HANGOVER RATING SYSTEM

1 Star Hang-Over *
No pain. No real feeling of illness. You slept in your own bed and when you woke up there were no traffic cones in there with you. You are still able to function relatively well on the energy stored up from all those vodka Red Bulls. However, you can drink 10 bottles of water and still feel as parched as the Sahara. Even vegetarians are craving a Cheeseburger and side of fries.

2 Star Hang-Over **
No pain, but something is definitely amiss. You may look okay but you have the attention span and mental capacity of a stapler. The coffee you hug to try and remain focused is only exacerbating your rumbling gut, which is craving a full English breakfast.

Although you have a nice demeanour about the office, you are costing your employer valuable money because all you really can handle is some light filing, followed by aimlessly surfing the net and writing junk e-mails.

3 Star Hang-Over ***
Slight headache. Stomach feels crap. You are definitely a space cadet and not so productive. Anytime a girl or lad walks by you gag because her perfume/aftershave reminds you of the random gin shots you did with your alcoholic friends after the bouncer kicked you out at 3:45 a.m.

Life would be better right now if you were in your bed with a dozen doughnuts and a litre of coke watching daytime TV. You've had 4 cups of coffee, a gallon of water, 2 Sausage Rolls and a litre of diet coke yet you haven't peed once.

4 Star Hang-Over ****
You have lost the will to live. Your head is throbbing and you can't speak too quickly or else you might spew. Your boss has already lambasted you for being late and has given you a lecture for reeking of booze. You wore nice clothes, but you smell of socks, and you can't hide the fact that you either missed an oh-so crucial spot shaving or it looks like you put your make-up on while riding the dodgems depending on your gender).

Your teeth have their own individual sweaters. Your eyes look like one big vein and your hairstyle makes you look like a reject from the second-grade class picture circa 1976.

You would give a weeks pay for home time, a doughnut and somewhere to be alone or a time machine so you could go back and NOT have gone out the night before. You scare small children in the street just by walking past them.

5 Star Hang-Over *****
You have a second heartbeat in your head, which is actually annoying the employee who sits next to you. Vodka vapour is seeping out of every pore and making you dizzy. You still have toothpaste crust in the corners of your mouth from brushing your teeth. Your body has lost the ability to generate saliva, so your tongue is suffocating you. You'd cry but that would take the last of the moisture left in your body.

Death seems pretty good right now. Your boss doesn't even get mad at you and your co-workers think that your dog just died because you look so pathetic. You should have called in sick because, let's face it, all you can manage to do is breathe... very gently.

6 Star Hang-Over ******
You arrive home and climb into bed. Sleep comes instantly, as you were fighting it all the way home in the taxi. You get about 2 hours sleep until the noises inside your head wake you up. You notice that you bed has been cleared for take off and is flying relentlessly around the room. No matter what you do you now, you're going to chuck. You stumble out of bed and now find that your room is in a yacht under full sail.

After walking along the skirting boards on alternating walls knocking off all the pictures, you find the toilet. If you are lucky you will remember to lift the lid before you spontaneously explode and wake the whole house up with your impersonation of walrus mating calls. You sit there on the floor in your undies, cuddling the only friend in the world you have left (the toilet), randomly continuing to make the walrus noises, spitting, and farting.

Help usually comes at this stage, even if it is short lived. Tears stream down your face and your abdomen hurts. Help now turns into abuse and he/she usually goes back to bed leaving you there in the dark. With your stomach totally empty, your spontaneous eruptions have died back to 15-minute intervals, but your body won't relent. You are convinced that you are starting to turn yourself inside out and swear that you saw your tonsils projectile out your mouth on the last occasion.

It is now dawn and you pass your disgusted partner getting up for the day as you try to climb into bed. She/he abuses you again for trying to get into bed with lumpy bits of dried vomit in your hair. You reluctantly accept their advice and have a shower in exchange for them driving you to the hospital. Work is not an option. The whole day is spent trying to avoid anything that might make you sick again, like moving. You vow never to touch a drop again and who knows for the next two or three hours at least you might even succeed.