50 cans of Red Bull...a day

Meet Paul Gascoigne. Known as Gazza to England soccer fans, the former captain is perhaps best-known for his emotional, tearful reaction after receiving a red card in England's semi-final game against Germany in the 1990 World Cup, knowing that meant he would have to miss the final game if England advanced (they didn't).

That, and being a massive drunk and drug-addict. You can probably guess the cycle: binge, get caught, express shame, "get clean", relapse, etc. It's the same story you've probably heard thousands of times before, with the same "I've cleaned up my act this time!' story running every few years, to break the time between the next report of his latest escapades.

Well, things have somehow gotten even worse for Gazza, with reports out of England that he's been placed in a mental health ward after his latest serious of bizarre events while staying at a London hotel. Among the gems:

• He holed up in his room for two months, with his only companion being toy parrots that he treated as real and had programmed to swear at guests in the lobby (where he would sometimes appear with a fake parrot on his shoulder)
• He ordered plate after plate of liver from room service, saying that "it was good for his blood"
• Female staff was barred from his room since he had a habit of answering the door naked

My favorite story, though, is that he had recently checked himself into a rehab clinic in the US for a month (at a cost of £16,000) to treat his crippling addiction. Not to cocaine or alcohol, which he clearly was still happy to keep doing. But to Red Bull.

How much Red Bull was Gazza drinking? How about 50 cans. A day. I cannot even fathom how one could possibly choke down 50 cans of that vile swill, much less how one's system could survive. If I have more than one in one day (or night), I feel like I'm Redd Foxx, getting ready to "have the big one." I start twitching and shaking, I get sweaty and jittery - basically, I turn into Bill Belichik getting prepared for the post-Super Bowl press conference.

Honestly...50 cans of Red Bull a day? How does that even happen? Do you start at a couple of cans, and then that doesn't work, so you go to five? Then 10? Then 25? Was Jolt cola the "gateway" drug into the harder stuff? And why not 75 or 100 - Gazza was always the "ultimate competitor," so why not go for something truly amazing and set the bar so high that not even Kobayashi could beat it?

Posted by The Duke of Everything at 12:47 PM