Hello gentle readers. In the past month I have been forced to attend several family functions, from Christmas to funerals, and have come to a bit of an epiphany, albeit a quaintly obvious one. The realization is this: While in a room full of people who think you are a fuck-up, have screwed your entire life, and are a black mark on the family name, it is usually wise to be drinking. A lot.

Bow before my wisdom.

However, the catch is that overt drunkenness does not help make your case as being a responsible and upstanding citizen, especially when you pee on your 2 year old cousin at the wedding of his parents. Thus, while it is imperative that you be drunk when dealing with these people, it is often wise to conceal your state of inebriation, lest you further tempt fate and lend credence to the baseless accusations against your good name tossed about by your own blood.

And so, having done extensive research on this subject myself of late, I have decided to share with you my empirical findings.

1. Do not talk about being drunk.

2. DO NOT TALK ABOUT BEING DRUNK!

3. At functions that include a free bar, it is a moral imperative to drink as much free booze as possible. Especially if you are underage, as they never card for private bars. However, to camouflage your obscene consumption rate, order only things that look like “straight” drinks. Things like screwdrivers, Bloody Marys, and Rum and Cokes. To the untrained familial eye, these drinks simply look like orange juice, tomato juice, and coke, respectively. A beer can be mistaken for little else, save for carbonated urine. And, as everybody knows, only Uncle Eddy drinks carbonated urine.

4. Play with the little kids in the family. You are able to talk gibberish, sit on the floor, and generally behave like a drunken moron, and come across only as “sensitive” and “fun loving”. However, when they reach an age where they can recognize the stench of booze on your breath and the difference between a “good” and “bad” touch, it is best to ignore them completely from then on.

5. Hang out with the elderly. They represent a group that your drunk ass can blend in with while completely blitzed. Few other social groups make no sense in conversation, fall down a lot, spontaneously release bodily fluids, and smell like pee, even when stone cold sober. The only other comparable group in that respect that comes to mind are Mexicans. If you can find a group of elderly Mexicans to hang with, it would be well advised to do so.

6. All that said, truly the best way to avoid having your drunkenness detected is to not hang out with anybody. Sweet sweet isolation.

7. Flasks are your friends. Easily concealed, quick to drink, good all around. Especially in situations where no other booze source is available, like while in a car, or at a baptism, or while carrying a casket.

When you are concealing a flask of gin, and a flask of tonic, and a lemon in your coin purse during Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, mixing them in your mouth in the back pew, you have done well. Good job!

8. That said, being seen pulling from a flask at family functions is bad form. Thus, it is usually best to conceal your flask in something while pulling from it. I suggest closing your wallet around the flask and pulling from it that way. Thus, when your Great Aunt walks into the coatroom and sees you pulling, she will assume you are simply drinking from your wallet.

9. Formal wear is fantastic for concealing flasks and bottles, as there is often many pockets and layers. I suggest a button up dress shirt with two breast pockets, a sports coat over that, and a trenchcoat with lots of pockets. And cargo pants.

10. Wine is often a socially acceptable spirit served at family functions. For more kick, spike yours with Everclear. If it is red wine, cherry Mad Dog 20/20.

11. There is always one Obscenely Drunk Uncle (ODU) wandering about. Latch on to him, under the guise of “taking care of him”. That way any booze stench, vomit on your lapels, and broken china can be easily blamed on the ODU. Make sure, when the ODU sobers up, to brief him on all his drunken antics that he doesn’t remember not doing.

12. A great way—nay, the BEST way—to conceal booze on your breath is by eating Ranch Corn Nuts. By eating a packet of these, you ensure your breath will smell like nothing else until late August. Unless of course the nuts were chased with paint thinner.

Also, it really helps in your attempts at isolation, as nobody will want to stand anywhere near Ranch Corn Nut Man.

13. If anybody asks, you are not drunk, you are “tired” or “sick”. And the green chunks around the rim of the toilet seat in your Aunt’s house are not “vomit”. They are “digestive problems”.

14. Take the focus off of your alcoholism and drug problems by constantly changing the topic to your inauguration.

15. If you have found yourself in the wonderful and enviable position of sitting up late one night and talking to your Uncle over whiskey sours, keep pouring him more, because your pounding of booze then becomes “social drinking”. When he finally says “no thanks, I think I’ve had enough”, knock him out with your chair and finish the bottle. Blame it on the cat or something.

16. If you are my sister and you write a journal entry on loose leaf paper about how much dope you smoke and how you sell your prescription medication and use the money to buy harder drugs, do not leave said journal entry on the floor of your grandfather’s living room, even by accident, as it will be picked up by your nosy Aunt, read, and quickly disseminated among your entire extended family.

If you are me though, you (I) should be fully prepared to capitalize on this diversion, as it takes the focus off of you and you can then freely move about in a drunken stupor and hit on your cousins while sipping your Everclear Zinfandel.

That is all.

(I am, after all, only here to help.)