There’s a certain process that everyone goes through on a night they decide to ditch their Netflix and frozen dinner binges and head out to a club with their friends. It lets you blow off some steam, dance, and just have generally good time. There’s a lot of work pre-club, and just the same (or more) once you’re there to keep things fun and slutty. From getting dressed, pregaming with your girls, what you do at the club (including bathroom breaks), to heading home, we are laying out the most likely chain of events for your night out so that you can prepare yourself (and maybe lay out the aspirin).

Go on. Add aspirin to your dash buttons now.

1. Getting Ready

The first thing you do when preparing for a night out, is hop in the shower. Shower activities include jamming out to that awesome “Party Pump-up” Playlist you created on Spotify, shaving your legs for the first time all week, and using the good smelling body wash (it was expensive- so you save it for special occasions!).

This shaving cream smells amazing.

Next you’ll need to plan your outfit. You’ve been perusing Pinterest and found an outfit that looked super cute, but realize you have nothing even remotely close to it in your own closet. So you give up and resort to your trusty LBD or sequin skirt that makes you feel like a disco ball (drunk you may even believe you are one).

After watching three hours of YouTube videos, you believe that you are a makeup artist and can do a sexy, smoldering cat eye. But you can’t seem to get the lines even on both sides, and your thin cat eye liner becomes thick and is more reminiscent of your punk phase in high school. But whatevs, that’s in style, so you go with it. They rocked bold eyes on the runway, you can rock it at the club. Bonus- dark eyes look great with neutral lips, so you don’t have to worry about messing up your lipstick when you’re making out on the dance floor.

When it comes to hair, again, you’ll have a Pinterest-inspired vision and spend three hours curling, teasing, and spraying your hair. But make sure to bring a hair tie because when you finally get the club you get too hot so you sweep it up into a pony tail or messy bun.

You meet up with your girls before the night out and all agree to take two four shots before you grab a taxi and head out.

Your friends will love these hilarious penis-shaped shot syringes.

2. At the Club

First things first, you have to walk around to get a sense of the atmosphere, and to spy any cuties that you could just happen to end up dancing next to (“Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to accidentally bump into you while I was here dancing…”)

Second, you make a beeline to the bar when you realize everyone here is much more intoxicated than you. You order a fancy martini or a Manhattan, but then remember these drinks are expensive and want to create an inverse correlation between the amount of alcohol you get and the amount of money you spend, so you head back to your favorites: the Long Island Iced Tea or Vodka-Cran.

Now that you think you’ve been on (and won) Dancing with the Stars, you approach that cutie from earlier and ask them to dance. You two will grind the night away, laughing and participating in some classic DFMOs, when your friends grab you and the party heads to the bathroom.

Your herd has moved into the tiny ladies room, where one girl goes to the bathroom, and the rest of you inspect your hair, makeup, and make sure your dress is still in the right place. You realize your smoky eyes have smudged a bit due to the heat, but it still looks great so who cares. So you all head back to the dance floor and repeat this cycle for the rest of the night.

3. Getting Home

Finally, it comes time to leave, and things can go one of two ways: You will either head home with your friends, or with that Hottie (they graduated from a cutie as the night went on). There is one main difference if you go home with the hottie: you could choose to show this person your inner sex goddess. But if you go home with your friends, you won’t have to stress over the stride of pride the next morning.

Either way, you will eventually need to get home in the morning. The question is whether that morning is 3am or 8am, and whether you still will be wearing those killer heels that are now killing your feet. When you do get home, make sure to wash your face in case you didn’t do a super job last night. You should be able to piece together your night by looking at receipts and stamps on your hand to figure where you went and what you spent. It might be better to do this together before you look at your bank account, to help soften the blow.

Finally, consider the night a success if you haven’t overdrawn your bank account, you have your phone, wallet, and keys, and nothing is broken.