Caffeine Abuse
When I was a teenager, I had a joke in my act that went like this --
"I take drugs, but I don't take them to get high; I take them for the intense emotional conflict the next morning."
And I did feel conflicted about self-altering substances, which is why I'm not really chemically indulgent now, nor was I, particularly, at that time.
(The joke continued, "I took acid and saw God -- God told me he wished everybody would stop taking acid; he values his privacy." Funny about collective memory -- the "took acid and saw God" era was in the past when I did that joke, but everyone knew the underlying notion and it pretty much always worked.)
Which brings us to coffee.
I've just discovered it. (Where's it been hiding?)
Was disgusted by it as a kid -- always been a cola boy. (And I like tea. . . . And Mountain Dew.) But, as with pickles, I now have a fondness for it that would perplex my younger self.
And in both cases, it was raw, animal need that brought me to the party.
Pickles, the young Andrew found particularly revolting. They were green, wet, slimy, filled with the juice of heaven knows what. (Oooh. I just realized many Britons don't know what pickles are. Pickles are pickled cucumbers. Gherkins are pickles but in the states, gherkins are small -- don't know how it is over there -- and most pickles are full, cucumber-sized, wart-laden, sandwich-accompanying monstrosities.)
And you couldn't get away from 'em.
As fast food culture overtook New York (It had already overtaken the rest of America, but New York tends to be resistant to such things), burgers -- dressed with pickle chips -- became normal kid fare. When I would be handed a pickly burger and whine about it, my parents would say, "Just take the pickles off!" which left the remaining burger with the disturbing taste and aroma of pickle juice, which was oh-so-easy to hate.
But years later, when I was broke and counting on the food I would get if I performed at the Improv to sustain me, a hungry me one night stared at the pickle laying uneaten next to my rapidly disappearing sandwich and thought, "That kinda smells like a de-pickled McDonalds bun. I wonder if I could eat that."
I now love pickles. (Dills, anyway.)
So, these days -- with the stress and inconsistency of my living situation wearing away at me -- I am hungry not for foodstuffs but for the strength to go on. And coffee, I knew from my occasional (less than once a year?) social indulgence in hipster latte or authentically Italian cappuccino, could give me that strength. The occasional, often reluctant, indulgences let me know (as did pickle residue in an earlier time) that I could tolerate the flavor of the potentially noxious substance, so why not give it a try?
Um.
Before I answer that question, let me take you back a few years to the couch I was sleeping on in Fran and Carol's apartment in L.A.. The uncomfortable sleeping arrangement was giving me a headache and, though I was loathe to rely on medications, I remembered I'd seen an acetaminophen bottle in their medicine cabinet (that's what we call paracetamol) and I really did need relief, so I went and took a couple of capsules and returned to "bed".
It only took a few minutes for me to start questioning whether I had actually taken acetaminophen.
I laid back down on the couch and thought about how the capsules were, I think, orange and black (Halloween colors!) -- colors I did not associate with generic pain relievers. Even though it was only 5 or 6 in the morning, I walked down the hallway and stood outside the girls' rooms, waking them by asking the question, "You know that bottle that says acetaminophen -- is that really what's in it?"
It was dexedrine I had taken. (I think it was time-released too, which meant it would be the gift that kept on giving.) I ended up going to the emergency room with tachycardia and other symptoms. It was a tough day.
Flash forward to yesterday when I drank so much coffee that my symptoms were very much the same. I ran into Chris from The Onion at the Astor Place Barnes & Noble (yes, I'm running into him everywhere -- New York can be like a small town) and peppered him with rat-a-tat-tat, gatling gun-like prattle; fast and sometimes misshapen anecdotes, delivered with uncontrollable, mistimed fervor.
Shortly thereafter, I felt terrible about it.
I regretted the way I had come across. And I felt physically uncomfortable, unable to come down from my "trip". I was in a period of intense emotional conflict which didn't even wait for the next morning to occur.
I got a monkey on my back. I may ask Donald Trump if he can get me into rehab.
(That, I realize, was a topical, Miss USA-related reference that may or may not be understood in the UK. I urge you, whenever a reference in one of my blogs is lost on you, to do an easy web search, which will enable you to fully enjoy my offerings.)
But first, I think I'm gonna have a cup of coffee.
__________________________________
23 December, 2006 @ 17:45 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer
"I take drugs, but I don't take them to get high; I take them for the intense emotional conflict the next morning."
And I did feel conflicted about self-altering substances, which is why I'm not really chemically indulgent now, nor was I, particularly, at that time.
(The joke continued, "I took acid and saw God -- God told me he wished everybody would stop taking acid; he values his privacy." Funny about collective memory -- the "took acid and saw God" era was in the past when I did that joke, but everyone knew the underlying notion and it pretty much always worked.)
Which brings us to coffee.
I've just discovered it. (Where's it been hiding?)
Was disgusted by it as a kid -- always been a cola boy. (And I like tea. . . . And Mountain Dew.) But, as with pickles, I now have a fondness for it that would perplex my younger self.
And in both cases, it was raw, animal need that brought me to the party.
Pickles, the young Andrew found particularly revolting. They were green, wet, slimy, filled with the juice of heaven knows what. (Oooh. I just realized many Britons don't know what pickles are. Pickles are pickled cucumbers. Gherkins are pickles but in the states, gherkins are small -- don't know how it is over there -- and most pickles are full, cucumber-sized, wart-laden, sandwich-accompanying monstrosities.)
And you couldn't get away from 'em.
As fast food culture overtook New York (It had already overtaken the rest of America, but New York tends to be resistant to such things), burgers -- dressed with pickle chips -- became normal kid fare. When I would be handed a pickly burger and whine about it, my parents would say, "Just take the pickles off!" which left the remaining burger with the disturbing taste and aroma of pickle juice, which was oh-so-easy to hate.
But years later, when I was broke and counting on the food I would get if I performed at the Improv to sustain me, a hungry me one night stared at the pickle laying uneaten next to my rapidly disappearing sandwich and thought, "That kinda smells like a de-pickled McDonalds bun. I wonder if I could eat that."
I now love pickles. (Dills, anyway.)
So, these days -- with the stress and inconsistency of my living situation wearing away at me -- I am hungry not for foodstuffs but for the strength to go on. And coffee, I knew from my occasional (less than once a year?) social indulgence in hipster latte or authentically Italian cappuccino, could give me that strength. The occasional, often reluctant, indulgences let me know (as did pickle residue in an earlier time) that I could tolerate the flavor of the potentially noxious substance, so why not give it a try?
Um.
Before I answer that question, let me take you back a few years to the couch I was sleeping on in Fran and Carol's apartment in L.A.. The uncomfortable sleeping arrangement was giving me a headache and, though I was loathe to rely on medications, I remembered I'd seen an acetaminophen bottle in their medicine cabinet (that's what we call paracetamol) and I really did need relief, so I went and took a couple of capsules and returned to "bed".
It only took a few minutes for me to start questioning whether I had actually taken acetaminophen.
I laid back down on the couch and thought about how the capsules were, I think, orange and black (Halloween colors!) -- colors I did not associate with generic pain relievers. Even though it was only 5 or 6 in the morning, I walked down the hallway and stood outside the girls' rooms, waking them by asking the question, "You know that bottle that says acetaminophen -- is that really what's in it?"
It was dexedrine I had taken. (I think it was time-released too, which meant it would be the gift that kept on giving.) I ended up going to the emergency room with tachycardia and other symptoms. It was a tough day.
Flash forward to yesterday when I drank so much coffee that my symptoms were very much the same. I ran into Chris from The Onion at the Astor Place Barnes & Noble (yes, I'm running into him everywhere -- New York can be like a small town) and peppered him with rat-a-tat-tat, gatling gun-like prattle; fast and sometimes misshapen anecdotes, delivered with uncontrollable, mistimed fervor.
Shortly thereafter, I felt terrible about it.
I regretted the way I had come across. And I felt physically uncomfortable, unable to come down from my "trip". I was in a period of intense emotional conflict which didn't even wait for the next morning to occur.
I got a monkey on my back. I may ask Donald Trump if he can get me into rehab.
(That, I realize, was a topical, Miss USA-related reference that may or may not be understood in the UK. I urge you, whenever a reference in one of my blogs is lost on you, to do an easy web search, which will enable you to fully enjoy my offerings.)
But first, I think I'm gonna have a cup of coffee.
__________________________________
23 December, 2006 @ 17:45 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer
posted by Andrew J. Lederer at 12:52 PM
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