alcohol is older than the great pyramid atgiza, machu picchu, the roman colosseum, taj mahal and thegreat wall of china combined. and while it's not considered one of the wonders ofthe world, maybe it should be. alcohol, or more accurately, ethanol; is asimple enough chain of carbon and hydrogen with an oxygen thrown in for good measure,but it is most definitely humanity's favorite neurotoxin. anywhere we've been, we make alcohol,or bring it with us. it's a social lubricant, liquid courage, and a constant companion.it just gets along with us so well! when ethanol enters the body some leechesin through mucous membranes, but the lion's share of it travels through the stomach tothe small intestine, to be absorbed into the
bloodstream. ethanol is water-soluble, soonce in the bloodstream there's no stopping it. like a drunk westchester teen it partiesat every stop on the train to drunktown; skin and organ tissues, heart muscles, brain cells…alcohol pals it up with them all. in the brain, it binds with a molecule called glutamate;a neurotransmitter that normally keeps neurons excited so they can fire on all cylinders.once bound, your brain slows as your neurons become less excited. it also activates gabareceptors -- the famous gaba molecule is another neurotransmitter and needless to say, sincethe receptors are active, the brain doesn't make more gaba, without gaba, you feel calmerand sleepy. this continues until the liver is able to metabolise it and get it out ofthe blood.
no matter how you get the alcohol in yourbody, this long process is how you get drunk. though being human we obviously found newand horrifying ways to jump the line. inserting drugs into the rectum has been done for millennia,and was a popular way to take tobacco for a while, but still, don't try it. alcoholenemas, what the hyped-up media called butt chugging, bypasses the body's natural poisondetection and metabolization systems -- getting people way too drunk way too fast. it's superdangerous. alcohol inserted into the body via an alcohol enema isn't processed by thedigestive system and can cause alcohol poisoning, and even death. not to mention if you do live,you can have anal pain, tenesmus -- or the feeling to go a lot, and colonic bleeding.vodka-soaked tampons are along this same vein
(no pun intended) with the mucosal membranesbecoming irritated and burning from alcohol contact. but that doesn't stop people from trying things,ohhhhh no. palcohol is a powder-like alcohol legalized in the u.s. in march of 2015, andthen banned in some places shortly thereafter. we talked about it on dnews, remember? no?come subscribe so you don't miss it for next time. palcohol is made to be dissolved inwater, but it could also be snorted -- which is the worry for some legislators though theredoesn't seem to be much evidence that anyone other than one vice reporter actually didit. the reason snorting it would make sense, from a drunks perspective, is because youwouldn't have to wait the few minutes for
the alcohol to hit the stomach, and then smallintestine. the blood vessels in the nose are close to the skin, and if the ethanol is absorbable-- boom. direct line to the blood. palcohol highly discourages this practice, and thedescription by the vice reporter should too. ouch. but ,if you're trying to get to theblood, why not go right to the source? cause some people do. a 1999 oxford journal study looked into peoplewho injected alcohol directly into their bloodstream, and although they didn't die, there was burningpain. three case studies looked at people who admitted to injecting vodka, sherry, whiskey,and one guy even tried beer. but they weren't the first. victorians were famous for gettin'crunk. a man named h.c. dalton injected whiskey
-- not ethanol mind you, whiskey -- underthe skin of patients suffering from morphine poisoning. this guy was mixing a deadly cocktailfor sure. of course, he wasn't trying to get the man drunk; it wasn't his first rodeo;he'd used whiskey injections in the past to keep patients alive and kicking. funny story,this was all described by the 1911 montreal medical journal, and alcohol was listed asa stimulant (but it's not. it's a depressant). gives a whole new meaning to "doing a shot,"doesn't it? and now, the ultimate, breathable booze, hasbeen invented. you don't need to inject, snort, butt-chugg or even drink it. instead, justbreathe air at this bar in london called alcoholic architecture. when vaporized alcohol is presentin the air, and it intoxicates your lungs,
your skin and is even absorbed through theeyeballs -- bypassing the liver going direct to blood and have we learned nothing fromthis video!? what the hell, man? according to a doctor consulted by the associatedpress, “this has the potential to cause serious side effects as well as brain damagein the developing young brain.†they even make people wear ponchos so they don't absorbtoo much too quickly. overall, a study of over 2300 adults foundinnovative alcohol use extremely rare. only 1.1 percent of people surveyed ever done anyof these things. so when you see it in the media, raise your glass, and toast their hype.maybe we should all just stick to drinking alcohol with our mouths, the way it was intended.
