Joy Joy Joi

Quitting drinking is very very good. Rah, rah, rah! Joining AA is even better. Remember you have the monolithic Japanese business culture to combat if you decide to stop -- and that's a helluva drinking culture.

Here are some sobering words, Joi. The older I get, the more I see alcohol totally screwing people up. Really smart people. Really nice people. Really creative people. It wrecks them little by little by little. And they put themselves out of business, out of commission, out of a job, out of a friendship, out of a relationship, out on the street.

It's never cool. It's never funny. It's pathetic.

It seems cool at 20. It's workable at 30. It's tricky at 40. It's a disaster most likely by 50. I see it happen every day. I see someone really talented who should have gotten a certain job but they put themselves out of the running because of drinking and someone probably a lot less talented, but sober, gets the job or opportunity or award.

I don't drink very much, I don't like it. I'm very lucky it's not a tempation for me. It's really a serious disease for many people.

Here's how it works with me and why I hate it. If I stay up late for a fancy dinner and get drunk, I get fat from eating too late. I eat too much because I'm drunk. I'm too tired to exercise early in the morning because I'm hung over. I can barely drag my butt out of bed and I lose the whole next day and maybe the day after for exercising. If I stop exercising I feel really lousy and want to feel better so ... you guessed it, I might eat too much and drink. It's a spiral -- DOWNWARD -- instead of the other direction.

If I don't drink, I get up early, I exercise, I feel good, I feed myself carefully that day, I feel better so I don't drink, and since I don't drink, I feel even better, end of the day, I'm tired early because I got up early and since I worked out I sleep like a log.

I'm happy to quit drinking in sympathy with you Joi and you call/email/IRC/IM me any time and I'll teach you how to make my 1/3 cranberry juice, 1/3 orange juice, 1/3 sparling water trompe l'oeil planters punch.