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40 Days Without Booze

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Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#111

Post by jasondemeuse »

munificent wrote: post #78
smsm42 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not "like a drug", it is a drug just like any other substances commonly called drugs. We just integrated it into our culture, and learned to live with it and accept the consequences of its use (on the societal level, personally it is still as capable of destroying lives as any other drug if abused). But it doesn't change neither chemistry nor biology nor physiology of what is happening. So if someone talks to y…

> if someone talks to you about dangers of such things as marijuana while sipping wine or beer - you're talking to either dangerously ignorant or dangerously dull person. Or maybe you're talking to someone smart enough to realize that just because a bunch of things are in the same category , that doesn't make them equivalent .

You're totally right, I would hope that many people would be as smart as that person and understand how much more dangerous alcohol can be than marijuana or many other drugs.

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#112

Post by wavesounds »

plg wrote: post #67

I know a lot of people who are similarly dependent upon (if not outright addicted to) exercise. Typically running although I've seen it with cycling and swimming as well. For these people if they don't get their exercise on schedule, they go absolutely nuts. There are many benefits to exercise but for many there are also big big risks, e.g. joint problems, soft tissue injuries, etc.

I used to be a pack-a-day smoker now I'm a runner/cyclist and you're exactly right if I've been sitting all day and I don't get exercise by the time it gets dark I start going nuts. That being said I'm pretty confident my body was designed to run and not to inhale burning plant matter or drink excessive amounts of fermented grain. So far I feel much better and I don't have any of those problems.

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#113

Post by moutarde »

ctdonath wrote: post #27
tomjen3 wrote: post #3

(I am reading this after two glasses of wine). Am I alone in thinking that he sounds like an addict? I mean, sure he didn't have a big issue sticking to his decision, but at the same time the list of changes is pretty significant.

Was thinking that too. For all the verbiage, there was only a vague " I had only been averaging a couple drinks a day " way down the article as an indication of what the abstained-from baseline was. Averaging two? The "couple" numeric implies room for large values of 2, and "averaging" easily includes two days of nothing followed by 6 in short order. This brings back the crux of those who argue such subjects: some pe…

> Their average may be comparable, but frequency * intensity produce wildly differing results.

I think this is largely an academic discussion. Some people drink a glass a wine every day, some people binge drink once/two times a week. If you consider alcoholism to be the point at which you can't withdraw without death resulting then both groups will pass. If you consider regular alcohol consumption as a potential psychiatric problem then both groups are suspect. But both groups still have:

A) People who just drink socially/for fun.

B) People who are alcohol dependant (in terms of a psychological crutch).

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#114

Post by cityzen »

I quit drinking six years ago cold turkey. Working for myself it was always easy to find a time/reason to have a drink and I realized it wasn't heading down a good path. My wife and I were also looking to have kids and I decided I didn't want to drink around them. For awhile people either didn't understand it or were amazed that I just quit (I love to party, still do!).

My best friend kept nagging me about having a few beers with him when I visited. Since we both smoked for a short time in high school I suggested that we, instead, buy a pack of cigarettes and smoke a few while we're hanging out. "But I don't smoke anymore." Lightbulb moment.

The biggest thing i realized is that drinking is something to do. You hang out with the same people at the same bars talking about the same crap. Initially it's pretty boring when you quit but I really don't even think about it anymore. I will say that in the time since I quit drinking I had two kids, my business has seen year over year success and I've completed an Ironman triathlon.

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#115

Post by [deleted] »

reustle wrote: post #11

Great writeup. As someone who never drinks, and never has, it continues to sound like a drug to me and I want no part of it. That said, I still get questioned about my decision like I have 2 heads.

[deleted]

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#116

Post by justinator »

plg wrote: post #67

I know a lot of people who are similarly dependent upon (if not outright addicted to) exercise. Typically running although I've seen it with cycling and swimming as well. For these people if they don't get their exercise on schedule, they go absolutely nuts. There are many benefits to exercise but for many there are also big big risks, e.g. joint problems, soft tissue injuries, etc.

If you think about it, we're all dependent on exercise: if we don't do it, we'll become weak, and become prone to all sorts of maladies. I don't suggest cutting it out, completely.

We're also all dependent on eating. Too much is a bad thing for a lot of different activities (sex, basket weaving, etc), be them addictive substances or not.

"Everything in moderation", is a good starting point.

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#117

Post by VLM »

munificent wrote: post #87
VLM wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"doing things that our body is not meant to do normally." The reason it doesn't outright kill you is an enormous amount of evolution to occasionally consume "somewhat overripe fruit". That doesn't mean you're evolved to chug grain alcohol like water, or get drunk every night like the goof in the article, it just means your body is quite very well used to handling a bit of fermented grapes once in awhile. Hacking one'…

> get drunk every night like the goof in the article The author didn't say he gets drunk every night, he said he drinks every night. I have a beer or a glass of wine with dinner most nights. I get drunk (i.e. have more than one drink, feel drunk, feel worse the next morning) with a much lower frequency.

Then I missed the point of the author's amazing experiment. If he's not "feeling it" buzzed or whatever, what is the point of all that expensive drinking he's doing and why all the health changes once he stopped drinking? Author is having a lot more than a glass or two, to get that kind of long term habit and those effects, I think.

I also have a glass of wine that goes with some meals, but I don't cook "chicken in wine" every single day. Wine doesn't go well with everything. When I'm eating something unhealthy like pizza, well, you gotta have beer with pizza, but I don't eat bad food every day, so... Or even stuff in between good and bad, I had saki and sushi last weekend, close enough to natural human food to not bother me occasionally, but not eating/drinking that every day.

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#118

Post by nmcfarl »

jsolson wrote: post #81
nmcfarl wrote: post #4

My wife is pregnant and as a show of solidarity I’m not drinking around her (which cuts out the majority of my drinking). Which is not quite this experiment, but has shown me one thing where his and my experiences differ: Socializing. As it turns out I socialize a lot in bars - and I don’t like bars at all when not drinking. Mocktails° help - but not enough, and basically no bars serve those in Seattle, only fancy re…

> and basically no bars serve those in Seattle, only fancy restaurants. I suppose this depends on what you mean by "bar". I've got some friends who are mostly abstainers, and they've had some delicious mocktails at Vito's, Tavern Law, and Rumba. I treat all of those as more bar than restaurant (I don't know that Seattle has turned me into more of a booze hound, but it's certainly made my booze habit more expensive),…

I treat Vito’s as a restaurant (a very, very lounge-y one) - this is pretty much a personal choice, as I like their kitchen (and their mocktails). I should check Rumba’s mocktail selection.

And I don’t find other cities more mocktail friendly - Seattle’s pretty impressively good at it - in the restaurant scene. And perhaps I should just be spending more time talking with the bartenders at the bars :)

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#119

Post by aet »

cityzen wrote: post #114

I quit drinking six years ago cold turkey. Working for myself it was always easy to find a time/reason to have a drink and I realized it wasn't heading down a good path. My wife and I were also looking to have kids and I decided I didn't want to drink around them. For awhile people either didn't understand it or were amazed that I just quit (I love to party, still do!). My best friend kept nagging me about having a f…

Nice job!

Re: 40 Days Without Booze

#120

Post by justinator »

These sorts of stories hit me hard - not that I have my own, "I quit for x number of days", but rather, I don't think there was 40 days total in the last year that I had a drink. It would take a few years to get that number.

I guess I just never developed the taste. Hard to understand the other side of the ritual.

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