I used to think that my life would be perfect, at least insofar as partying was concerned, if no one could remember anything that I couldn’t. Last weekend, though, I faced the cruel reality that physical consequences may remain even if memories never formed.

It was Sunday mid-afternoon when I first surveyed the wreckage.

Jeans around ankles. Unidentified puddle on kitchen floor. Soundtrack to “Hairspray” playing at full volume.

Temples throbbing and stomach rumbling, I sifted through my amygdala for traces of what exactly I’d done the previous night. What I successfully pieced together was that the night involved a funnel, a gerbil and a foam Stanford No. 1 hand with index finger extended, appearing in roughly that order.

For further guidance, I looked to my cell phone call log/Facebook message inbox, which is usually the low point of my post-blackout dawns. The questions that confronted me were pressing: Why did I call my auntie in San Jose at 2 a.m.? What the heck did we talk about for two minutes and 17 seconds? Why have three people on Facebook, two of whom I don’t recognize and one of whom is an Australian high-schooler, requested that I acknowledge that we are in a relationship? And did I really use the SuperPoke application to “Superman” my girlfriend’s best friend, toward whom I harbor untoward sentiments?

Hoping to distract myself, and praying that my shame had reached its peak, I got down on my knees to tackle the aforementioned amorphous puddle. It was then that I noticed an unmistakable sharp discomfort, dare I say burning, in my lower abdomen (Read: lower abdomen). I tentatively turned around and shook it all about, only to have my earlier suspicions confirmed. Apollo, we have a problem.

Disclaimer: the rest of this column contains off-color, explicit and largely (if not entirely) inaccurate material, so “Caveat Lector.”

As is custom whenever I suspect that I have a STD, I curled up in the fetal position and cried for a couple of hours. After that failed to heal what ailed me, I called Dr. Mom, who, as a pediatrician in Uniontown, Penn. — one of the nation’s leaders in teen pregnancies — thankfully has copious experience in diagnosing and treating copulaic illnesses.

“Mom!” I wailed, “I Superpoked someone yesterday on Facebook and didn’t use protection!”

Since my mom wasn’t exactly in the know when it came to Facebook terminology (more of a LinkedIn woman herself), I had to explain to her what I meant. She then explained to me that, in her professional opinion, the transmission of STDs via Facebook was impossible.

“Could happen if you were LinkedIn though!” she quipped. “Get it, Vishnu kutti? LinkedIn, like, to her, or him if that’s your thing. Not funny? I guess you’re not in the mood for joking.”

With Superpoking gone as a potential explanation, we were left with an even more disturbing conclusion: something I had done that I didn’t remember had left me with a nagging pain in my urethra. After explaining my symptoms to my mom, she had quite a surprising diagnosis: penile candidiasis.

What is penile candidiasis you ask? Simply put, it is a male yeast infection. You probably thought that men could not get yeast in their vaginas. Well, I promise you, we can. (FYI: Although most men who have this fungus are asymptomatic, if a man has a yeast infection he can transmit it to his partner and vice versa, so it is best that both partners refrain from sexual activity until they are fully healed.)

As I learned as a young, impressionable sprout, knowing is half the battle. In my war against the thrush, however, I’m realizing that the other half, action, is just as important: Monistat 7. Even though I still haven’t determined the launching point of the Candida invasion, I must accept the consequences of leaving myself exposed to attack. Luckily, with miconazole nitrate at my side night and day (for seven days), we will surely triumph.

I just hope that our post-victory celebration will be tamer than the one last Saturday night (and hopefully I can get the Australian high-schooler to come, too).