twiSted bLueS

[Doctor Rock]

And Chad, thanks for the story. 

[Sabamah]

wait...is it almost earth hour on the west coast? i forgot what time y'all said it was!

[Sabamah]

Talked to Jared for a bit.. He said some guy came in claiming to be the grifters' best friend.. I'd never heard of him..  Jared said he asked if the grifters still owned Shangri-la. He said we never did and the guy said "I'm pretty sure they did."  Jared said 'ok'.  Said his name was William Sides... Name wasn't familiar..

great story, I know.

there is a lot about this story that i love. especially the thought of a band like the grifters getting together and being like "hey, guys...let's open a fuckin' record store." that statement, in my brain, is followed by a montage of the grifters renovating an old ramshackle house on madison avenue- getting in paint fights, hauling in boxes that just have the word RECORDS on the side, hanging up the shangri-la sign, etc.

ILTS that my brain just made up.

[Moetown]

That was a good movie, Bams.



I know you don't know me
But why don't you blow me

[Doctor Rock]

To blow me is to know me. 

[Just Some Girl]

Talked to Jared for a bit.. He said some guy came in claiming to be the grifters' best friend.. I'd never heard of him..  Jared said he asked if the grifters still owned Shangri-la. He said we never did and the guy said "I'm pretty sure they did."  Jared said 'ok'.  Said his name was William Sides... Name wasn't familiar..

great story, I know.

there is a lot about this story that i love. especially the thought of a band like the grifters getting together and being like "hey, guys...let's open a fuckin' record store." that statement, in my brain, is followed by a montage of the grifters renovating an old ramshackle house on madison avenue- getting in paint fights, hauling in boxes that just have the word RECORDS on the side, hanging up the shangri-la sign, etc.

ILTS that my brain just made up.

That's a good brain, Savannah.

[Just Some Girl]

I regret to say we're not honoring Earth Hour here, albeit for practical reasons. M______ is in bed asleep (migraine, long day) and I am alone with Mama and Simon. Even if I could explain the symbolic gesture using my limited skills in Romanian and/or Hungarian (and frankly, I have absolutely no shot... I can use the dictionary for object names and occasional verbs but abstract ideas? no way!), I doubt I could convince a nervous old woman to make my 13 month old son spend his last hour before bed in the dark.

I get that. It's really just a symbolic gesture anyway, as noted. Hopefully when Simon's older though, it can be, as Eric says, a good starting point for discussion.

Ryan and his kid played Connect 4 by candlelight last night, and just talked -- partly about this, but partly about other stuff -- which I think is super-cool. Not a lot of parents have the kind of time to just rewind for an hour (and not a lot of almost 10-year-old boys wanna just sit and talk with their parents, either) and it's sweet to use that time to reconnect. Ryan says they did discuss the issue(s) and now T_____ thinks Earth Hour should be every weekend!

[Just Some Girl]

Other than Ryan, Pat and Dan (and maybe Savannah?), gawd, is there anyone on here who doesn't have a depression problem?

Oh, I've had "depression problems"!  And I still have some black days now and then.  But it's very hard to be depressed for long around a lively two year old that has me wrapped around her finger.  

You hide it well enough...

Yeah, I do admit I don't have enough distractions at the moment, and spend a lot of time sitting with my thoughts. It's hard to keep it at introspection level and not veer into break-down crying self-pity mode. (Not that I've ever been all that good at shutting off my brain -- especially the negative stuff -- even when I'm happy.) I have too much time to lie around staring at my ceiling.

Carrying around the kind of guilt I do doesn't help lighten the depression load at all... Meh, but whatttya gonna do, right?

[Bizarro]

Warning: vague philosophical rant about politics.

Do you feel like we've all gotten so cynical about politics, we're in a race to see who can find the best way to say the sky is falling?

You've got the folks who say the sky is falling hard-core apocalypse style, with evil conspiracies that will end life as we know it within five years unless they're stopped RIGHT AWAY. Then you've got the folks who present themselves as the voice of reason because of their more reasoned opinion that the sky is falling gradually, because of all of our middling little failings, and will come crashing down within a generation while the complacent sit idly by and watch.

I think the net effect of the former is hysteria and insane, short-sighted decision making. And the net effect of the latter is apathy and a lack of faith that any progress or change can ever be made. And the combined effect of the two is to make people unwilling to commit any energy at all to the day-to-day grind of incrementally improving our collective situation.

Maybe having a kid has just made me focus more on the long term, but it seems like we could all do to embrace a timeline that goes a little further than our own laps.

[matthew]

My therapist wanted me to go to AA. Ack. I am completely comfortable saying I have a drinking problem, but I'm not even considering dubbing myself an alcoholic yet. And I'm not even sure I believe in sobriety as an answer to anything. AA stinks of cult to me, and addressing your underlying issues so that you can go back to drinking in moderation seems much more reasonable.

Maybe I am kidding myself. I do not know.

Fuck A.A. I never wanted to drink as much as I did when I was forced to attend those pity parties. There really is nothing quite as dreadful as a collection of sober drunks.

It is most definitely a cult and even though the literature and script has been redacted to the exclusion of the G and C words, there is no mistaking the fact that you are in the midst of a Christian organization.You can watch a profanity-laden film that has been edited for prime time television but there is no stopping you mind from filling in the "bleeps".

However, the words are less important than the form and the form is positively Christian: admit that you are a sinnner/alcoholic, surrender yourself to a higher power/God, and then attend regular meetings/church to talk about how wonderful you now feel.

I was most resistant to the strictly enforced self-confession "and I am an alcoholic."  by all attendees, as it felt less like an empowering admission than a coerced and collective shaming/branding all of the participants into feeling utterly hopeless and dependent on the organization. They never made me say it (I did say once - and this was long before I ever saw the Prisoner - "Hi, my name is Matthew and I am a human being." to a moderate chuckle) and you won't see me attending meetings two or three times a week into my 80s. Those people have, in my opinion (and pardon the cliche), merely traded one addiction for another.

I was able to quit cold turkey despite achieving near chronic alcoholism levels (massive withdrawal leading to a anxiety disorder which still plagues me; stealing incredible amounts of money from them; pissing my bed two or three times a week, collapsing in public many, many times, often leading to arrest or hospitalization; serious injuries; many violent or near violent run-ins with the law and/or ambulance technicians; begging cashiers to let me buy alcohol past 11 PM; drinking my parents' vanilla in order to stave off the DTs; etc.) ...only because I realized I WANTED TO STOP.

Yes, "WANTED". Many people will appeal to necessity vs. need in arguments with addicts not realizing that most are fully conscious of their "need" (whether it be physical or psychic) to quit. These individuals fail to realize that this need is competing with another, greater need to continue drinking and drugging, and that the need to quit will only be addressed once the big need is defeated (hitting rock bottom) or abandoned (epiphany).

I quit when I held myself down while I was weak with withdrawal and admitted to myself that the daily impermanent suicide of drink was causing maximal suffering to myself and others and that I should either

a) find the guts to actually kill myself if that was my actual desire

or

b) just stop

"a)" actually involved a lot of gnashing my teeth and growling at myself with vicious taunts in a sort of violent self-intervention... I swear I managed to hurt my own feelings.

But I knew that I was right.

And I haven't drank a drop since I listened to me.

AA works for some people, but for many of them it ends in a lifetime membership (and I would have personally rather choked on my own vomit or frozen to death while passed out in a snowy field than have to spend another minute in one of those meetings) and so it is more akin to palliative care than a solution or "cure" (which, outside of death, does not exist). There is a reason AA has a worse track record than almost all forms of addiction therapy.

[matthew]

My therapist wanted me to go to AA. Ack. I am completely comfortable saying I have a drinking problem, but I'm not even considering dubbing myself an alcoholic yet. And I'm not even sure I believe in sobriety as an answer to anything. AA stinks of cult to me, and addressing your underlying issues so that you can go back to drinking in moderation seems much more reasonable.

Maybe I am kidding myself. I do not know.

I don't think so. I've had enough alcoholic relatives and friends to see the difference between really really really wanting a drink/to be fucked up, etc., and really really needing one.

I'm sure others here would say I'm justifying my own abuse with this distinction, but I can assure you, from seeing it countless times, that the distinction's very real. I don't wake up, ever, wondering where my next drink is coming from. I wouldn't step over my loved ones to get drinks. Having drinks doesn't interfere with my job.

Et cetera.

And I just fucking like it, ok (Dan)? Is that part of the AA cult's slippery slope scenario? Don't care.

The depression is a life-long issue that pre-dates being a drunk (willing to admit I have a problem with drinking too much or too often, but not that it runs my fucking life). Alcohol definitely exacerbates it (along with exacerbating my general apathy), though, and for that reason, it may be a stupid thing to do.

Yeah, what she said. I got so caught up in the AA part of the post that I didn't address you.

But then I have never seen you drink.

Maybe you do need God.

****

There was a guy on the metro last night who was trying to sell Sacred Heart of Jesus t-shirts to other passengers. From afar we thought that it was a Swastika and when he saw us discussing it he bounded down to our end of the car and spoke to us about Jesus and even Mel Gibson's movie. That was fun.

Incidentally: we were on our way to an SAQ to pick up some vodka for Becky.

[matthew]

I haven't had a drink since September 20, 2006.  And I was a bad drunk.  I could put down 2-3 1.75 liters of bourbon a week.  I had the shakes when I wasn't drinking, and it consumed a lot of my thinking.  I was able to work without it, didn't start until the workday was done.  I quit by checking into a five-day detox, complete with phenobarbital cocktails to keep me from seizing.  I then completed 30 days of outpatient care, including AA meetings every day.  I continued with AA for another 5-6 months before I just quit going, against the advice of my sponsor.  What's the point of all this?

A) AA is a cult; but not an evil one.  They are very insular and suggest you only have friends who are in recovery as well.  The main focus of their program is drunks relating to drunks; only another alcoholic can really understand where you're coming from.  And you have to accept a "higher power" of some sort to keep your ego in check.  None of this is really detrimental, especially if it keeps drunks sober; it's just not my cup of tea.  Their lessons in humility and letting go of resentments are good in practice, but these are changes you can bring about on your own.  AA works, for thousands of people all over the world, but at the end of the day, it just feels like more religion that I don't want in my life.

B) You can quit drinking anytime you want.  You just have to want it.  I hemmed and hawed and knew in my heart of hearts that something had to change.  For years, I knew the end was coming, I just needed some kind of catalyst to get my ass in gear and make some real changes in my life.  A very brief yet torrid affair with an old flame and her endless piles of cocaine served as my catalyst, finally.  The desire to drink was removed from me on the third day of my detox.  It hit me in the morning, after breakfast.  All of a sudden I just knew I would never have to drink again, and I reacted by breaking down and bawling.  It was like the cliched weight being taken off my shoulders.

C) I still deal with depression all the time.  I have real self-esteem issues, and am disappointed in some of the decisions I have made.  But its OK.  I also have good days when I feel on top of the world, and I remember what is really important.  My friends and family, my cats, and all the wonderful art, music and literature that bring me joy every day.

I miss Guinness more than anything, and I'd like to think that someday I'll be able to enjoy them again.  But, for now, I just remember how shitty it feels to have to drink, rather than just want to drink.  So I don't drink.  And it's OK.

See, I much prefer reading Chad's posts on this subject than writing my own.

Cheers!

[Bizarro]

{Chad's heartfelt story of recovering from alcohol abuse}

Cheers!

Heh.

[matthew]

<a href="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=10195465&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=01AAEA" target="_blank">http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=10195465&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=01AAEA</a>

<a href="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=10201202&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=01AAEA" target="_blank">http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=10201202&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=01AAEA</a>

They are playing Brooklyn in a couple of days...anyone able to go, should.

Do it for me.

I want to see them live as much as I do the Simple Ones.

[Bizarro]

RIP, Charlie Wicks, creator of The Rat