everything tastes of vodka

[insane_alien]

I've never really thought much about this till this morning but have you ever noticed how if you've been drinking vodka(or some other vodka based drink) the night before, that in the morning, every liquid you drink seems to taste like it has vodka in it? is there anything to explain this? i have a feeling it's psychological but maybe i'm wrong.

 

oh and, 10 points and a cookie if you can guess what i was drinking last night.

[YT2095]

you`re Exhaling the alcohol, as you know ethanol has a distinct smell, and Vodka is basically ethanol in water.

 

when you have a drink you breathe your own breath again from the cup or glass, and since 90% of "taste" is actually Smell, you have your answer

 

and doubt that you exhale it either, how does a breathaliser work?

[insane_alien]

aha. well, that explains it. thanks man.

[Sisyphus]

 

oh and, 10 points and a cookie if you can guess what i was drinking last night.

 

Soy milk?

[joshuam168]

you`re Exhaling the alcohol, as you know ethanol has a distinct smell, and Vodka is basically ethanol in water.

 

when you have a drink you breathe your own breath again from the cup or glass, and since 90% of "taste" is actually Smell, you have your answer

 

and doubt that you exhale it either, how does a breathaliser work?

 

umm...no. unless u were up drinking until 3 A.M. and then got up at 6 A.M., your not going to stil have ethanol on your breath. after roughly a night of sleep, again depending how much sleep you've had, the alcohol is going to be gone, the tasting of vodka is psychological. especially if its really cheap nasty vodka, i've had that happen with other alcohol, wen i've drank way too much the night before and it was nasty. but i've never tasted vodka in my drinks the next day before. but its definitely not "left over" ethanol.

[iNow]

umm...no. unless u were up drinking until 3 A.M. and then got up at 6 A.M., your not going to stil have ethanol on your breath. after roughly a night of sleep, again depending how much sleep you've had, the alcohol is going to be gone, the tasting of vodka is psychological.

 

To make such an assessment, one would need to know how much he drank, how fast he drank it, how much he weighs, how much he ate, and the exact duration since his last drink. Since none of this information has been presented in the thread, you cannot make the statement you just did with any degree of confidence.

 

 

A towing service in Minnisota acts as a cab service on Friday and Saturday nights, but they also tow your car home with you so you don't have to go back and find it the next morning. I think that's one of those rare, effective, wonderful ideas that should be implemented in more places.

 

 

So, I second the vote for soymilk.

[CPL.Luke]

I would guess a coke and vodka or some other such variant of coke.

 

personally any diet coke (coke zero etc.) now permanently tastes like it has vodka in it as the diet cokes don't have as much flavor in them and as such has a similar effect on taste as coke watered down with vodka.

 

 

I would recommend usin fanta or something like that next time.

 

I don't like YT's explanation as I don't get that effect while drinking wiskey or any other such drink.

[insane_alien]

umm...no. unless u were up drinking until 3 A.M. and then got up at 6 A.M., your not going to stil have ethanol on your breath. after roughly a night of sleep, again depending how much sleep you've had, the alcohol is going to be gone, the tasting of vodka is psychological. especially if its really cheap nasty vodka, i've had that happen with other alcohol, wen i've drank way too much the night before and it was nasty. but i've never tasted vodka in my drinks the next day before. but its definitely not "left over" ethanol.

 

try drinking till 6am and getting up at ~10am. started around 3pm. i was still drunk when i got up. definitely a lot of alcohol left over.

 

I don't like YT's explanation as I don't get that effect while drinking wiskey or any other such drink.

 

now you mention it, i haven't noticed with other drinks like cider. i'll have to experiment. some people i kow are coming to the university this semester so i'll probably end up at freshers week(for the third time) i'll lay off the vodka and see what happens.

[fredrik]

I've never really thought much about this till this morning but have you ever noticed how if you've been drinking vodka(or some other vodka based drink) the night before, that in the morning, every liquid you drink seems to taste like it has vodka in it? is there anything to explain this? i have a feeling it's psychological but maybe i'm wrong.

 

oh and, 10 points and a cookie if you can guess what i was drinking last night.

 

I never drink vodka, but when I've had a few beers... sometimes a certain period after that I tend to pick up this green apple/hang over flavour in my mouth, which I identify as acetaldehyde (oxidized ethanol). This compound has an extremely low treshold and it can both oxidize in the liver, but also by mouth bacteria, which I suspect is at play at times. I've had the theory that drinking beer for some hours, encourages the mouth bacteria to beef up the enzymes systems necessary to respire ethanol. So that after that, even though I've rinsed my mouth in water, all other beers I drink (that I know are good) I often judge them as flawed to to the acetaldehyde aroma. It's also one of the distinct aromas I smell in the breath of anyone that has been drinking too much alcohol, sometimes even the day after. IMO, one of the key notes in hang-over smell. It does not smell ethanol though, it smells oxidized ethanol. If I remember correctly without checking the tables the odour treshold of acetaldehyde in air is ppb range, even thouhg it varies from person to person.

 

I used to brew beer so I have come across this nasty compound many times.

 

/Fredrik

[YT2095]

I don't like YT's explanation as I don't get that effect while drinking wiskey or any other such drink.

 

well I`m not particularly fussed if you believe the facts or not, it doesn`t change anything.

 

it still remains that you exhale these vapors that the nose picks up again and translates to "Taste".

[John Cuthber]

I guess he's not fussed about whether you believe facts either. If it doesn't work with whiskey (and, unless you are calling him a liar, I think we can take that as a fact) then, since vodka and whiskey have similar alcohol contents it can't be due to alcohol.

My personal guess is that it's at least partly due to acetaldehyde. but I still can't explain the difference between spirits.

[YT2095]

if you don`t think you can get busted next day (or longer) on a breath test, be my Guest

 

Acetaldehyde does also indeed play a significant role, that was never in dispute either.

the difference is the volatile aromatics in Other spirits, as I said Vodka is just Alc and Water.

and yes, drink enough Whiskey or Pernod etc... and they taste like it also the next day!

 

the fact that CPL said he didn`t means nothing other than Not Enough, I can give testamony to Plenty cases where you Can taste this next day (and even Week later) with Pernod type drinks) later.

 

that is indeed the Mechanism behind it, argue all you like, that IS the reason!

 

plug you nose next time and see if it happens then

[John Cuthber]

I do plenty of drinking but I don't drive so I'm unlikely to get busted the next day. I am also aware that (at least from my point of view) it doesn't take a very heavy drinking session to be still over the limit the next day.

Pernod is noted for tasting of pernod the next day (etc). That's down to things like anisaldehyde rather than alcohol so it rather argues against alcohol being the sole factor.

This assertion "the fact that CPL said he didn`t means nothing other than Not Enough," might be true but you cannot know because you don't know how much whiskey he drinks.

[DrDNA]

Have you tried brushing your teeth and scraping your tongue? Works for me...............

I'm guessing that you drank vodka last night?

[insane_alien]

well it was a couple of nights ago now.

 

anyway, i'm going out tomorrow night(well, tonight seeing as it's 00:36 just now) and i'll probably be drinking wine i don't think it'll be enough though. but i'll try to remember to experiment. no promises though.

[DrDNA]

Well, then you are complicating a simple experiment with tannins. Now we'll probably never know what is really going on. Remind me next time to use mice and in a more controlled environment.

 

BTW: I suspect that what you are observing has nothing to do with alcohol or alcohol metabolites at all. More than likely, some molecules that contribute to the drink's taste are not easily broken down in the mouth or upper GI. And these molecules are probably hanging around in the mouth, upper GI or upper respiratory system and they can populate (or re-populate?) the receptors in your taste buds the next day. I'm pretty sure this is what happened when I drank a lot of KY burbon years ago.

[foodchain]

I've never really thought much about this till this morning but have you ever noticed how if you've been drinking vodka(or some other vodka based drink) the night before, that in the morning, every liquid you drink seems to taste like it has vodka in it? is there anything to explain this? i have a feeling it's psychological but maybe i'm wrong.

 

oh and, 10 points and a cookie if you can guess what i was drinking last night.

 

I have no idea what you were drinking, but I would think you hit some saturation point in your bloodstream though:D I have mixed drinks with vodka and everclear in them, along with some caffeine, its quit a kick but it does not taste very strong so you have to be careful really. As for a good drink mix, I would think sprite or 7up along with grape juice does nicely with vodka overall, though its been sometime since I had such. If you wake up the next day and happen to still be drunk, odds are you went a little overboard. I don’t like to drink really save for the purpose of getting drunk also, but really not to act as a overbearing communist but you really probably had a little to much:D

[Paralith]

vodka and redbull? I had a tiny 5'3" friend who I swear could drink gallons of the stuff. That girl could drink football players under the table. Though I never recall her mentioning a similar problem before.

 

I like Dr. DNA's explanation because it takes into account molecules that might be particular to vodka and not other liquor, and variability from person to person - alien might have something about his metabolism that isn't quite as efficient at dealing with this supposed molecule as other peoples' are.

[joshuam168]

To make such an assessment, one would need to know how much he drank, how fast he drank it, how much he weighs, how much he ate, and the exact duration since his last drink. Since none of this information has been presented in the thread, you cannot make the statement you just did with any degree of confidence.

 

 

A towing service in Minnisota acts as a cab service on Friday and Saturday nights, but they also tow your car home with you so you don't have to go back and find it the next morning. I think that's one of those rare, effective, wonderful ideas that should be implemented in more places.

 

 

So, I second the vote for soymilk.

 

i was stating such as an average....on average a good nights sleep does rid your body of any significant amount of alcohol in your blood. as in all medical science i was the accepted norms as a basis for my conjecture.

[insane_alien]

averages should only apply when you are talking about a bunch of people. when talking about a single circumstance they tend to be wrong about 70 % of the time.

 

if you applied it to all of us who were out that night(20-30) then it may have had some significance. then again, i only know what me and my gf done after... some early hour when it was dark.

[joshuam168]

averages should only apply when you are talking about a bunch of people. when talking about a single circumstance they tend to be wrong about 70 % of the time.

 

if you applied it to all of us who were out that night(20-30) then it may have had some significance. then again, i only know what me and my gf done after... some early hour when it was dark.

 

yes that makes sense....never use accepted norms....guess the doctors and the scientists are wrong. sorry my bad

[Paralith]

yes that makes sense....never use accepted norms....guess the doctors and the scientists are wrong. sorry my bad

 

Hmm. I don't think the words "never use" were in alien's post.

 

When you have an average, you can use it to guess what might be happening to an individual, but especially if you're dealing with a somewhat complex issue with many contributing factors, you can only expect a limited likelihood that your guess is accurate. Averages don't help you much in cases like these, especially since they are very easily skewed by extreme outliers - for a hypothetical example, a minority of people break down alcohol VERY quickly (I have no idea if this is true, but it wouldn't surprise me if it is). This will drive the average down beyond the amount of time the majority of people need to eradicate alcohol from their systems. However, using the average from a larger group to predict the average of a smaller group probably has a higher chance of success, since the small group is more likely to represent the variability of the larger group the average came from in the first place.

[joshuam168]

no they are not very easily skewed by extremes.....thats why they are taken from large numbers of people, so that a few extremes factor in nicely to make the average. and if you think about it for those people who have an extremely high metabolism for alcohol there are going to be those with an extremely low metabolism for alcohol...which help to balance out this "extremeness". if, as you two are implying, that a norm should not be used in this case, then it would follow that you should never really use norms on an individual....hmmm curse those incredibly stupid people for wasting their time on coming up with these norms.....and also for stupidly using them on single individuals...imagine the nerve....

[Paralith]

That's assuming that there ARE in fact enough people on both extremes to balance out the average. Do you know that for a fact? And does this average take into account the speed with which the alcohol was imbibed? Or is the metabolism rate the same for all speeds? Over what length of time is this average metabolism amount? Is this for full or empty stomachs? Was the majority of metabolism done while asleep or while still awake? And will all these averages also have harmonious extremes that keep the skew away?

 

The point is, this is a complex issue. Averages are less accurate for more complex situations when it comes to individuals. It's not that averages are always wrong and should never be used. It's that in some circumstances they're less useful than others.

[joshuam168]

norms should always be used! thats why they were developed! even though the issue may be more complex norms are used to help rule out incorrect thinking and to help build ideas. if we didnt have these norms it would be incredibly hard to come anywhere near an answer for any medival problem!

 

aas for the balancing out.....there may not be enough of both extremes to balance eachother out. but stil these extremes would be factored into the average....henceforth why its called an AVERAGE. my point was merely that even tho there may be these high metabolism people there would also be low metabolism people.....your argument on that point therefore makes no valid contribution on this point.