My sophomore winter was full of two things: skiing and drinking. Which is perfect because they go hand-in-hand. One of my buddies had a house in Maine and asked me to come out for Sunday River’s college week. It was going to be a week of empty lift lines and dirt cheap ticket prices not to mention that we were going to cram between 20 and thirty people into his house for the week.

There are a ton of stories from that week of debauchery but there is one that sits very close to my heart. I believe it was the third day and I was in rough shape after skiing for 2 days, drinking for 2 nights and only catching an odd hour or two of sleep here and there. I got into the singles line at the chair lift exceptionally hungover and got onto the lift with a dad and his two small children. The order on the chair went like this: small child, Dad, small child, my hungover ass. I hadn’t said a word to the dad or the kids and was just laying my head up against the bar when I felt a hard metal square in my pocket. I reached down and felt the tell-tale outline of my flask. I then decided it was a good idea to try to throw some hair on the dog. Without really thinking I pulled the flask out, unscrewed the top and took a pull.

I was expecting whiskey. But what I thought was whiskey turned out to be this disgusting $10 gin. I managed to choke it down but I could feel my body panicking. There was nothing I could do but lean over the side of the lift and vomit out the contents of my stomach. I probably only let loose 3 or 4 mouth-fulls of puke before I wiped my mouth with my glove. I took a deep breath and then looked over to my left. The three others on the lift were just staring at me. So, I did what any other person would do in my position. Nothing. I just stared forward and thought about what I should say to them. Thankfully the lift had come to an end, so I skied off in a different direction, leaving the Dad to tell is children not to grow up to be like me.