Can't do coffee

5th day sober. Apparently I can't do coffee any more. Like a fool, I had some last night with the result that I feel like I didn't get any sleep at all just lay in bed trying to sleep, checking the time every hour or two. I think I did get some sleep because I had some dreams - that were actually kind of interesting. In any case I got out of bed a bit after 2. 

Ken comes by tonight and I'll just have to do my best and explain to him that I'm still on the mend. Also that I'm like him now and have to avoid caffeine. What's nice is I have a $14 bottle of new sealed Japanese instant coffee to give him for Suzy, his wife, who likes instant coffee. 

What I'm finding motivating to avoid alcohol is to get into the medical details and they are gory indeed. For instance the big bruise on my left hand is because my clotting factors are lacking since I probably have a fatty liver. And while a person starting from zero could probably have a pint of Guinness each evening and be fine for life (it's actually got about half the alcohol as the general run of IPAs) I can't contemplate even a capful. There's a sensitization to alcohol that happens, called "kindling" and not only that but each detox gets harder and the last one was hard enough! 

I also need to avoid aspirin (except maybe those children's aspirin old people take for their heart) and by all means avoid Tylenol. Also eat healthily in general which I can a lot better if I do my own cooking. 

On thing that struck me, thinking last night, is that I'm glad I switched from trumpet to shakuhachi because just like at Cafe Stritch, playing on stage at all (which is not a stretch because a lot of bands like a trumpet as part of the backing instruments) would mean being in the alcohol-soaked dens that are bars and clubs. Shakuhachi is pretty much the opposite sort of instrument from that. A jazz/pop trumpeter is expected to have an appetite for the sauce, and sure enough, I played some of my better Old Spaghetti Factory sessions fueled by a coffee stout. 

But a shakuhachi player who can hardly wait for Happy Hour just does not compute. It's a very sober instrument.  Not as in sad or depressing but as in, fitting with clarity of mind. 

I got out of here at a quarter after 3 with about 7 packages, which I took to the downtown post office. Then I had some time to wait before going to the bank where I had a 4:00 appointment. So I'd noticed an ambulance go down to the court house with lights and siren so I went over there to be a lookee-loo. After a while the ambulance crew came out with a guy who looked OK but who knows what was wrong with him. Guys that young *do* get heart attacks, plus they OD and things like that and they doubtless had him stabilized before moving him so of course he didn't look too bad. They loaded him in and drove off and the Sheriffs drove off and it was time to go to the bank. 

I went over to the bank and again, it was nice and uneventful. They'd missed me last week and I said I wasn't feeling well "but nothing that's catching" and that was that. We wished each other a good weekend and I was off. 

I started to steam for home and then remembered I wanted to pick up bags at the Amazon place, so I turned around and went there. There was a bum with all kinds of stickers and junk hung all over his bike and a loud radio playing some inane music out front. That's OK, I thought, I'm going inside and that'll take care of him. 

It didn't because the bum came in too. Why, I don't know. I gathered up 5 bags which is 5 more than I started with, and was getting ready to leave when the bum said, "Nice saddlebags" to which I made no replay or reaction. It does not pay to interact with bums. He said it again, and again I ignored him, and a nice gal held the door open for me as I went out. "Thanks! It's a luxury!" I said to her. It *does* always pay to interact with decent people. 

From there I went to Nijiya and first thing, got a chirashi bowl and a bottle of Pellagrino water. I left the bike where I'd locked it and walked up the block. I had a nice look around in The Arsenal, and a nice talk with the gal working there. I told her how I'd found that if you take up airbrush and get good, being able to do things like freehand paint that famous picture of Lee Harvey Oswald on a T-shirt, or anything anyone wants, you too can make $10 a week. It all started when I'd noticed "leather paints" which are just acrylics, and I'd told her how, in Colorado, I'd gotten talking with a gal at a gas station and before I knew it she was handing me a picture of her horse, her leather jacket, and $100 cash, to paint the horse on the back of the jacket. Which I did and it came out fine. But sheesh - it's an awful lot of trust, handing some stranger who says they can paint all that stuff and assuming they'll come back. 

I went up to the Nissei building and ate and it was good as usual. Then I walked back to Nijiya and did some serious shopping. Not just the usual cucumber pickles I've come to like but some eggplant ones I don't know if I like yet. Some 100% soba noodles which at $10 for the package are not cheap. A new kind of senbei. Some barley tea because it's always featured in episodes of Atashin'chi when it's hot weather. And the usual routine things. That was still only $40-odd, so life's a lot cheaper when not buying booze. 

I got back here and put things away etc. the usual. Put the pickles, which come in bags, into containers. Tried the new senbei - it's good.

Then I packed things, prioritizing things that have to go to the post office because even if I wake up in the late afternoon for sure I can take those, and I can get the FedEx packages that have to be shipped tomorrow, even if I don't pack them before I head out, packed after I come back and take them on Saturday which is actually a rather pleasant ride, with much calmer traffic. 

Ken came by and first ate his dinner - Burger King I think, two small burgers and some fries. I taxed him one fry. He then wrote out my check - $350 this time, "Because we haven't been doing so well".  Which is OK with me, I'm not spending on booze any more and I'll have our numbers back up in time. Besides, I mentioned to Ken, our "not doing well" means making $7k a month as a rolling average, while when it was really bad over a year ago, we were down in the 3's and 4's. 

Then we talked and this time a lot of it was about restaurants and food. And we talked about boozing a bit, and I mentioned that a heavy, habitual drinker like I'd been, could really not even go back to one beer a day even if I could practice moderation which it's pretty well proven I can't. I said he (Ken) had probably not been really stinkin' drunk more than a few times, and he mentioned once in Italy when he was working over in Europe. I recalled a time in Munich, myself. I said I figure I've almost certainly got fatty liver, which will heal itself as long as I never drink even a capful again. And that his (Ken's) son P. needs to be careful of going down the same road as I know P. likes to drink. It only takes stepping into the bathroom P. and I share when I'm over at Ken's, awash in P.'s drunken pee, to know this. I didn't remind Ken of that last bit though. 

Ken said P. is now getting into diabetes and is on metformin and some other drug. I said I'm hoping as things normalize there will be those free diabetes screenings there used to be, which I believe measure one's A1C and that I almost might be able to get such a test at CVS or somewhere. P. could turn that diabetes around if he'd just stop drinking, get off sugar and carbs, and get into walking or swimming. "Things that will never happen for $200, Alex". This is also something I didn't say to Ken. 

I also showed Ken some pictures from online and explained that wondrous phenomenon called ascites and how I'm pretty sure Tom Price has it. I said that in the past when I'd quit, it'd been trying to approach it emotionally and that's what AA does and in fact most "popular" entreaties for the public to stop drinking so damn much. But that's not really worked for me. What I think will work is what I've been doing, digging into medical lectures aimed at doctors and medical students that really show that alcoholism isn't just a matter of making your mother sad, but is something that does great damage to all these systems in the body. In other words facts over feels. I said that while AA is like the Holy Rollers, I like to think I'm more like St. Thomas Aquinas, who valued reason over emotion. 

We were eventually talked out, and he took off. I tried to make at least a close approximation of shrimp kung pao and considering the lack of certain ingredients and it being my first try, it came out every well. I was just toasting the peanuts when Ken called to ask me to look around the front of the building for his drug box. I looked, not there. He had me look in the boxes he'd brought - nope. He said he may have left it at work - his day job. I had a mouthful of my spicy shrimpy concoction in my mouth when he called - yep, the drug box had been left at his desk. I said it's great news because I'd done a little more looking around here. 

This place here is really just a side line, and Ken's main places are his house of course and his day job where he's got three different labs. I've been there and it's impressive. The thing with Ken is, he knows so much over such a wide area, and if one of the other engineers there has a problem Ken will pitch right in and help them. He's a real team player. He's like that with his family and friends too. He'll help ya if he can. He's offered to drive me to vaccination sites most recently, but he's always helping or offering to help. And in return when he's doing things here I pitch in as well as I can. It's as often adding my thinking as my physical strength so it's not hard.