I learned something interestig about alcohol consumption recently.
An experiemnt was done with a group of nice ladies whose custom was to go out together once a week for a night of relaxing good times with the girls. These were adult, responsible women who felt that they held their liquor pretty well-- "I NEVER drive if I think I'm not OK to drive." "I never get actually drunk..."-- their object was not to get sh*tfaced but to just have good clean fun.
So in this experiment they were videotaped as they consumed their usual. For some of them it was a lot; for others it wasn't much. They all stopped at the "OK to drive" point-- or so they thought. Then they were given field sobriety tests and thier blood levels were measured.
Every one of them flunked the basic functions a field sobriety test looks at. Their blood levels were medium to high.
The women then watched themselves, the next day, on tape. Every one of them was totally gomorrahfied at their demeanor-- loud, obnoxious, while finding themselves quite amusing-- we've all seen this effect, haven't we?
The explanation given was not just the old saw that drink loosens inhibitions and makes you feel like you're on top of the world. The explanation was that research has shown that one of the first and most-profoundly-affected parts of the brain, when one is drinking, is the part that generates self-observation. The first part of our minds that is impaired is our innate ability to know how we ourselves ARE.
Even before our judgment is affected, the data upon which to MAKE a judgment is impaired.
I found that really scary. The amount of alcohol it took some people to reach that state of being was really small. And the variation in behavior didn't match their blood alcohol.
In other words, the numbers may match, but the brains don't. Each brain reacts differently. And of course addiction makes that disparity even greater, for most people.
Hardi and I are less tolerant of people driving after drinking than we used to be, when we are the hosts. Their own perceptions just aren't reliable.