including local news shows across the nation.

Just because it's patently idiotic and foolish doesn't mean people won't believe in it on the basis of no evidence whatsoever.
posted by ErikaB at 3:49 PM on November 23, 2011 [8 favorites]


Are absinthe infused dildos making America's men obsolete? We'll have more at 11!
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 3:53 PM on November 23, 2011 [7 favorites]


Aaaaaaaaand I think the league made fun of this with the cocaine laced toilet seat.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 3:53 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I saw this on the local (Los Angeles) news the other night, but as the usual teen outrage story, not the debunking. A week or two ago, the moral panic and danger-to-children was over binaural beats (which are about as psychedelic and dangerous as a nap).
posted by malocchio at 3:55 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


Next Week: Bran

Are super satisfying dumps ruining our children? Tune in at 11!
posted by robocop is bleeding at 3:57 PM on November 23, 2011 [14 favorites]


See, when I was a young man, we never would have gone for this kind of bullshit. Why would you even try it? If we already had the vodka we were going to damn well drink it, usually to some unsafe point of intoxication. If someone had suggested we dip a tampon in it and insert it somewhere, we would have looked at him like he was kind of slow. Then we probably would have dared him to do it first.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 3:58 PM on November 23, 2011 [4 favorites]


"If someone had suggested we dip a tampon in it and insert it somewhere, we would have looked at him like he was kind of slow. Then we probably would have dared him to do it first."

You see, I'd have probably done it, but I was the kind of kid destined for poor life choices like grad school.
posted by Blasdelb at 4:05 PM on November 23, 2011 [5 favorites]


Nonsense! You microwave a melon slightly, to warm it up. Half-frozen? You'll freeze your dick off!

The best watermelon fucking story you will read today.
posted by fings at 4:12 PM on November 23, 2011 [15 favorites]


"Liquor up the ass is a real thing."

This Thanksgiving is about to get a whole lot more interesting.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 4:13 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


Leave it to MetaFilter to criticize someone shoving a vodka-infused tampon up her hoohah.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 4:14 PM on November 23, 2011 [6 favorites]


When I was a young man, if any of the young men I hung out with started to talk about tampons, for any reason, we probably would have not hung out with him ever again.

fyi kids, it's a lot easier to just drink booze the old fashioned way.
posted by freakazoid at 4:14 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


The best watermelon fucking story you will read today.

Are you sure about that? I'm an editor at a Watermelon Fucking Quarterly
posted by Hoopo at 4:14 PM on November 23, 2011 [16 favorites]


Absolut Absorbency.
 {}
 ||
 ||
|__|
|  |   
|__|
posted by Ratio at 4:15 PM on November 23, 2011 [16 favorites]


Are you sure about that? I'm an editor at a Watermelon Fucking Quarterly
posted by Hoopo


Everybody knows it's the Watermelon Fucking Journal.
posted by timsteil at 4:17 PM on November 23, 2011


it claimed to be port, for really cheap called Cockburns.

Not only does Cockburn's pretend to be port, it's the best selling port brand in Britain. Some of their products are acceptable, but if your friend bought ruby port, he got what was coming. As did the port.
posted by howfar at 4:18 PM on November 23, 2011 [4 favorites]


Everyone knows that Proceedings of the Academy of Watermelon Fuckers is the most respected publication in the field.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:19 PM on November 23, 2011 [15 favorites]


As a HuffPo writer, she should at least get credit for creating original content.
posted by KokuRyu at 4:22 PM on November 23, 2011 [7 favorites]


That or NEJWF.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:23 PM on November 23, 2011 [9 favorites]


You are nobody in the field of Watermelon Fucking until you have a cite in ARSWMF -- the Annals of the Royal Society of Water-Melon Fuckers
posted by Rock Steady at 4:26 PM on November 23, 2011 [11 favorites]


Hoopo, so you get more than 90 good submissions per edition? If you could forward your acceptance criteria, I'd be most interested.
posted by ambrosen at 4:27 PM on November 23, 2011


Not long ago my SO's hospital took in the corpse of a fellow found dead with the neck of a vodka bottle up his ass. He was a chronic alcoholic and recovering from a pharyngotomy necessitated by cancer.

Absorption is indeed quicker through the rectal mucosa. Which is why he didn't have time to get the bottle out before he lost consciousness. Apparently this is not uncommon.

She also thinks this is kind of a badass way to go. I'm inclined to agree.
posted by clarknova at 4:29 PM on November 23, 2011 [6 favorites]


badass huh huh huh
posted by flabdablet at 4:35 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


i c wat u did ther
posted by clarknova at 4:36 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Rectal Mucosa

*fingertap*
posted by nathancaswell at 4:40 PM on November 23, 2011


On one hand this was kind of a stupid story... On the other hand it was a Hiffington Post story.

Oh wait, I repeat myself.

Somehow it all makes sense now.

Pouring Cabo Wabo in your ear gets you drunk!!!
posted by edgeways at 4:42 PM on November 23, 2011


With kids, some kid will read this article, and talk to someone else about it not relaying the main points, then another person and another. And inevitably, someone will really get fucked. I'm not saying stop the information, but that when adults do stupid shit as a 'don't do this kids', it will come back at them 10 fold worse. They WILL do it regardless of the consequences.
Duh, this 'urban ledged' has been all over everywhere. People have heard about it. Like those "rainbow parties". This article isn't going to convince anyone to try it, but it might discourage people.

I can't believe how anti-intellectual some of you are being. It's like you regard ignorance of certain things virtuous. People were wondering if you could really get drunk shoving a vodka soaked tampon up your hoo-ha and now we know. What's wrong with that?

What would really tempt students to try this would probably have been tempted by all the moral-panic articles claiming that kids everywhere were already doing it, and actually discouraged by this nonsense.
posted by delmoi at 4:47 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


One of my friends snorted Coke once. Not quite a Wasabi Snooter, but close.
posted by flabdablet at 4:48 PM on November 23, 2011


Everyone knows that Proceedings of the Academy of Watermelon Fuckers is the most respected publication in the field.

I and my esteemed colleagues at the New England Journal of Melonfucking take vast umbrage at this offensive falsehood.
posted by elizardbits at 4:50 PM on November 23, 2011 [4 favorites]


until Danielle Crittenden stepped into the breach

Nice o...

[more inside]

..ne
posted by DU at 4:58 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


The best watermelon fucking story you will read today.

I was expecting this.
posted by St. Sorryass at 5:08 PM on November 23, 2011


Surely the Transactions of the American Society of Fruit and Vegetable Copulators C: Melons and Large Berries has the best peer-review practices. They are unnatural peer-review practices, but then the peers are pretty unnatural, too.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:12 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


more like pear-review amirite.
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 5:19 PM on November 23, 2011 [11 favorites]


Nonsense, the Abstracts of the Royal Australasian Union of Ornithologists and Watermelon Fuckers! (ARAUOWF!) has indeed been long known for their field altering efforts.
posted by Blasdelb at 5:19 PM on November 23, 2011


liquor up the ass

I SO want to make a bad "you lick her" joke here....
posted by usagizero at 5:21 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I'm sorry, but the Abstracts are way overrated -- they're a pale copy of the Annales - Ornithologie, Carpophilie, Société.
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 5:22 PM on November 23, 2011


I've been reading up on sharks recently.

Do you know what else puts horrible burning things inside itself and then tells their offspring and internet surfers about it?

Did you guess sharks? Because that's wrong. Only you are that hopelessly cruel.
posted by Slackermagee at 5:29 PM on November 23, 2011 [8 favorites]


Crittendumb is still around? I remember how much she was bashed on alt.support.childfree a decade ago. lolz
posted by luckynerd at 5:30 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I should mention the new, open-access, slightly edgy web-based journal in the field, wmlnfck, and the the mass-market accessible glossy, Watermelon Fucking Illustrated.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:53 PM on November 23, 2011


a friend of mine told me about a guy he knew who carried in a small bottle of hash oil into a rod stewart concert in the 70s - realizing that he was going to be strip searched pretty thoroughly, he took it out of his jacket pocket and stuffed it into his pants - he evaded the security people successfully, but loosened the cap in the process, and the hash oil went all over his underwear, and of course his penis, being a mucous membrane, absorbed a rather unreasonable dose of cosmic joy

he ended up leaning against the wall when the rush hit him and he slid down to the floor, pretty much unable to move or register much of the concert on his consciousness

i'm pretty sure this would work with tampons, too, although it seems to be rather wasteful ...
posted by pyramid termite at 5:58 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


I remember how much she was bashed on alt.support.childfree a decade ago.

she must have some redeeming qualities, then
posted by pyramid termite at 6:00 PM on November 23, 2011


great, now i want to smear my dick with hash oil and attend a rod stewart concert.

wait, what?
posted by palomar at 6:04 PM on November 23, 2011 [10 favorites]


"I should mention the new, open-access, slightly edgy web-based journal in the field, wmlnfck, and the the mass-market accessible glossy, Watermelon Fucking Illustrated."

Totally outclassed in that area by the Public Library Of Watermelon Fucking (PLOWF)
posted by Blasdelb at 6:04 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


great, now i want to smear my dick with hash oil and attend a rod stewart concert.

if you want my body and you think i'm sexy, come on bluwgoigngngngngngn zzzzzzzzz
posted by pyramid termite at 6:19 PM on November 23, 2011 [11 favorites]


Great.
Now what am I gonna do with this Sham-Wow and room-temperature forty-pounder of Gordon's Gin?
posted by isopraxis at 6:26 PM on November 23, 2011


So... no one's linked to this Louis CK bit yet?
posted by delmoi at 6:38 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


Candy
is dandy.
But liquor
is quicker.
In your vagina.
posted by empath at 6:50 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]


palomar: "great, now i want to smear my dick with hash oil and attend a rod stewart concert.

wait, what
"

ALL OF THE TEENAGERS ARE DOING SO

FIND OUT HOW, TONGIHT, AT ELEVEN
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:58 PM on November 23, 2011 [4 favorites]


You people are amateurs, the cool kids have all moved onto fucking vodka infused watermelons.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 7:03 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Sherry's nuthin', opium enemas are where it's at.
posted by XMLicious at 7:05 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Tangentially related, but where the hell else am I going to be able to post this, an article last week found that sex with animals may be tied to risk of penile cancer. The truly amazing part is the percent of men who claimed to have had sex with animals. Maybe even more than have sex with watermelons.
posted by binturong at 7:06 PM on November 23, 2011


No, not liquor up the ass. Wine is best. Liquor burns going up just like it burns going down. Wine actually will get you quite drunk as long as you get it past the rectum and into the large intestine, where it will be absorbed quickly.

Coffee also works, but obviously doesn't get you drunk. Just make sure it's not actually HOT when you try this, otherwise you'll end up with burns on parts of your insides which don't actually have pain nerve endings. Body temperature or slightly below is best.

If either the wine or the coffee are too cold, you'll cause cramping.

Yes, this is the voice of experience talking.
posted by hippybear at 7:16 PM on November 23, 2011 [16 favorites]


From binturong's LA Times link:

Researchers compared the health and sex habits of 118 penile cancer patients to 374 healthy men who served as the control group. Among all the study participants 34.8% reported having sex with animals. More men in the cancer group reported having sex with animals than the controls, 44.9% versus 31.6%. Penile cancer is cancer of the tissue of the penis.

There's a nice tidbit further down the article, too.

I certainly hope there's a misplaced decimal or a misunderstanding about percentages. Otherwise, 53 of the 118 cancer patients, and 118 of the 374 control subjects had sex with an animal. Actually, I just convinced myself that no arithmetical error has been made.
posted by porpoise at 7:38 PM on November 23, 2011


in the interest of providing public service announcements, champagne is a terrible idea.

no i will never ever elaborate.
posted by elizardbits at 7:42 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


"in the interest of providing public service announcements, champagne is a terrible idea."

I suppose all that gas ain't coming out the top...
posted by Blasdelb at 7:46 PM on November 23, 2011


LC: Read the article attached.
Ouch.
I cringe inside.
LC: Although I wonder which is worse: habanero or firewater.
Blasdelb: habenero
it doesn't go away when you wash your dick
hands down
I've done both
LC: O_O
Blasdelb: You should post this to metafilter


Part of me wants to try habanero vodka just to tell the tale.
posted by Leucistic Cuttlefish at 8:03 PM on November 23, 2011


Oh God, I'm going to hide the habenero vodka...

To be clear, this second incident happened when I was quite innocently making habenero cheesecake, which is DELICIOUS, and needed to go to the bathroom. I've used gloves to handle habeneros ever since.
posted by Blasdelb at 8:15 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Candy
is dandy.
But liquor
is quicker.
In your vagina.


Surely that should be:

Candy
is dandy.
But liquor
is quicker.
It's even finer
In your vagina.

posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 8:23 PM on November 23, 2011 [15 favorites]


(My dialect's non-rhotic, it works for me).
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 8:31 PM on November 23, 2011 [4 favorites]


Or a shooter
In your cooter.
posted by mazola at 8:33 PM on November 23, 2011 [5 favorites]


Or a jelly shot
Up the you know what.
posted by flabdablet at 8:54 PM on November 23, 2011 [5 favorites]


Rectal Mucosa

*fingertap*

Why are you capitalizing that? Is it your mom's name or something?
posted by clarknova at 7:02 PM on November 23 [+] [!]


Mama was a punk rocker.
posted by metagnathous at 9:03 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


One of the drug talks I was given as a child involved the advice, "Sure, you could smoke hash, but it's better if you have a big hash rock to just shove it up your ass," followed by a detailed story about the body buzz.

Strangely, being told that directly by a parent had the effect of me never wanting to do hash -- smoked, anally or otherwise.

Much like the "OMG temporary tattoo LSD!" urban legends don't make sense if you just think it through, if I were a teenager that had access to vodka, would I A) Drink it right away to brag to my friends how I drank vodka B) Mix it with Kool-Aid and drink it with my friends C) Invite the cool kids to come over and drink it so I could look cool or D) Find a tampon, soak it in the vodka I have access to -- thus grossing out anyone I'd share it with, stick it in my vagina (or as suggested ass) that I'm not comfortable talking about, really, even when I'm using it for sex stuff, let alone booze cootch shenanigans

Occam's Razor would suggest something within the realm of A, B or C.
posted by Gucky at 9:13 PM on November 23, 2011 [3 favorites]


Science. It, um, works.

bitches
posted by effugas at 9:28 PM on November 23, 2011 [1 favorite]


Another alternative.
posted by madmethods at 9:39 PM on November 23, 2011


Strangely, being told that directly by a parent had the effect of me never wanting to do hash -- smoked, anally or otherwise.

Excessive heroin and cocaine injection will damage your veins. Often, this leads to really nasty complications. People use up all the small surface veins, and eventually have to move over to the deeper, more critical veins -- particularly the femoral. And then they fuck that up as well, with things like abscesses and deep vein thrombosis.

In an attempt to try and persuade people to not keep repeatedly traumatizing an already seriously traumatized vital body part, a couple of harm reductionists had the bright idea of trying to persuade people to shift their favoured route of administration to the anal, on the grounds that there's a great big mucus membrane in there, so absorbancy should be fast -- somewhat akin to injecting. Thus was the 'Up yer bum' campaign launched.

Personally, I'm sceptical. It's hard to see it having any value whatsoever with cocaine. You'd just end up with a frozen sphincter. And if you think I'm going to run the risk of my last bag of dope ending up soaking through my underpants, you've got another think coming.

Even so, for years, well meaning needle exchange and outreach workers were telling their clients to forget about injecting and squirt that dope into their anal cavity.

Never heard of anyone actually taking them up on the proposition though. Aside from another drugs worker who was determined to test the advice. He claims he squirted it in and it all leaked out again. There may be technique issues to be mastered?
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:14 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


One of the drug talks I was given as a child involved the advice, "Sure, you could smoke hash, but it's better if you have a big hash rock to just shove it up your ass," followed by a detailed story about the body buzz.

The one thing I wish my parents told me when I was a kid is that you need to heat up the block of hash in order to pull off a piece small enough to smoke in a pipe... I wasted so much hash doing hot knives until I learned that trick. Thanks for nothing, mom and dad.
posted by KokuRyu at 10:43 PM on November 23, 2011


There may be technique issues to be mastered?

Well, yes, there are.

You see, the rectum, which is the part of the intestine which lies immediately behind the anus, is made mostly of smooth muscle fibers. (Your heart is made of similar fibers, actually.) This isn't actually designed to absorb any liquid.

If you want to actually absorb things anally, you have to get it beyond your rectum and into your large intestine itself. There's a sphincter ring which lies between the large intestine and rectum. It's designed to help hold in matter which hasn't yet completed having its liquid absorbed before moving it into the next chamber for evacuation.

If you're going to actually do anything anally for absorption, other than the really aggressive skin-absorbed things like LSD, you really need to find a way to get it beyond that inner sphincter ring and into the large intestine, which is a giant tube lined with cells who are designed to do nothing better than absorb liquid and whatever remaining nutrients (or chemicals, in this case) may still be left in whatever has been processed by your system. You can use that to your advantage, but the trick is you actually have to get whatever it is up far enough to be in that part of your body.

I'm not going to do into real detail about this here, but suffice it to say, there ARE techniques and tricks which can be used to make this happen. I'm sure anyone who thinks about the problem for a little while can come up with one or two possibilities for getting it up there.
posted by hippybear at 10:47 PM on November 23, 2011 [2 favorites]


I don't know whether to be embarrassed, horrified, or slightly pleased with myself that I know all this and am willing to share it here. I think I'll go sit in a corner and try to figure that out.
posted by hippybear at 10:49 PM on November 23, 2011 [10 favorites]


You can find just about everything on the internet.

Despite the claims of widespread consultation with a range of anal experts, they don't appear to have the kind of concrete info on technique you'd need for this to be effective.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 11:16 PM on November 23, 2011


I like to drink, and I've found increasingly less expensive means to do it (homemade hard cider), but I'm still not quite ready to stick a tube so far up my ass that it makes it into my guts to get drunk.

Although I've been tempted to by the reported cost/effect ratio.

So is there any special prep before an inter-rectal ethanol solution injection? Is it particularly bad to get colon-residing post-intestinal ... product... re-introduced into the intestine?
posted by porpoise at 11:16 PM on November 23, 2011


metafilter - I'm sure anyone who thinks about the problem for a little while can come up with one or two possibilities for getting it up there.
posted by pyramid termite at 4:02 AM on November 24, 2011


I don't know whether to be embarrassed, horrified, or slightly pleased with myself that I know all this and am willing to share it here

I was pretty horrified about the sharing, figured you gotten drunk and overshared.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 4:19 AM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


Um, no. It's not. Because it looks stupid and is stupid AND ACTUALLY WASTES THE ALCOHOL AND DOESN'T WORK. Research shows that giving teenagers accurate information about risks helps them make better decisions.

This to a thousand. Not only that, but every time you go OMG POT WILL TURN YOU INTO A SCHITZOPHRENIC DROPOUT, the kids in the audience who actually use weed no ill effect beyond eating all the crisps and watching the Matrix trilogy to completion will then automatically tune out everything else you say. Even if it's useful stuff like "don't share needles" and "try not to spill the whole bottle of hash oil on your junk."

The silence-and-tutting approach never works, and it's pretty hazardous too.
posted by Jilder at 4:43 AM on November 24, 2011 [3 favorites]


She didn't google very hard. This woman debunked the story 10 days earlier, has a better blog name (Tiny Cat Pajamas!), writes interestingly on Nashville, progressive issues and being a wiccan, and I don't have to give page views to anyone related to David Frum or Huffington Post.
posted by hydrobatidae at 6:53 AM on November 24, 2011 [2 favorites]


I was pretty horrified about the sharing, figured you gotten drunk and overshared.

No, I was involved with handball parties for more than a few years and learned far too much about how that end of the body works and what kinds of things you can do with it during that time. It's knowledge, I'm not ashamed about knowing it, and people here seem to actually be interested in the topic, so what the hell?
posted by hippybear at 6:54 AM on November 24, 2011 [3 favorites]


No, not liquor up the ass. Wine is best. Liquor burns going up just like it burns going down. Wine actually will get you quite drunk as long as you get it past the rectum and into the large intestine, where it will be absorbed quickly.

The problem is that this results in horrible slurring when you are talking out of your ass.
posted by srboisvert at 8:17 AM on November 24, 2011 [3 favorites]


It's knowledge, I'm not ashamed about knowing it, and people here seem to actually be interested in the topic, so what the hell?

C'mon, this is Metafilter. If your comment was three times as long, more detailed down to the weave of your ass hair, and had the tone of "I am the authority on all rectal administration of drugs", you'd be sidebarred by now.
posted by benzenedream at 8:25 AM on November 24, 2011 [6 favorites]


If you're going to get drunk not using your mouth, flat champagne seems to be the preferred liquid of choice according to an informal poll of my three more adventurous friends who have tried such things.

FLAT champagne, mind you - which is the perfect solution for dealing with half-drunk bottles still lying around the day after a big soiree and needing a "hair of the dog"-style hangover helper. Some Yoga poses are also apparently helpful.

this is not what I thought I'd be posting about while making Thanksgiving dressing this year...
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 8:37 AM on November 24, 2011


Sometimes you're the mythbuster, sometimes you're the myth.
posted by effugas at 8:47 AM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


"No, not liquor up the ass. Wine is best. Liquor burns going up just like it burns going down. Wine actually will get you quite drunk as long as you get it past the rectum and into the large intestine, where it will be absorbed quickly."

And I thought Rossi bottles could only ever be useful for staining cloth.
posted by Blasdelb at 8:53 AM on November 24, 2011


Or, to put it in a way Mr. Frum might approve of...

Pelvic Alcoholism never fails, only Pelvic Alcoholics.

anonymous
posted by effugas at 8:56 AM on November 24, 2011


Nobody's sticking glass bottles up their ass, are they? Because I saw a video on the Internet once, and that didn't end too well.

Also, this thread is awesome, not only for hippybear's shared knowledge, but that amazing hash oil dick story. I went to a movie once and didn't have time to smoke beforehand so I just popped a chunk of hash in my mouth as it started - sad to say, that seemed to have no effect whatsoever.
posted by stinkycheese at 10:20 AM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


C'mon, this is Metafilter. If your comment was three times as long, more detailed down to the weave of your ass hair, and had the tone of "I am the authority on all rectal administration of drugs", you'd be sidebarred by now.

How do we get things on the sidebar? I think it should go there anyway.
posted by kafziel at 10:37 AM on November 24, 2011


Oh dear lord. Okay, you want a sidebar worthy comment?

Getting liquid into your large intestine will require an enema bag. You hang it up high, like on the shower curtain rod or something. Gravity plays a large role in this practice.

You'll want to evacuate your bowels as best you can before you begin, and do a shallow douche to clear any remaining matter out of your rectum.

Whenever you do an enema, you want the water to be baby-bottle warm, or only a tad warmer. Too cold, and you'll cramp; too hot, and you'll do damage to parts of your innards which don't have pain receptors.

Okay, so you've gotten everything out of your rectum. Now it's time for the deep liquid.

You'll want to be naked in your bathroom for this.

Put whatever liquid you want to use in the enema bag, making sure the valve clamp is closed. Hang it up on the shower rod (or someplace lower if the tube running from the bag to the nozzle won't reach, and get on your knees on the bathroom floor. (Fluffy bathroom rugs are your friends.)

Insert the nozzle. You don't have to go deep for this, just the 3-4" length of the nozzle will suffice. I'd recommend NOT using lube for this, as that will allow the nozzle to slide out as easily as it slides in, and you will end up with the bag draining all over your bathroom if that happens. If you have a hard time getting the nozzle in, remember that the feeling of pushing out with your anus is the same thing as opening the sphincter, so it's a little counter intuitive.

Now, you'll want to bend forward and put your forearms on the floor, so your ass is higher than your torso. (I told you gravity plays a role here -- that applies to inside your body too.) While bent forward, reach back with one arm and undo the valve clamp.

Now, here's the part which is the real technique. Just as pushing out is the same as opening your anus, if you pull IN with your anus, you'll actually be opening that inner sphincter between your rectum and your intestine. (I'm sure you've noticed this on the toilet -- you push out for a while, find there's nothing left, you sort of relax and pull in, and then you find a new batch appears to be expelled.) I can't describe this delicately, so I'll say that it's kind of a metaphorical gulping that you want to do. You want to avoid pushing out while you do this or you may expel the nozzle, but as best you can, try to pull in in waves while the liquid flows into you.

If you're doing this with wine or coffee, you're probably not using a whole lot. I've managed to take about a half-gallon of liquid before when I'm going for a really deep clean for long handball sessions, but if you're using a half gallon of wine this way, you're doing it wrong.

Once the bag is drained (you'll know -- you'll both hear the bag empty like a bathtub drain and you'll feel the liquid is no longer flowing), close the valve clamp and extract the nozzle.

DO ALL THIS WHILE STILL LEANING FORWARD ONTO YOUR FOREARMS AND ON YOUR KNEES.

Stay in this position for, oh, 10 minutes or so. Let gravity really take the liquid up into your innards. Your large intestine, once past the rectum, take a turn toward the left, and then turn and move directly up your torso, then across your body, then back down the right side. It's okay to get liquid all the way around this track.

If all this is too difficult or uncomfortable, you can achieve a bit of the same effect by running the liquid inside you while lying on your left side rather than on your knees bent forward. You won't get anything really up into the part of the intestine which runs across your middle in that position, but perhaps you don't want to, either.

After 10 minutes or so, try getting up. You may feel you have to evacuate immediately. That's okay. Your body isn't used to having this done to it. You will have absorbed quite a bit of alcohol during that time.

If you can manage to actually get up and not have to immediately expel, then keep the liquid in you for a while. Remember -- you're going to be absorbing the alcohol a lot faster than you'll be feeling it, so you may not want to have it in there for eons.

Once you're ready, grab a book and sit on the toilet and let your body drain. You may not get it all out on the first go -- any liquid which gets all the way around to your right side in your large intestine will take longer to get out because it's difficult for peristalsis to squeeze water for transport the same way it would solid matter.

You'll find that you're bringing other matter out of you along with the liquid. This is nothing to worry about.

That's about it. There's your Deep Enema 101 class. Now go do a practicum and report back your results.
posted by hippybear at 11:19 AM on November 24, 2011 [21 favorites]


Man, that's a lot of trouble. I just put bourbon in my coffee. So much easier and more delicious, not to mention less messy.
posted by rtha at 11:47 AM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


(I'm with you on that, rtha... As my best friend's partner's grandmother likes to say... "There's nothing wrong with bourbon!")
posted by hippybear at 11:51 AM on November 24, 2011


Oh man, this is gonna be the best Thanksgiving EVER!
posted by stet at 11:53 AM on November 24, 2011 [4 favorites]


I'm at my in-laws' house right now. I love you guys. I love you all so, so much. You are helping me make it through the remainder of the evening with this thread, which I am surreptitiously reading on the far side of the couch.
posted by bitter-girl.com at 3:22 PM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


*pours out more bourbon for bitter-girl*
posted by rtha at 5:45 PM on November 24, 2011


after this thread, bitter-girl, I wouldn't touch any of rtha's bourbon until he makes it clear where exactly it poured from.
posted by Hoopo at 6:07 PM on November 24, 2011 [1 favorite]


I'll say this: I normally can't stand Frum and Crittenden, but between Frum's "the Republicans are crazy" article on nymag.com and Crittenden actually sticking vodka-infused tampons up her hoo-hah for SCIENCE, I'm starting to think slightly better of them. Or at least, giggle insanely at this entire story.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:50 PM on November 24, 2011


I, for one, am disappointed that no one has yet made a joke based on rhyming RUM with BUM.

For shame Metafilter, for shame.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:54 PM on November 24, 2011


What, like "Frum's mum put rum in her bum" - that kind of thing?

I agree. Get on the ball.

Actually, rum on the ball would probably sting too.
posted by flabdablet at 12:12 AM on November 25, 2011 [2 favorites]


good show flabdablet!
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 12:52 AM on November 25, 2011


How about,

Frum's dumdum but fearsome, buxom, and welcome bantam mum is numb but chum and ho-hum about Sodom rum plumb in bum from the humdrum and boredom from stardom?

If only she were from Belgium.
posted by Blasdelb at 9:37 AM on November 25, 2011 [2 favorites]


Convoluted, but just crazy enough to work. Tip 'o the hat to you Blasdelb!
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:44 AM on November 25, 2011


justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow: "Vodka eyeballing . It's a trend!"

Sorry. Only foreign substance I ever put in my eye was extremely high grade liquid LSD. Optic vodka is for kids.
posted by Samizdata at 12:50 PM on November 25, 2011


"Handball party" in case you were quietly wondering, as I was.
posted by brainwane at 1:18 PM on November 25, 2011 [1 favorite]


If there is any justice in the -Filers, it will end up on the sidebar when the mods wake up from thanksgiving
posted by Blasdelb at 4:19 PM on November 25, 2011


« Older Mahna Mahna   |   To create is to resist, to resist is to create Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments