Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas

by Chuck Klosterman

It’s been several months since I’ve been able to handle talking to Donna while sober, so I pour three shots of Southern Comfort into a Coke glass and fill it up with Mountain Dew; this creates a color resembling the deepest waters of Loch Ness. In order to be more efficient, I suck on an ice cube while I drink (this eliminates the problem of the cubes melting in the glass and diluting the mix). I figure I have fifty minutes to get fucked up, plus or minus three hundred seconds. Time for three drinks, maybe. The first glass goes down like a handful of liquid thistles, but the second is smooth as a gravy avalanche and the third literally disappears from the glass that contains it. When Donna knocks on the door of my apartment and opens it in one motion (she has her own key), I am both drowsy and awake, the product of combining 80 proof alcohol with enough caffeine and glucose to make a ground sloth break-dance.