Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Last Week I Had an Epiphany

Last week I had an epiphany.  Not all on my own, mind you, there may have been some outside sources influencing my decision, but it was a good decision.

I was not going to drink during the week.

Now, for those of you who aren't familiar with the situation, I tend to drink a bit pretty much every day.  I say a "bit" because, just like with my homemade cigarettes that cost me $1.00 a pack to make, I don't keep track of how much I smoke or how many $.44 beers I consume.  If I drink ten it costs me $4.40, if I drink 20 it costs me $8.80.  $10 a day for beer won't break my budget.  You might make a case that while $10 is nominal, consuming 20 beers is not.  Point taken.

On Friday, October 12th, I decided I wasn't going to go to the store and buy the usual 8-10 30-packs of beer like I would normally on a pay day.  Instead, I counted the beers in the fridge (40 plus) and made up my mind that that was all I was going to have for the weekend.  After that, no more until the next weekend.

I stayed up till 4:00 am on Sunday finishing off the last of the beer.  I knew the Green Bay Packers were playing on Sunday Night Football and I didn't want any beers lying around to tempt me during the game.  This worked out pretty well as after staying up that late I didn't really even feel like drinking any more that weekend.

Then came the week days.

Surprisingly I wasn't hankering for a beer like I thought I might be.  In retrospect, no one really "hankers" for a Milwaukee's Best Light, but more for the after effects.  I picked up some decaf coffee which satisfied my oral fixation.  Drinking two pots of regular coffee at work and another two cups of decaf at home didn't do wonders for my teeth, but I'm still working on other alternatives.  I felt relatively normal from 5:30 till I went to bed at 10:30.

The dreams I had got to me, though.  In one, I was forced into a fight club in which there were five teams of ten, one team which was the "home" team who basically killed the other four teams.  Not just beat up the weaker teams, but killed them.  I did a lot of running in that dream.  Another was a cross country ski competition with people I went to high school with, except there wasn't any snow, just dry city streets that we were racing on.  Thursday night was the first night I couldn't vividly remember what I had dreamed about.

My work days, while not as odd as my nights, had their own character to them.  Strangely, I still felt somewhat out of it in the mornings, almost like I had been drinking the night before.  Knowing full well that I hadn't, I came to the conclusion that my body was letting me know that there was something missing, like I had a negative value for a blood/alcohol content.  I found myself saying stuff doing stuff and afterwards thinking that the ship was listing to the opposite side that it used to.  But once again, by Friday this seemed to even out and everything seemed to be floating properly.

Even with all this going on, I thought it would be worse than it actually was.  I'm not saying this like I conquered any alcohol related problems that I might have, but for five days I did.  That was my goal, five days.

On Friday I picked up a 30-pack and had it like usual.  On Saturday, after mowing the lawn and changing the oil in the Jeep I went out and bought another 30-pack with my eye on the noon Packer game.  I knew I'd still be a bit fragile and didn't want to run out during the game, so the second 30-pack just gave me a little security, a blanky if you will.  The game ended at 3:00 and the Roommate and I went out to eat.  Upon our return I drank again from 4:00-6:00 and made myself a pot of the decaf coffee.  Those should be my last beers until Friday at 5:30.  While I still have a few left from the second 30-pack, I don't feel any temptation to open one.  The thing is, I don't think I'd be able to open just one.

It's kind of nice to have a new challenge in my life and a rather big challenge at that.  On the plus side, I've saved $100 and in one week alone I cut down my caloric intake by 10,000 calories.  We'll see how this goes.  I'm sure consuming 40-60 beers over the course of a weekend isn't ideal, but not drinking during the week is a step in the right direction.

2 comments:

joo said...

When did the Renter become the Roommate?

B to the... said...

When I gave up on trying to be the man of my house.