The big talk.

I guess it's time to make it public: I'm giving up drinking for a month, starting July 1st.

Let me explain.... It's a money issue more than anything, as I'll probably be dropping a grand in five days in late August on my middle-American adventure, and cash doesn't come easy when you work a non-profit job. When I sat down and went through my monthly expenses, it just seemed like the wisest idea. Now, to clarify, maybe 'quitting drinking' is not really the right term. If someone hands me a drink at the bar, and I'm not dropping any dimes on that drink, I will certainly not hesitate to toss it back, believe me. I'll still be going out and everything, I'll just be turning $100-nights into $20-nights.

Some people drink because it helps them come out of their shell. Those who know me well know that I really don't need booze in order to do retarded things... That urge comes naturally.
I usually use drinking as a stress-release on my weekends.
I know, it's tough to imagine me all stressed-out, but things can get pretty intense at work during the week. Beyond the apparent stress factors of my job (the hobos, the prostitutes, the 12-year-old pregnant chicks, just to name a few), here are a few not-so-obvious things that contribute to my weekly stress:

1. I see anywhere from five to twenty babies in a day, and every single parent thinks that their child is the most amazingly beautiful baby in the universe. Newsflash, mom and dad.
I do see some cute kids, but I also see some of the most excruciatingly ugly babies you could ever imagine. I once read an article on babies, and it explained why we think that children are cuter than adults. The article said that babies have a larger head and smaller features than an adult, and back when we were cavemen, and were too stupid to actually differentiate between ages, those differences made us feel that the babies were helpless, and needed nurturing. Thus, when we think that something is cute, it's actually our brains just sensing the helplessness in something. The article said that the most attractive babies had the best chance of survival. There are times when I see babies coming in that look like bad props in an early 80's horror movie, and as I stand behind the parents as they gloat and undress the babies for a weigh-in, all I can think is how that kid probably would have been left behind in a snowbank a long time ago if this were the ice-ages.
It can be pretty taxing to hear parents go on and on about how perfect their children are. When some poor son-of-a-bitch drops all of his standards and settles for me as his wifey, and I have kids, I'm going to be humble as hell, because they'll probably be midgets anyway.

2. Sometimes I think that there's not enough Evelyn 'Champagne' King and Bastian songs in the world to get me through my daily commute. I can only hide myself in cheesy ipod songs for so long before the stress starts to get to me. I've felt more transfered-ass-heat on plastic transit seats than probably anyone else in the world. I also seem to have an affinity for sitting next to guys that like to dig in their ears (to find things perhaps?) the entire ride. My morning ride is usually no big thing... Full of screaming babies, but I have to deal with that once I get to work anyway, so I'm pretty good at tuning it out. It's the evening ride with the sweaty-ass blue collar workers and, people screaming into cell-phones, and heavily-perfumed office ladies that kill me, especially because it takes me almost three times as long to get home.

3. Ummm... I guess I'm not a big fan of sitting with a bunch of depressing single dads at the laundromat once a week.

Hmm. Guess that's all that really bugs me.

You know what? Maybe things aren't very stressful at all for me afterall, and this month should be so amazingly easy to get through. Maybe.

~sarah p.