While conservative columnist David Frum is trying to convince his friends he's not crazy just because he's not that into the Tea Party, his wife, Danielle Crittenden, managing editor of blogs for Huffington Post Canada, is experimenting in the bathroom with a vodka-soaked tampon. The alleged "trend" among teenagers of sticking alcohol-infused things in non-mouth orifices seems to be a lot like those "lipstick parties" of a couple years ago -- made up by weird adults. Her own teenage son hinted as much when she asked if he'd heard of the "trend" and he responded, "Uh uh. No. Wait. [Cousin] told me bout it. Once. Some girl. At his school. Maybe. Dunno." There's always some girl, isn't there? She often has a disastrous experiment with some sort of food product. Crittenden set out for first person information and detailed what happened for the Huffington Post. 

It’s a very strange experience to have your friends think you’ve gone crazy. Some will tell you so. Others will indulgently humor you. Still others will avoid you. More than a few will demand that the authorities do something to get you off the streets. During one unpleasant moment after I was fired from the think tank where I’d worked for the previous seven years, I tried to reassure my wife with an old cliché: "The great thing about an experience like this is that you learn who your friends really are." She answered, "I was happier when I didn't know."

• "No need to say 'Bottoms up!'"
• "Wait, a super plus couldn't handle a double??"
• "Did it help that I've had three kids? Possibly."
• "I began hopping around and breathing in the rapid, short puffs I'd learned in birth classes, so long ago, before I realized I didn't need to breathe like that if I took the epidural... I could really use a frikkin epidural right now."
• "Gradually I felt... what? A small buzz? Certainly a definite, if slight, lightheadedness. Maybe it was the onset of toxic shock syndrome. Or intoxicated shock syndrome...?"

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Elspeth Reeve