BTW — I feel no real guilt about drinking. I do, however, feel some guilt about getting nothing done on my hungover days. By nothing, I mean only knitting. Not dissing knitting, but I’m supposed to be working on a dissertation ‘n stuff –

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Anyway, thanks everyone for weighing in :) My stance now: drinking good, hangover bad. I’m just trying to drink less so I’m hung over less.

Of course, since I’m down to 2 drinks a day, I’ve been thinking of buying bigger wine glasses…

chris, welcome back from ethiopia!

now, i have to say your comment up there is playing down siel’s question. i agree with andrea in that if you are walking around feeling guilty and out of control about drinking (or just physically bad), you might think about drinking in a way, or not drinking in a way, that makes you feel better.

the difference between feeling bad about W and feeling bad about drinking is that you can choose to change the drinking habit. W is another can of worms, he is outside the personal control of most of us (let’s not go there!).

the problem with our culture and alcohol (or cigarettes, weed, coffee, etc) is not prudishness, it is excess. 1 or 2 beers is pretty harmless for most of us, but we want more more more. so this stuff is not inherently bad, it is just that many of us insist on using substances in a way that does not appreciate what they do. a lot of societies in the past used substances in rituals, ceremonies, and special occasions. now we just throw them back out of sheer habit.

anyway, i hear you on the beauty of a little beer. but on the other hand, to me any habit that mentally of physically makes you feel lousy should be jettisoned from your life.

I doubt you have a ‘drinking problem.’ I disagree with Andrea’s analysis that if it is bugging you then its a problem. By that definition, Carry Nation had a drinking problem - drinking bugged her an awful lot, so she had a drinking problem? Thinking about George Bush bugs me a lot, so I should stop thinking about George Bush? Just because _other_ people might have a problem with how much you drink doesn’t mean _you_ have a problem. It’s _their_ problem if they can’t deal with the way you enjoy alcohol.

Modern American society has a very warped view about alochol. We think it is inherently bad, and yet most of us like it and do it. This strange ambivalence is unique in human history. I could pontificate for a long time on this topic, but wait, I did - it is all in my new book! It’s called Fermenting Revolution: How to Drink Beer and Save the World. But you’ll have to wait about nine months before it hits the shelves. Keep an eye on http://www.beeractivist.com for updates. The book should be out in Sept. 2006 on New Society Publishers. In it, you will find extensive and fun reading about why drinking a mere two daily glasses of wine (or beer, my beverage of choice) is not only _not_ a problem, but is very significantly GOOD for your overall health and well-being - and that’s not according to me, but to actual _scientists_.

Fermenting Revolution,
Chris O’Brien

Drink Beer. Save the World.
http://www.beeractivist.com

If it’s bothering you, it’s a problem. I don’t necessarily think it’s a drinking problem in a medical sense, but it’s bugging you. You can change it.

For me, the key was in un-linking the notion of celebration and alcohol. It happened when I was about your age, and had (have) a dear friend who’s a recovering alcoholic. OF COURSE, you don’t serve wine when there’s a person with relatively new sobriety at your house. (Now we can; he doesn’t mind at all. But interestingly, I no longer feel the need to do it.) So we learned to entertain and be entertained without alcohol. Seriously, there’s been no loss of fun.

I still have …I don’t know… 2 or 3 glasses of wine a week. And I have a serious liking for micro-brews, but no one else in my family does, so I avoid that one usually. But a party without wine isn’t a problem.