This is a story about how I went to four different convenience stores today.

This story basically has everything to do with me being hungover. I don’t know about you, but when I’m hungover I’m functionally retarded. Even on the best of days, I have a great deal of trouble keeping information from falling out of my brain, and being dehydrated and nauseous just makes it worse.

So anyway, I was having a standard lethargic and hungover Saturday when I developed a craving for bacon.* I decided to go to Target since I also needed Pepto Bismol and pens (and because Target is the source of all things good in the world and always makes me feel better even when I’m hungover). So I drove to Target, stopping at the E-Z Stop (that’s store #1) along the way to get cash from their ATM and buy some vitamin water. It was an extremely easy stop, as advertised. But things were about to get crazy.

Once at Target, I grabbed my Pepto Bismol and was making excellent progress towards the food section, when the brand-spaking-new Eighth Season Simpsons DVD set caught my eye. Then I checked out and left the store. I was in the parking lot before I realized I’d failed to procure a full half of the items on my shopping list.

What I should have done is gone back into the store and bought them, but I’m one of those people who is afraid of having total strangers judge him for behavior that isn’t really even that embarrassing to begin with, like going back into a store with a bag full of already-purchased items and maybe even having the cashier who just rang me up notice me. (This is basically the same reason I couldn’t go back to the E-Z Stop, because the woman who sold me my vitamin water might remember me. It would not be a very E-Z stop for a shopper as neurotic as I am.)

So, I decided to go to a different nearby convenience store. (I could have just gone to the Rainbow right next to Target, but like I said, I’m an idiot when I’m hungover.) I drove to the Super America (#2) and was horrified to discover that they don’t even sell bacon there. Baloney, yes, but not bacon. So I drove down to the Holiday station (#3)—same story there. What’s wrong with the world? At this point the bathos of the situation almost caused me to surrender and go home, but this urge was overpowered by my hunger and the even greater bathos of literally failing to bring home the bacon.

Because I’m also a terrible driver when hungover, I somehow ended up in an alley near a warehouse by some railroad tracks while driving around looking for another convenience store likley to sell me bacon. Finally, I tried the Twins Stop-N-Go (#4). Great success! The surly clerk rang up my overpriced bacon and responded to my “Actually, I don’t need a bag,” by putting my purchase in a bag. I stopped-n-went, looking forward to my fatty, greasy meal.

All told, my quest looked something like this:

I’m fairly certain I can say, with complete confidence, that I can totally relate to Lewis & Clark.

I returned home, humbled but triumphant. I fired up the George Foreman, settled down with the Simpsons, and felt about 1000% better.

* Bacon comprises 50% of the closest thing I’ve ever found to a hangover cure (the other half being, of course, Propel Fitness Water™).