Why is it that I can sip bourbon all afternoon long and never get more than a slight buzz with little impairment, but let me have a tall Sierra Nevada with lunch, and have a bomber of Stone IPA every 2 hours after that and by 6pm I am totally blitzed? Why? :smack:
This post brought to you by Teachers™, your local "I’ve got the summer off and you don’t, so “Plplplplp!” group.
I’d wager it’s the hops - they are actually a mild sedative. I can drink martinis all day long but 2 pints of Optimator and I’m sloppy.
(BTW…I am a member of the club 
)
IPAs are damned strong. Some approach 8%.
(My favorite is Lagunitas…and not the Maximus. The maximus suxus. The regular is sweet, sweet nectar.)
I think the fact that you “sip” the bourbon might have something to do with it.
If I pace myself on hard liquor, I have the same reaction. I tend to drink beer pretty fast…and each one faster than the one before. And I don’t think the “liquid” in beer counts for anything. I need about two glasses of water per beer to sober up so I don’t go to bed and wake up with a hangover.
Agreed. I don’t drink beer, but I do know that I can leave the bar at closing time perfectly sober after three straight vodkas, which lasted me all evening. Alternatively, I can slur a request to the bartender for a taxi at 10:00 after three V&Ts, which went down like water inside of an hour.
The short answer: Carbonation and your pyloric sphincter.
The long answer, high concentrations of alcohol in the stomach (I think ~17% +) causes the pyloric sphincter to shut, blocking the passage of alcohol to the small intestine where it is more readily absorbed – so your bourbon is pretty much just sitting there giving you a nice even keel buzz. However, carbonated beverages (such as beer, champaign, bourbon and soda) actively relax the pyloric sphincter allowing the full effects of the alcohol to hit you hard and fast. Huh, well, that wasn’t so very long now was it.
This response brought to you by me, your local, “I’ve got tomorrow off and only two months of freedom until Med-School starts so I just poured a hole heaping handful of bourbon into what was left of my coke, pyloric sphincter be damned.”
But Teachers™ is Scotch, not bourbon. How does that factor into this?
Beats me, I am still trying to figure out why I can drink all night long just fine, but 1 drink at lunch and by 2PM I am looking for a place to nap.
Scotch is better.
Sometimes I feel like Adam Sandler in “The Waterboy”, except for Scotch.
One drink gets me tired. Three or four does not.
Oddly enough, I’m the opposite; I can drink a six pack and feel more full than buzzed, but a couple of scotches and I’m feeling a buzz.
Beerbon. That’s the correct answer.
As long as it’s not Tequiza. Now THERE’S a foul brew!
I can match a friend double bourbon and coke (what? if it’s well, I ain’t sippin’ it straight) to glass of beer and they’re s**tfaced while I’m asking for another.
Besides the very elegant and informative pyloric sphincter reponse, is it possible that people metabolize the alcohol from the different drinks differently?