It twas the night before Christmas...

It twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, nobody was drunk not even me!
Got up at 5am today to do the Christmas shop. Spent an absolute fortune on food and drink. I bought myself a bottle of non-alcoholic red. Ive drank 2 bottles of that now. Its not something I could get used to long term but it is nice during the holidays.
My wife and I have spent the day cooking turkey (I cleaned up, my wife cooked), and preparing food ready for tomorrows family dinner. There will be seven of us for dinner itself with lots more calling in. Ive got a spare 30 minutes in the house by myself tonight while my wife is at a 'christingle' service at the church with my mum in law so I thought I'd update the blog. Every Christmas eve we have a tradition of watching a Christmas movie in the bath while drinking pink champagne. Obviously thats out of the question this year but we didnt want to break tradition so we bought non-alcoholic sparkling while and while my wife was out I added red food colouring (clever eh!?!), ran the bath and loaded its a wonderful life on the laptop...the tradition lives on!!
As ive said previously Christmas has never been big on my drinking agenda but its funny how many people are over reacting to Christmas and my not drinking. Someone at work asked if I'd be giving up giving up over christmas,and Ive lost count of the number of guests who've assumed they shouldn’t/couldn’t drink on Christmas day just because we're not.

[Christmas movie has now been cancelled....I was just interrupted by my wife coming back and we went to deliver a turkey sandwich to my father in law and his wife, who are coming tomorrow for dinner but wanted an early sample. We've got too much to do now so it been decided...bath, fake wine, tv specials on tv while peeling veg and decorating cake number 3]

I wish everyone a safe and merry Christmas and I'll update again before new year!!

My first glass of (non-alcoholic) red wine after 4 months!!

I went out into the cold last night to get a bottle of this wine from Asda. I was pretty excited and I was convinced that when I got there, there wouldn't be any left...however happily I was wrong!. It wasn't with the wine, it was with the beer (perhaps they would sell more if it was!). They had a little section of low (8%) and non (less than 0.5%) alcoholic wines. Theres plenty of white wines out there but this is the first red I've seen that wasn't on the net (and therefore you can buy by the bottle not the case).

When I got home I cracked it open and was really surprised to find it smelt exactly like red wine...my wife will confirm this after she gagged when I asked her to smell it (she hates red wine after one too many (bottles) a few years ago).

Now, before I go on, understand I have a cold (well its really man flu but we'll not go into that) so my smell and taste could be impaired. The taste was like a weak Merlot but I was still more than pleased with it after 4 months of missing my favorite tipple. I think I'll be buying up a case of this for over Christmas!

When I bought this I did think of a friend of mine who said they would give up drinking but they liked the taste of red wine (that must be why they buy bottles for under £5). I'll be giving them a bottle of this for Christmas so they dont have to drink anymore ;-)

So it looks like I'm stocked up for Christmas and I'm quite looking forward to it. Plus people wont keep asking why im not drinking as they'll never know my nice little red is alcohol free...until I jump in the car!

One thing that I did find strange...I got a 'beer flush' from it! Now this was either psychologically induced or its something in the grapes rather than the alcohol that gave my cheeks that rosy glow! oh well, at least red cheeks are festive!

How come nobody told me????????

They sell Sutter Home Fre Merlot (Alcohol free red wine...well its 0.3% but anything under 0.5% doesnt count...that was a rule we put in early!) in Asda and Tesco!!! Im off there tonight to do a shop and I'll pick some up! I only knew about online shops, which is fine if you want a case but if you dont know if you'll like it whats the point! Movie and a glass of wine! nice!!

The World Wide Web and Alcohol

I actually got a lunch break today! It happens about every 6 weeks or so. I decided to see what I could do with the blog. I added a stats counter (although I think its broken as its stuck at 1 and I got other people to visit the blog and it didnt go up), and I also added a link to the blog to various forums on google.
While surfing the web it seems that giving up drinking is quite popular! Who knew?! I found this article very funny. Its about a womans attempt at quitting drinking for 30 days:

Part 1
http://www.handbag.com/diet-and-wellbeing/drinking-alcohol-give-up-drinking-health/v1
Part 2
http://www.handbag.com/diet-and-wellbeing/Health-diet-giving-up-alcohol/v1

Its actually surprising how many people my age (nearly 30) are trying to give up the booze (I think as a long term strategy to cutting back rather than abstaining for life). I think its a quarter life crisis (at least if they do cut back it might really be just a quarter!).
The more I think about alcohol the more I really dont want to binge drink when this is over. I know once I've started again I'll start to forget some of the lessons learned so perhaps this blog is a good idea...Its a reminder to me that when my head was alcohol free for over 4 months I thought getting drunk was pretty pathetic and stopped me doing loads of things which I would otherwise have done.
What I like about reading peoples articles online about them quitting drinking for 30 days is that its pretty much the same old story...there not "alcoholics" but they really cant just give up. Im not sure what this says about these people, but I really dont think they're any different to me or the average person who drinks, and thats what makes me wonder...what makes an alcoholic? I suppose its someone who is dependant on alcohol...but doesn't that make anyone who even thinks twice, or gets tempted to have a beer when giving up for 30 days an alcoholic? If so I think pretty much every person I know who drinks is one!!

A week of saying NO!

Its been a funny week for the old 'I'm not drinking for a year' thing'. It started when my wife pointed out that we cant have our annual tradition of pink champagne on Christmas Eve. She said we should have written it into the rules but we didnt so I guess we'll have to start that again next Christmas!
As you'd expect people are starting to ask us to Christmasy things which involve booze (for them!). We're off to the pub this week for our annual Christmas get together with our friends. It should be good and as we have no plans we might even stay until the end!
We went to a 21st birthday party for one of our neighbours briefly before going elsewhere...there was more booze at that party than in Threshers the week before Christmas!! Still I was impressed at the lack of non drunk looking kids (im 8 years older so I can call them kids!)
My mate from the RAF called last night. Asked if I wanted to do something when he was back...our friendship is built around getting very drunk and staggering about (and has been since we were about 14) so I've said I'll go to the pub but no all day benders as theres not much point for Sober Joe here. He asked the question "WHY?" I said "why not"
New Year is planned out now and were taking passengers on our trip to see as many people as we can! Should be fun.
Theres a show on "current tv" (some wierd channel on sky) about binge drinking this week (its actually lots of little shows spread over 2 hours and not all of them are about alcohol). Anyway I reccomend it...theres lots of different storys of interest
The ramp up to Christmas has begun and I'm not missing booze at all...although the strangest thing happened...my wife said she really fancied a nice brandy (just one glass) and weirdly so did I (I had thought the exact same thing the day before)...we dont even drink brandy!!

Motivation!?

Its becoming apparent that when you say you are going to give up drinking for a certain amount of time people ask you why. This isn't just like 'why are you going to the shops?' its more like 'Why would you want to jump off the bridge?' I find this really funny. People assume that if your wanting to not drink then you must have a problem. Truth is if you cant or wont consider giving up I'd say it's you that have a greater problem. To all those people who couldn't give up drinking for just a year I say "Why?" (obviously I'm not having a go at people with real issues with alcohol...its the ones that claim not too that I'm asking the question 'if you dont have a problem how come you cant give up?" ).

I don't think I have a problem with alcohol, certainly no more than any of my friends or family (a lot less in most cases actually!), instead I have a 'reason' for giving up, or in fact I have a list of reasons/observations. Here's some of them:

• To see if I can (if I cant I really would have a problem ;-)


• To challenge myself (I like doing that. I dont like not wearing a t-shirt in summer so to get over my self conciousness I walked naked in Newcastle for 4 hours as part of an art project (see picture))


• When I quit smoking nobody asked why!


• Because it annoys other people. Its like your attacking thier way of life (sad and also I've been guilty of this...sorry Sean!)


• Because its opens up a whole new world (like this New Year where I can drive to see everyone I want too


• Because I often think what will people in 100 years think about us. Like when kids cant understand we once thought the earth was flat, I think in 100 years we'll look back and laugh at those primitive fools who appear in the Internet Archives on TV shows called 'Binge Drink Britain'


• Because if one day I have kids they will not grow up seeing their parents binge drinking.

This last ones important to me. I don't know if I'll ever want kids but if I do it will be in the next 6 years (before I'm 35) and I wont be one of these parents who wonders why there children are messed up when they didn't do everything they could to give them every chance in life. That means eating right, exercising, reading as often as I can and generally setting a good example.

In summary don't ask me why I'm doing this unless you want a long drawn out answer that will imply you have a problem for not doing it yourself ;-)

'Tis the season

Well its the 1st of December and for those of us who live in the UK (as opposed to the US where thanksgiving already started the holidays off) the ramp up to Christmas and the holiday season begins!...but first a little about my weekend. It was rubbish!! Should have been going to a party but circumstances conspired against us so we didnt make it, I did get a little pleasure in seeing a comment left on my blog (the first of many I hope)

When I gave up drinking for a year the first thing everybody said was 'What about Christmas?' to which I replied with the simple answer 'I dont drink on Christmas day'. The main reason I dont drink on Christmas day is that I usually drive from house to house seeing the family and by the time ive been fed I cant be bothered with beer (I might have 1 at the end of the night. I know a lot of people I know go out on Christmas eve...I've never understood this. Even though we dont have kids (we'll we have a dog and a gecko so I suppose we do ;-) Christmas Eve is a time for wrapping presents, posting the cards in person we forgot to post before the deadline (even though I'm writing about this now I'll still forget) and watching some movie like 'Its a wonderful life'. Its not, in my opinion, a time for throwing up in the gutter!! That said New Year I usually get wasted which is fun!

This new year is going to be different. Firstly I'm not bothered at all about 'spoiling' new year by not drinking because lets face it...its always rubbish. This year I'm going to drive to see my friends and family at various party's and see as many people as I can (theres no way I could get enough taxis to do this if I we're drinking!) So I'm going to start forming a battle plan soon so I can make it to everyones house/pub I can in 5 hours!!

I read a comment on the site mentioned above and although as I'm finding not drinking quite easy now I really like this as a mantra for stress in general “your situation is like someone that thinks they’re drowning but doesn’t realize that they’re only knee deep in water. Stand up and move on.” nice!

Facebook

Im a big fan of Facebook...I work from home on a computer so I have plenty of time when Im not speaking to people at work so I have a little browse on what people are up to. I've often got stick for updating my status too often (2x a day is not often!). Anyway I found a group that sums the whole thing up! "Im not drinking for a year". There was only 1 member and no admin so I've taken over the group. Hopefully more people will join http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2466216248 . Within 3 minutes of me updating this group one of my 'friends' on facebook send me a 'cosmopolitan request'..Ignore. It did make me smile though

Sods Law

The first week we gave up drinking a case of free wine arrived on our doorstep...seriously! I forgot that I switched energy suppliers and it came with a free case of Virgin Wine. Also that month the kitchen got fitted...with the wine rack I specifically requested (I really didnt think that through)
In the end we gave most of the wine away and kept 4 bottles just to fill the rack (which then got drunk by friends and family over the next month!).

Its always the same when you give something up, there always seems to be multiple reasons to start again. Its like when you quit smoking and can only see cigarettes in everyones hands you pass in the street (its a bit like a super power...you can sense it without even trying).
The truth is though that these things would have happened anyway and will continue to happen, so when people say 'oh but you can drink just think once, its a special occasion' (for them). They dont realise that everyone has special occasions and if that were an excuse you'd never give up.
In fact while on this subject I'll mention a type of people who although are dear friends, bug me for this reason...I hear every time were in a situation where they are drinking and we are not 'your not as much fun when your not drinking'. The truth is I'm sick of F***ing hearing you say that 10 times during the night. Perhaps if you didnt mention it every 30 minutes, I would have a better time!! (I'll protect your name for the sake of privacy but you know who you are ;-) Seriously though, if I'm the type of person who only amuses you when I'm drunk then either you need better friends or I need to change! (god I hope I'm not like Fun Bobby from Friends!).

Another coincidence recently was that I won an award at work. A trip to London and a free bar! Bloody place didnt have anything for non-drinkers except water and OJ! Still it was a good night and testament to having a good time without alcohol. In fact if we had been drunk we probably wouldnt have wandered around London at 1am laughing at people drinking wine out of the bottle in McDonald's at Marble Arch...classy!

Off to a 70's party on Friday. Shame I dont do drugs really...it would be 'in theme' and not drinking wouldn't be an issue at all. Truth is I'm sure it will be a good night, and I've almost forgotten what it is to drink in a pub/party situation anymore, so I'll be 'gett'in my groove on' and dancing the night away...providing I remember to get a costume. I think I'll post some pictures after the party.

D-Day

Its been 110 days since I last had a drink of beer!

So...why have I started this blog? I've often thought about blogging given that I work in IT and I'm a geek!! Its my 29th year on this planet and I think I have something worth writing about. I've decided to give up alcohol for a year (as has my lovely wife).
We had talked about this a few times in the past year, I think more trying to see if the other one was serious or not, finally after 1 hangover too many we decided to take the plunge and start from 1st Jan 2009...oh but wait! cant do that because it would run over my 30th Birthday (and that would be no fun!), so after a bit of a rethink we started our mission on 7th August 2008 (with a hangover).
When we first told people we were going to do this most peoples reaction was "why?...whatever (you'll never do it), yeah yeah". Its now been 110 days and we've been to parties, award ceremonies, meals with friends and family and just down the pub and not a drop of alcohol has been consumed!
I think the best thing about not drinking (apart from the £50 we save in taxis each time) is that we've started to do things we never would have done before. Last month we danced on stage at the Billingsgate in London totally sober. Now normally I would never dance...for 2 reasons: 1 I cant dance, and mobile phones can now video dancing! However as a sober person I can make the personal choice to make a fool of myself...and I quite enjoyed it!
Ive been looking back over the past 110 days (I can do that thanks to facebook!) and heres a summary of the things I've done sober:

• My 29th Birthday (I got a boat!) We stayed in a country house and had a great time. We took non-alcoholic beer and to be honest I'm glad. I didnt get tired, we stayed up late and we really got the most out of our money
• Sky Diving. I did my first tandem sky dive
• Been out with work (this was one of the first 'no beer' nights and my boss even commented on how civilised it all was (he doesnt drink anyway). Not drinking also meant I could leave early the next day which was a bonus
• Been to the pub/partys. Have to admit this is one area where although I've still had a good night I havent stayed until the end. I wanted to make a big deal about how it wouldnt change anything by not drinking but it does. Sitting in a crappy pub surrounded by people who slowly get stupider isnt that much fun. The answer is to stay for 3 drinks and leave!! This has the added bonus of getting 2 nights out of 1 which we've used to go see other friends in other pubs or just chill out at home

Over the next 9 months I have a holiday to Cyprus to see my brother get married (opted to stay in a Villa with a pool rather than near the pubs!!), work nights out, friends 30th birthdays, weddings (if certain people get their finger out! you know who you are!), Christmas, New Year and god knows what else...So I'm going to start blogging and hopefully people with find what I have to say entertaining/amusing/interesting