Most writers become successful before turning to drink, but Augusten Burroughs did it the other way round. The author of acclaimed childhood memoir Running with Scissors, and the story of his own near-fatal alcoholism and rehabilitation Dry is in town to read from his new book, Possible Side Effects tonight at Powell’s from 7.30 pm.

Since Running with Scissors is now being made made into a movie starring his holiness Alec Baldwin (pronounced round these parts with awe and wonder, in Kim Jong-Il/Team America voice “A-rec Bald-rin”), Burroughs’ ego must be about fit to burst!

Unpaid intern caught up with him today and you can read about Burroughs’ best hangover cure after the page break…

Unpaid Intern felt like he had stepped out of one Augusten Burroughs' memoirs this morning, having "enjoyed� last night's Evening with Dan Savage a little too much. Since Burroughs writes in Dry about sobering up for work in the advertising industry after consuming three packs of cigarettes and two bottles of whisky on an average week night, it seemed a good idea to start by asking him the best way to cure a hangover.

"Take lots of vitamin B before you drink, and something to control the swelling like an Advil. Also a fatty breakfast to soak up the alcohol, or to appear to soak it up. But the best cure for a hangover is a Bloody Mary,� he admits.

Apart from looking like a man who's been through a lot - being given away to his family's psychiatrist at thirteen was just the beginning, Burroughs himself looks to be a little wired. Turns out it isn't from drinking since he stopped years ago, but from lasting damage he did to his startle reflexes as a result. You get the feeling if somebody popped a balloon nearby, he would jump out of his chair, and while talking he pulls a packet of nicotine gum from his pocket and chews. He does this twice during our twenty minutes and admits to losing count of how many pieces he gets through on an average day.

Since his early twenties in New York, Burroughs claims to have calmed down "a lot�, and now spends much of his time at home in Massachusetts with partner Dennis. Judge for yourself, but Unpaid Intern wonders if this calming down might be a drawback for Possible Side Effects, which amounts to 26 mini-memoirs taken from different points in the author's life. Now Burroughs' life is less sensational, it's not nearly as much fun to read about. Who cares if he bought a dog or has a big refrigerator?

While Running With Scissors is being made into a movie for release in the fall starring Annette Benning, Gwyneth Paltrow and Alec Baldwin, one doubts the new book has such potential. For example, it features stories about Burroughs going to London and staying in his hotel room for a week, and, yawn, excuse me, another about chipping a tooth on holiday – this stuff just is not in the same league as his embarking on an affair at 13 with a pedophile, featured in the film.

Burroughs admits his life is running out of good material as he becomes happier, but it's okay, he wanted to get his memoirs out of the way before turning to fiction. For a man who seems to have lived the writers' life in reverse, this seems an apt way to go about things. He doesn't plan on having any more disasters in real life to write about.

"If you look at the writers who really drank, like Hemingway, it didn't end well. I mean, he shot himself. I was determined not to let my childhood rule my life or to let the booze take writing away from me. That's what alcohol did - it replaced my writing,� he says.

"If I started drinking again now, I don't think it would take long for me to slide downhill. Writing is addictive, but it's different from drinking. It's the way that I process the world. While drinking is like scratching an itch, I can get to a point with writing where I feel like something has happened, that I've made sense of the world around me and I can move on and look at the next thing. With drinking that itch never really leaves you.�

In other words for Burroughs, writing seems to have evolved into something most of us do when we experience a dose of REM sleep. While Unpaid Intern is not totally convinced by his latest book, the overwhelming neurotic energy of Burroughs when you meet him in person, a kind of athletic, intellectual Keith Richards, makes him endearing and is good enough reason to head down to Burnside to this evening. After a stiff drink, of course.