The Two Cocktail Makeover

  This article from TNI reminds me  of a conversation I had with Kate Hansen freshman year. I claimed (and still do) that fermented liquid de-hanced my physical self image - that it made (and makes) looking in the mirror something an exercise of self-criticism/loathing. Kate found that (and by extension I suppose, me) odd, and it seems she had the laws of the universe on her side:

The Two-Cocktail Makeover, as it is probably not terribly difficult to figure out, involves drinking two cocktails, looking in the mirror, and thinking you look fabulous. It’s hardly a thorough treatment plan; it’s best thought of as an occasional supplement to a dutifully existing core of self-care. (As for what defines “occasional,” I’ll leave that to your discretion. Birthdays, holidays, Tuesdays, noon.) It’s a wheatgrass shot for your self-image, not a daily vitamin. But manalive, sometimes wheatgrass shakes the health right into you, doesn’t it? (Am I revealing my hippie roots?)

And now the Two-Cocktail Makeover is science, kids. A research team based in France found that self-rated attractiveness of study participants increased along with alcohol consumption; people rated themselves as being more attractive, bright, original, and funny after downing a few. Rather, people rated themselves more favorably after believing they’d downed a few: Participants who were told they were drinking booze but who were actually given a nonalcoholic beverage gave inflated self-assessments on par with those who actually were tipsy. 

 The piece is worth a full read, mostly for the bachelorette party anecdote it sprang from (involving the lines: “No, really, you’re pretty! And I’m pretty too! I am so, so pretty! My friends are pretty, and you’re pretty, and I’m pretty. Am I pretty? I think I’m pretty.”), less so for the message of love-thyself-superego be damned uplift that closes the first section, and probably not very much for the clinical-political second half.