OK: You’ve got your tickets, you’ve got your best outfit ready to go, shined your shoes, bought some booze, made dinner reservations, and planned your night to perfection.  What could possibly go wrong?  Everything.

Murphy’s Law is like a five year old kid on a temper tantrum, completely bent on breaking anything you’ve planned to perfection while wearing tiny shoes.  So here’s five sure-fire ways to keep your New Year’s Eve 2012 from turning into a total shitshow.

5. Get tickets early

The world favors those who plan ahead.  Why? Because nobody ever actually does it. That’s why tickets for New year’s eve in DC are dirt cheap in November, then go up in price as the date gets closer.  Of course, this shocking revelation won’t help you today, but perhaps in the future it will.

"It took 10 years, $3 million, and most of my hair, but now I can go back in time and save $14.00 on my New Year's Eve tickets!"

Getting tickets early also makes your life a lot easier because then you can make dinner reservations, book a hotel, and create other fun activities around the night because now the main part of your evil plan is already locked down.  And don’t worry about commitment issues, most people end up going with the first thing they think of anyways, so chances are good that your $30 won’t be spent in vain.

4. Carefully Choose your group

A big part of having a good time is having a good group to party with.  And while most of your friends will be perfect for celebrating New Year’s Eve, you have to recognize the bad apples and weed them out before they cause trouble and ruin your night.

When I say “bad apples” I really mean “bad drunks”.  But because its hard to criticize our friends, we’ll just lay it out straight and tell you to Leave these types of friends at home:

"I love buying expensive and sexy clothes so I can puke all over them at the end of the night"

The hot party girl: She’s a total flirt, rips up the dancefloor at every club, is drop dead gorgeous, and absolutely loves to drink.  Best of all, she’s gained the reputation for getting smashed and hooking up with anything that has a pulse.  Sounds like a winning combination, right?

Don't even think about it.

Well, if you like babysitting unconscious chicks and wiping vomit off 5 inch stilettos, then by all means go right ahead and take her with you.  These girls can’t handle their booze.  Don’t be surprised if your “sure thing” turns out to be the key to perfecting your infant parenting skills.  The rest of us will be partying and celebrating while you brush the puke chunks from your hair.

And then there’s the belligerent drunk…

Not exactly the best drinking buddy. Especially if your enjoy Matzo and Challah.

There’s also the depressed drunk, the disappearing drunk, and the gassy drunk, as well as myriads of others.  The point of all this is know what type of drunk your friends are before inviting them out for a night on the town!

Speaking of which…

3. Know what type of drunk you are

“Judge not, lest ye be judged” So lets take some notes on how to make sure your friends won’t label you Mel Brooks every time you go out drinking and end up driving drunk, fighting with the police, and shouting anti semetic epithets from the backseat of a soiled police cruiser.

Vomiting wouldn't be so bad if all we puked up was sparkles, stars, and fucking rainbows all night.

Pace yourself.  New Year’s Eve is a long night, and if you are drinking the whole time, you will fail in an epic fashion.

Fortunately, you are an experienced drinker and know how much it takes to get yourself to that optimum drunkenness level.  And you also know that alcohol does not immediately take effect the moment you swallow it. You know that 1 beer = 1 wine = 1 booze.  So don’t “conveniently” forget that information the moment you step inside the bar.  Watch yourself.  Know your limits.

You might end up like this winner who passed out while peeing and talking on the phone a couple blocks away from a now-closed DC club.

AND REMEMBER: Even when you’re drunk, you still know that its wrong to touch that girls butt, a bad idea to punch the guy who looked at you, and is probably stupid to hop on a ceiling fan and cluck like a chicken with a bottle in your ass.   Drunk is not actually an excuse for being a douche, and you know it.

2. Be prepared

Lets face it, stuff happens.  You can either be prepared to enjoy life or you can completely fail.  If you want to have a good New Year’s Eve, you’ll make some appropriate preparations.

Y2K preparations not required nor advisable in 2010

Have a backup plan, because you probably didn’t adhere to #5.  And with your luck, the place you want to go will have a huge-ass line and you’ll wait outside all night in the cold listening to your girlfriend kvech about how cold it is.

"Yes, Dear"

Its also good to have:

• Cash and credit card
• The numbers for several different taxi companies (in case one is too busy)
• Condoms, Breath Mints, Barf Bag, and a Freshly Charged Cell Battery
• A good Dinner beforehand, then lots of water after

Dinner is important because food helps to slow down the absorption of alcohol, and water helps you to knock out one of the biggest factors of a hangover: Dehydration.  Well, that, and not drinking so much that you are puking like a freshman well into the next day.

"Boy, I haven't vomited this much since that time we had a drinking contest with ipecac syrup..."

1. Don’t drink and drive

So far you’ve avoided all the potential pitfalls and catastrophes for the night: You got your tickets, you ditched the skank you’ll end up babysitting instead of plowing, you took a good look at yourself in the mirror, and planned your backup.

You’re almost home free, but at the last second, one of those wicked roadside trees jumps out of nowhere and eats the front of your car, causing you and your friends to eat windshield.

"A few hours from now, I'll shit out a tiffany lamp."

Truth is, Drinking and Driving kills, and it will happen to you. Its killed 23 people that I’ve known personally. You don’t even have to be completely trashed to be too impaired to drive.  If there’s even any doubt in your mind that perhaps you’re too buzzed to drive, you should probably call a cab.  And thanks to the wonderful people at WRAP, getting a cab is FREE. Dude. Its free. Why the hell wouldn’t you?

Don’t wan’t to take a cab?  Plan ahead and have a sober friend come pick you up. Get a hotel room. Walk home. Sleep in your car. Hell, you can even take Metro if you’re desperate and have no other options.  They’re open till 3am on New Year’s Eve, and the buses are running on Sunday Schedule.

Granted, Metro has been pretty awful the past couple years, but look at it this way: At least you’ll burn off all those empty beer calories climbing up and down all the broken escalators.

Darn Metro

Party smart this year.

Mark Maskell