THE HALOGEN-BRIGHT morning sun beat down on my crusted eyelids. Opening them felt like I was prying the top of an ancient jar of mustard. To my right, my girlfriend’s carcass was comatose, immune to meddlesome light. I stood and stretched. My back snapped and crackled like bubble wrap, my muscles sore and flu-achy. Perhaps it was the tub of Buffalo Trace bourbon I consumed the previous eve, but it took several beats to make an important realization: Well, I thought, it looks like I’ve lost my pants and underwear. Read more Read it in print

THIS MAY SOUND as sacrilegious as an Exxon exec owning an electric car, but I often despise patronizing bars. I have a love-hate explanation: I love craft brews. I hate paying $6 or $7 a pint. Read more Read it in print

YOU CAN CHUCK them in your mouth or put them in water, but if anyone vomits,” the cute Chinese event coordinator chirped, pointing to trashcans lined with I HEART NEW YORK bags, “they’re disqualified. Anyone have any questions?” Just one: Why did I enter Chef One’s sixth annual dumpling-eating contest? Answer: A little bit of hubris, a lot of jet lag and, naturally, no common sense. Read more Read it in print

MY GREATEST ASSET is my gullet. Despite my horse-jockey height, my gullet is long and elastic, permitting me to swallow ponds and streams in one breathless gulp. It’s like discovering a Wizard of Oz munchkin is hung like Dirk Diggler. Read more Read it in print

LET ME BE blunt: I loathe interviewing celebrities as much as I detest raw tomatoes, a vegetable barely fit for chucking at American Idol rejects. Read more Read it in print

When I was young, with a liver that performed like a Lamborghini and employment as the world’s surliest receptionist, I adored open bars. I’d spend workdays alternating between misdirecting phone calls and scouring Craigslist for freebie offerings—say, unlimited Bud at Lit Lounge or vodka tonics at Blue Owl, a Wednesday standby that endures today. Read more

After countless forays to strip clubs, strip-club steakhouses and biker clubs, my girlfriend finally voiced an objection to my adventures in New York’s inebriated underbelly. “You’re not going out with Glenfiddich’s female whisky ambassador,” she commanded. I swear steam issued from her ears, like a real-life cartoon. “I don’t want you hanging out with women wearing bikinis, dumping whisky down your throat.” Read more Read it in print

It’s time to make you a football widow,” tell my girlfriend on a recent Sunday, as the clock ticks close to 1 p.m.—kickoff time for the first slate of NFL games. She sighs.“Off to the lesbian bar?” The last couple years, I’ve caught my bumbling Cincinnati Bengals inside the cave-like confines of Park Slope’s unlikely NFL hangout, girly club Cattyshack. Read more Read it in print

IT WAS A dark and drunken night, long past the hour of common sense, so naturally I was swerving my bike home from Williamsburg. My then-roommate Andrew and I had drunk two too many Styrofoam tankards of beer from Turkey’s Nest, where the faded décor and prices are time-warped in 1982: $4 buys 32 ounces of foamy fun, tip included. Read more Read it in print

I awoke from the nightmare, my heart somersaulting, my bladder threatening to spill like an oil tanker: Damn, I thought, why did I agree to be a tour guide? I blame the good, fine folks behind New York Craft Beer Week—Josh Schaffner and Mark Foggin—who contacted me with an offer I should’ve refused: “Want to lead a tour?” Foggin asked. “You’re a beer and bar expert.” Read more Read it in print