7.19.2018

19: chain of addiction...

full disclosure: i may be sipping an iced coffee while i write this. it seemed like the right thing to do, especially given today's subject...


which you can read for yourself... once that cat gets out of the way.


as i mentioned a while back, my favorite animator is trying to get me (re)addicted to caffeine. this is an interesting suggestion coming from him, whose idea of a hot beverage is hot chocolate or chamomile, or his latest obsession... Bengal Spice tea.

meanwhile, i go through at least three large mugs (which is like half a dozen normal-sized mugs) of extra-strong black tea on the average day. if i want something a bit milder, i might have a chai, or i go to my patented fruit-tea concoction (which involves cranberry juice, fresh lemons, and a copyrighted combo of sweet spices).  can you copyright a spice combo? too bad... i just did.

once (or, occasionally, twice) a week, i get the craving for an old friend, which is when i pull out the French press and the emergency bag of ground coffee i keep in the freezer. at least, that is how it used to be, before the (re)addiction.

it should be noted that i grew up in a household where "coffee" meant a plastic jar of freeze-dried crystals that (supposedly) came to life in the presence of hot water. tasting it was always an unpleasant experience. as a result, i never developed a liking for the thing, and i came to think of coffee as a 'last resort' when you were in desperate need of chasing away sleep.

this association stayed with me through my college years, and it was not until i returned to civilian life, where all-nighters were for entertainment purposes only, that i began to actually consider the taste of things that were presented to me under the guise of a cup of coffee.

i discovered that i actually liked the thing. once you move past the freeze-dried crystals and the overheated coffee pots that only serve to intensify the off-putting burnt/bitter tastes, you are left with something that could be accurately described as the perfume of the food world.

and, just like that, i became a lover of coffee... although i did draw the line at coffee beans that had been "reclaimed" from the excrement of rain-forest creatures. sorry, but there really is no reason for that... ever.

so, there i was, inside my appreciation for a good, strong cup of coffee, when disaster struck. grad school. by the end of the first semester, i was up to half-a-dozen (or more) large cups per day, and—worst of all—i really did not care from whence it came.

the worst part was that i did not need the coffee to stay awake at night (my insomnia handled that part of things), but it was necessary to stay focused during the days on end spent scanning and analyzing tiny slivers of brain tissue in a space with no windows and little-to-no contact with other human beings. i needed the caffeine to stay awake in the middle of the day.

i do not recall the exact moment when it dawned on me that my caffeine addiction was out of control, but i made a firm decision to make the necessary change. it should be noted that i do not quit things like normal, sane human beings. that approach only ever leads to me giving up on the quitting effort... sometimes after only a matter of minutes.

the only method that works for me is to gradually replace the undesired behavior with a slightly-lesser-evil thing... then rinse-and-repeat until "evil" is no longer a necessary part of the description. it is an approach i like to refer to as a chain of addiction.

me: that'd make a good topic for a blog post.
him: "Chain of Addiction" sounds like a good name for a 90's tribute band. they'd do like one song of "Alice in Chains", then one song of "Jane's Addiction", then  one song of "Alice in Chains", then one song of "Jane's Addiction"....

he may have gone back and forth like that for a bit, while i sat there shaking my head in pity (for him, naturally).

my coffee de-addiction six-step program proceeded as follows:
  1. eliminate the sugar and creamer, in hopes of being turned off by the burnt, bitter taste of the contents of the lab coffee pot. sadly, i realized that i was totally okay with drinking crappy, black coffee. 
  2. realizing that the ultimate reason for drinking all of the coffee was to get the caffeine to stay alert, it seemed to make sense to switch to drinking Coke. this proved dangerous as there was a soda machine a short walk down the hall... which gave instant rise to a Coca Cola addiction. 
  3. i eventually started to worry about all the sugar in the cola, so i attempted to switch to Diet Coke... which never stops tasting like you just licked a rusty battery, so that was not going to work. (un)luckily, i discovered that i really like the taste of Coke Zero... which became the only thing i drank for the greater part of a year. 
  4. it was around this time that i started experiencing some severe heartburn-related issues [i was also under an enormous amount of stress at the time, which did not help the situation], so i decided to cut out the cola and replace it with low-acid fruit juices. that suggestion came from my doctor in the form of a stern command. problem was, i missed the bubbles, so i began mixing my fruit juice with equal parts unflavored seltzer (for the fizz).
  5. i kept increasing the proportion of seltzer in my mixture, until there was barely a trace of fruit flavor left, which is when i ditched the juice and went to straight-seltzer.
  6. it seemed absurd to be spending money for fizzy water, so i started mixing the seltzer with equal parts regular (tap) water, until i no longer required the fizz.
and that is where i remain today. i have a cup of coffee when i am in a mood for coffee... as opposed to drinking it constantly as a means to survive. as for Coke, i can probably count on one hand the number of colas i drink during the average year. plus, i am more or a ginger ale girl these days.

then there is the lingering effect of step-four. should you open my refrigerator and find a juice carton with an "N" on the cap, that is a warning that i claim it as my own because the contents have been mixed with roughly equal parts water. oh, and i still consume many bottles of seltzer, especially during the Summer months, so maybe i am back-sliding just a bit.

but... i kicked my coffee addiction, and that was the point of the whole thing. and it has stuck all these years later. the chain of addiction definitely works. well, it did... until they turned me on to Turkish coffee. 

i should add as a postscript, that trying to do anything at all seems to instantly summon all the small animals in the vicinity. i placed my iced coffee, bottle of seltzer, and mini bouquet on the ground, and as i was fumbling for the piece of paper in my pocket, Baby Bear showed up. i did not even realize that she was out there, probably napping behind a tomato pot.


i get the paper unfolded, and place it among the other items, and here comes the Little One. apparently she was lurking out there too.


then she refused to leave. hey, you... you are in my shot!


luckily Mama Kitty shares my intense lack of enthusiasm about everything, or she would have gotten in the way too. this is probably why sane people have goldfish as pets.

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