Midterms this weekend! And I forgot to study!!

Thank God I actually went to class!

And I already know I've passed the first one.

[What?! What classes are you taking, Al? You'd think you'd have mentioned something before now.]

Sobriety 101.

Liquor stores close at 10:00 in Minnesota. It's 10:17 as I type this sentence. The gas stations are still selling weak s&%t til midnight, but that's not what I really like. Camo 18 or nothing, baby! Strong, smooth and cheap. And since I can't get any right now, I feel like I can wallow in the memory of it. Sort of. My emotions are far disconnected from my intellect I discovered, studying what it means to be an INTP, so putting things into words intellectualizes it and removes it from my pleasure centers. Sort of.

I know I never made verbal plans to get beer, I just visualized it and did it. Come to think of it, I never do anything involving verbal plans. I have to create a very strong picture in order to actually do something. Repetition and habit account for 99% of what I accomplish.

What makes this weekend worse than most? My wife took our older girl on a Girl Scout camping ("camping" I should say) trip. I have no supervision. The baby doesn't pay much attention to things like that. The pictures were taking shape as I waited for them to leave.

How did I make it through this first test?

Why I cheated, of course! Well, partly, I concentrated on Aliina's needs, but she wasn't much help. She wanted to watch the Wiggles, which, however much I may like them, don't demand much in the way of sobriety from me. But I fed her and made sure she went potty. Picked up all the dirty dishes and put them in the washer.

I listened to Dave Thompson try to defend capitalism from his precarious Main Stream (read Monetarist/Keynesian hybrid) position. I appreciate that he defends capitalism, but he keeps mentioning Market Failures and how we fall short of the perfect equilibrium model.

Snort!

Fortunately, his experiences as a lawyer and a businessman overwhelm the failures of his economics education. I should get him the new Samuelson book. It's a little less wrong than the older ones, I hear.

After putting the Bun to bed, I sat down and tried to set a new record in Minesweeper. That's the cheating part, using a less harmful addiction to fight a more harmful one. Now that Dave's done, I'm faking my way through the Bone-Head Sobriety exam (the time from now to midnight) by blogging. I like to think I'm overqualified for this one, but "Pride goeth before a fall," as the Good Book says.

44 days since my last drink. I'm even taking the grape juice at church. (50 points to anyone who remembers how I'm not being perfectly truthful.)

Things that have helped: the Marathon, treatment, AA, prayers, being scrupulously honest, the shed, autumn cleanup and other winterizing chores. Tomorrow, I need to finish up the trailer I started to build, I've got some plumbing to do... Might run. There's a 10:30AM and a 6:00PM meeting at the Alano, but no daycare. Maybe I'll just wander down with the girl and hang out in the coffee room for a little bit.

That's what One Day at a Time means.