BUMP: Just saw this thread, have something to add:
In college we used to joke that we were professional drinkers, being able to hold your liquor was not so much a matter of pride (like most of the "amatures" we encountered) but a requisite for enjoying the parties that we frequented. These parties included the standard drinking games: Tippy Cup, Beer Pong, Power Hours (and Centuries), What the F***?, Buzz, and Quarters among others. Hell, for about a year and a half, a my group of friends were the Thursday night regulars at a local bar and our games were the focus of entertainment for the bar. We didn't dwell on it, but everybody on campus took pride in Wisconsin being ranked #1 party school again and again.
It really struck me when we were having a "meet and greet" at the beginning of medical school and a bunch of my classmates (pooled from universities across the country) wanted to play drinking games. They all talked up how they were such big drinkers and had crazy drunk nights...so I watched from the periphery as they played a watered down version of Circle of Death and stupidly tipsy off of the equivalent of a lazy saturday BBQ amount of EtOH. That's when I realized that we we're perhaps over the edge back in Madison.
There were consequences, of course:
- There were the vomiting messes, blackouts, and miscellaneous property damage from parties.
- There were the unanticipated and often regrettable hook-ups.
- The dudes I used to live with had an ecclectic collection of bowel maladies: one had Chron's, one had Ulcerative Colitis, and two had "regular" earth-shaking bowel-movements twice weekly. Well, the wheat-germ of beer (or most liquors) often saw the collision of those problems on our one bathroon on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday mornings.
But those were offset largely by the amazing stories we accumulated and great times we had while drinking.
I don't drink much now though. Partially because I don't have the time due to my studies and responsibilities of professional school. Partially because I regularly am training for running events. But mostly because it doesn't excite me as much as it used to...the novelty has worn off, drinks are expensive in Chicago-land bars, and the bar fly women are the spent jet-trash type that don't inspire the "thrill of the hunt" so to speak (not to mention, many of them smell strangely like fish...think BV). I do enjoy the occasional bender (post-exam...etc.) but its not our standard fare of entertainment anymore.
That said, I tend to look down upon people who patently refuse to drink having never drunk before. I don't know why. Perhaps its residual from the college days, where those sort of people were "dry rags" so to speak. However, I realize that they are (knowingly or unknowingly) much more enlightened than people who drink religiously. I feel I could go on quite a bit more, for example about what EtOH does mechanistically, hangovers, alcoholism, medical consequences, or the various life experiences that have shaped who I am that were mostly fueled by EtOH. But, I think I'll just trail off here...
I weaned myself onto the stuff drinking mocha frappuccinos that I found too strong initially, then moved onto cafe mocha, then onto latte. Now I can't imagine drinking a mocha anything. The sweetness would kill me! 
