Because all you can drink sangria does not mean you have to drink all you can

I was hoping to avoid this for a while, but let's get personal. Wine is not my friend. It is evil, just plain evil. I had my usual Wednesday night happy hour, but at a different location. (I have to admit, I felt like I was cheating on our regular BFF bartender or something, but shoot, he took last Wednesday off to go to some concert so we had to pay regular price for our drinks. Hmph.) So we're up in El Barrio at ladies' night: all you can drink sangria for $10. Not a bad deal, right? And the sangria was GOOD--the bartender was good to us and kept our glasses full. I am not sure how many I had, but I am positive it was a number between 5 and 10 (definitely not 10, though). No need for an intervention or anything--the glasses were very small.

I was tucked in by midnight.

Then I woke up an hour before my alarm with a splitting headache. I don't normally get headaches from drinking. This is why wine is evil (sulfites=poison). This is why vodka is my friend and clear, colorless drinks are the way to go. I have learned my lesson.

However, I think all of the pain was worth it: that night I managed to successfully co-mingle two groups of friends. The co-mingling of friends is always an unpredictable social experiment. You always think that because you like all of these people, how could they not like each other, right? Wrong. You connect with people at different levels and for different reasons and they don't always mesh with each other. I've been guilty of greatly disliking the friends of my friends too. But the planets were aligned for this interaction. One group we'll call the Regulars, since we have a standing Wednesday night happy hour date, and the others I will call the Spillers, because they managed to spill 3 glasses of sangria that night (including in my shoe) and there was also the incident when I took them to my usual watering hole, and they spilled a flaming shot and almost burned the place down. Enough said. When we all sat at the table it was like a United Colors of Bennetton ad. Except for alcohol. I felt like I was the UN ambassador for sangria drinkers.

The bottom line is that a good time was had by all, everyone can just get along, and I hope I am not the only one with a headache.