Anatomy of a Drinking Game

If you're like me and like to have a good time that involves some alcohol (and who isn't like me) then you like to play drinking games. But playing the same games over and over again has become about as much fun as watching the WNBA...which is right up there with staring at the sun and putting hot sauce in your contacts. What we need are some new drinking games. Games that can get us drunk like we were in the cast of The Real World. Since you've become so good "quarters" and "P&A" that you end up less drunk than when you started. Not to worry. Help is here in the form of a pithy online guide to creating a drinking game.

1. Determine how much you want to drink. Figure out if you want to get absolutely wasted like a frat boy at a beer garden, or if you just want to get a good buzz going. Enough to where you start to think Kelly Osborne isn't hideous after all. I would recommend that you keep the drinking somewhere in between the two. Then again this is coming from a guy who routinely plays games that involve drinking full beers.



2. Decide what to use to determine when and who drinks. Some popular items for this are: playing cards, coins, and TV. Remember, people's motor skills and memories will be dropping faster than Ashlee Simpson's career, so don't choose something too complicated. For example, don't have people try to bounce a quarter into a shot glass six feet away or perform open heart surgery with a sterilized bottle opener. On the other hand, make it enough of a challenge so that girls will still lose easily. You can't have a game where people guess a number between 1 and 3...that's too easy, even for the Hilton sisters. Wait, nevermind...let's just assume you won't be playing them.

3. Set some rules. Now that you know how drunk you want to get and what equipment you need to play, you're going to need to lay down the laws. The more basic the better. If you have a game with 40 different rules you're going to have people more confused than Jessica Simpson in a spelling bee. "C...A.... NICK!! I TOLD YOU TO TELL THE JUDGES NO WORDS OVER 2 LETTERS!!" I'd recommend keeping the rules under ten to avoid confusion, especially if you have chosen a card game. You can't ask drunk people to remember a bunch of rules while trying to count and figure out what those funny shapes on the cards mean. It would be like analyzing a time-lapse of Oprah's body style while trying to weigh yourself on a mechanical scale. And if you've never tried that, I strongly recommend just playing with over 10 rules to find out what it's like.



4. Keep people's attention. If you're friends are anything like mine their attention span is shorter than a Britney Spears marriage. If that is the case you need to add an element where someone has to drink if they're caught talking to people outside of the game, using the phone, or throwing up in the corner. A tired and unoriginal example of this is the thumb rule. If you don't know what that is then just stop reading this because you're already a lost cause.

I've come up with a new way to do keep people's attention that involves a lot more drinking, because that's what drinking games are about right? Its called "stop." Here's how it works: When you catch someone not paying attention you grab their beer and drink it until they say stop. If you finish before they say stop they have to drink a glass that you have already had filled up in the middle of the game that will hopefully be warm by now. Also, make them get you a beer when they get up to get a new one for themselves, that will teach them to pay attention. This works great for two reasons: one, no one likes to see people drinking their beer, and two, you get drunk. The only catch to this is if they say stop before you finish you have to give them one of your beers. I usually keep a Natural Light for just an occasion.



Now that you know all of the elements you should be able to create a drinking game in no time. Allow me to demonstrate:



Say you and a couple of friends want to get really drunk because, well, you're losers and no one has invited you to a party. Trust me it happens. You don't have any cards or spare change so you turn on the TV. Real World/Road Rules Challenge is on. You decide that anytime someone says something stupid or bitches someone else out you have to take 5 drinks, 10 drinks if it's Mike or Coral bitching someone out. Chug a beer if a fight breaks out. At this rate, you'll be wasted in 15 minutes and ready to take on the world....that is, of course, if you've managed to get invited to a real party.