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Okay, so I just had a really bad experience drinking.. and oddly enough.. I thought of all the really Catholic ethnic groups that are stereotyped as heavydrinkers... The Irish, the Spanish, the Hispanic.... The Filipinos... Okay maybe that last one's just experience. Haha!! Anyways... I was wondering. any drinking atories? Drinking advice? Any abstaining?

I'm Filipino and I've never had a drink, excluding sacramental wine that is. :/ I personally find drinking kind of pointless. I'm an in-debt college student with limited funds, so alcohol is an extra expense that I don't need to concern myself with, and I'm under 21. Also, I was talking it over with a missionary once and he said something along the line of drinking itself isn't bad, but it opens people up to influences that might not be in their best interests. So yes. :O

That was kind of a tangent, huh?

I know. D: Whenever I have free time, I go to my friend's apartment to play Smash Bros. because I don't have my own console here. :/

I don't drink any alcohol because
1. I don't like the taste. I even notice the tiniest amount of alcohol in sweets
2. I have a low weight
3. I saw my classmates being very drunk and that was such a shock that since that day I don't want to drink any alcohol.

Of course, exceptions are toasts and the Holy Communion.
In small amounts, one can enjoy alcohol but, as many things, it is poison if you exaggerate the whole thing.

Alcohol can be a wonderful thing, a family and social thing associated with good food, good friends, and good stories (in my experience, both the making and the telling of stories can be alcohol-driven). This is kind of the traditional Italian understanding of drinking, which I grew up with, and from this perspective it's easy to understand why Jesus' first miracle at Cana was changing water to wine. Alcohol is one of those small luxuries that shows something is special- like your good clothes, or making a special meal. Even the glass-of-wine-with-dinner kind of drinking tends to go along with homemade food and long conversations-- which all together say that your family or friends or whoever are important to you.

Some perspectives on alcohol paint a much darker picture, and sometimes it is having a bad philosophy on drinking that gets people into trouble. There is the occasional person or family with a tendency for alcoholism, and they of couse should avoid alcohol altogether for their own safety and well-being. But for someone whose body and psyche handle alcohol well, and who has a healthy idea of how much to drink and when and why, it can be a very good thing and is a big part of many cultures throughout history.

...that's my two cents, as someone who grew up around moderate drinking, started drinking socially in college, and is now over 21 and pretty comfortable with drinking.

I don't really see the harm in drinking. I've done it with my brothers and it's always been fun. I think as long as you do it privately and with good people you know wouldn't take advantage of you or get belligerent it's all good. Going to the bar by yourself to drown your sorrows is just plain sad and potentially dangerous.It was designed to help you relax and have fun. So use it for that. And drink responsibly. *hikes up leg into the Captain Morgan pose*

Amen to that.

For a while, I was able to drink myself into oblivion and not really feel too terrible the next day. Then I stopped drinking for close to a year and when I resumed, I started getting the worst hangovers. One memorable morning I woke up with my head on fire, ran to the bathroom and puked my guts out, and spent the rest of the day sweating, shaking violently, and not being able to stand up for more than ten minutes without feeling like I was about to faint. I'd never experienced a hangover that bad. It was almost like opiate withdrawals.

...yeah, I'm done with liquor.