For the Love of Pre-Game

With nightlife, the pre-game's as important as the game -- how are you supposed to play your best without first engaging in appropriate early evening festivities, and plenty of quadriceps stretching? Let Thrillist and Smirnoff help you set the tone with these pre-game picks. Obviously, the most important elements are the drinks, and Smirnoff will provide a smoothly feisty foundation for anything from the classic martini to the Moscow Mule -- the concoction that kicked off the vodka craze in 1940s Hollywood, leading to the cliché, "Don't Bogart that Mule...Bogart". To provide a suitable environment for the first cocktail of the night, make sure your pad's also equipped with: Munktiki's: Enhance your ice-cold imbibing with these out-of-control ceramic tiki mugs, formed on a potter's wheel, meticulously carved, and cast in plaster into which liquid clay's poured, to be hardened, glazed, and fired twice at 2000+ degrees -- which, counterintuitively, isn't as hot as 98 Degrees. The CaliBowl: While your martini glass might not be spill-proof, this "insane product that's revolutionized the bowl" certainly is, with a rim sporting a lip that'll push food back onto chips, utensils, fingers, or, if you're feeling naughty, other peoples' fingers. Awdio: Time the muddling of your Caipiroska to the "ush, ush" of the first-ever network of 100%, 24/7 real-time music sets, bringing the beats from 100+ cherry-picked international clubs right to your crib, from Paris's Hotel Costes, to London's Bar Vinyl, to party hubs in Melbourne, Sao Paolo, Hong Kong, and Istanbul, where the bass thumps too loud to talk Turkey. Grab this stuff up, then hit there.Smirnoff.com for drink recipes, free music downloads, and a primer on turning an abandoned gas station into a nightclub -- and whether it's your apartment, or a truck stop, if you want to impress the women, the first tone-setting step is to hide the old beef jerky.