How to have sober fun without wanting to die

Living at UVA means there’s alcohol everywhere. At first, your friends might get pissed when you refuse to go out with them, but soon enough they’ll realize you’re onto something AKA not wasting an entire Sunday in bed hungover.

Once you calculate the insane amount of money on double vodka tonics alone, you’ll be eager to know what else you can do with your money.

Here’s how you can have a decent weekend without getting trashed.

Do something really physical

Get your heart pumping because then you get a natural high from endorphins. Steal someone’s puppy to take on a walk and “fall asleep” and don’t return it. Buy variety packs of candy, make all your friends eat it with you, and see how many rap songs you know by heart.

Take it back to your childhood

Play board games or poker with real money, so maybe you can win back all the dollars you spent at bars. Twister is a great way to feel the affects of falling over drunk without having to down the shots. Game night means your friends can still drink and be loud if they want, so they really won’t have any excuses to bail on you.

Take a trip

Washington D.C. always has cool artists playing shows at unique venues like the 9:30 Club where tickets are usually cheap. Wilco, Kid Cudi, and Father John Misty are playing there this year.

It’s so good to get out of town sometimes and spice things up with museum visiting, beach going, or city touring among strangers who aren’t pulling their hair out over school. Airbnb’s are surprisingly cheap if you wanna stay up all night in New York and find yourself in magical chaos.

Get lost in a really good series

If you have an insane amount of hours to blow, watch those ridiculously long Netflix shows that people keep bugging you to watch like House of Cards or Breaking Bad or Scandal. I haven’t watched any of these so can you go ahead and do that and fill me in? K cool thanks.

Treat yo’self

Dinner does not have to be all about the local beer selection. Go all out on a really good burger or a fancy milkshake. Tapas is actually pretty fun too – Charlottesville’s Parallel 38 has gotten awards for it. Take a big group and order all different things – it’s the ultimate way to avoid meal FOMO.

There’s also this South African restaurant called Shebeen Pub & Braai (make your parents to take you bc it’s $$). They have food I cannot pronounce but it was so good that I cried.

Tap into your soul

Not to get uber existential but everyone really needs to release their inner emotions sometimes, especially in college when everyone’s #growingup but also being really competitive??

Painting without getting wine drunk is quite soothing, and if you totally suck you can get a paint-by-number. Then you can trick people into thinking you have crazy hidden artsy talent and wear striped scarves and berets casually af.

Do something creative

Learn to make a new pastry that you can perfect by Valentine’s day to give to your BFFs or boyfriend or bae or whatever. Egg or TP someone’s house or car. IDK if you have exes in the vicinity, but this can be very liberating.

Clean your apartment

You’ll feel so much better after your laundry is done and the dishes are away so there aren’t any fruit flies. Play really loud music and things are bound to turn into a dance party.

Go see a movie

As of late there are SOOOO many good films including Joy, the Revenant (yes Leo really does deserve an Oscar for it), Carol, and The Big Short. The Regal Cinema here is super nice and ginormous, so you can go alone and not feel weird.

Have a #listening party

The kids these days are really into vinyl collecting and record players for probably all the wrong reasons, but still it’s pretty awesome to snuggle on a cozy couch with expensive lit just listening to your favorite songs play really loudly at a really high quality. You can probably reach an altered state of transcendence without using substances.

You can also get freaky #IRL with a Ouija board and three best friends at 2am.

As a last resort there’s this thing called addictinggames.com – a place where you’ll come across the best game in the world, better known as Text Twist.

You’ll see what I’m talking about but honestly be careful. Like make sure your laptop isn’t plugged in so your computer eventually dies and forces you to sleep…