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[Egan_BW]

Well, aren't you quite the Kerbal.

[Frumple]

That being said, having a drink won't trigger a slippery slope which kills you before you realize what's happening, either.

Hopefully. I'm pretty sure a good third of my family thought that, too, or something like it, and better than half (the rest didn't think much going into it at all) of it either spent part of their life addicted to booze or died an alcoholic. S'reason number one the closest I've got to the stuff is cough syrup, and I stopped with that once I noticed the shit was in it. Pattern recognition est.

One drink probably won't be what triggers things, but... still. Just about any addictive substance is a risk. Particularly if you have a family history of alcoholism and/or depression (among who knows what else), know that you're going into that one drink taking a risk a good number of your ancestors also rolled the dice on, and came up snake eyes. Sometimes you want to think you're going to be special on that front, but when that starts happening you just remind yourself they probably thought that, too.

[Egan_BW]

That sounds like fear-mongering to me. Thinking that you'll become an alcoholic the moment you taste booze is just as dangerous as thinking that you can drink as much as you want with no consequence. Fear is healthy, but irrational fear only weakens the healthy fear.

[WealthyRadish]

...being able to drink small amounts of mood-altering poison in company is a useful-ish semi-social skill. That said:

Drinking alone as an anxiety-cure and inhibition-inhibiter isn't a very good plan.

Chances are it won't make you happier if you're a moody sod already. Being a moody sod myself, can confirm.

I would like to emphasize this as well. If your plan is to start drinking at home for the (mild) euphoria alone, that is frankly a very dumb way of rushing yourself into possible habitual alcoholism for nothing. It's not the same as the somewhat hysterical "one drop and you could become an addict" argument, it's more that if you make drinking a part of your private routine simply for the buzz or drunkenness, that is practically the essence of alcoholism already.

Its effects in social situations are also exaggerated; when people act foolishly while drinking, many times what alcohol is really giving is permission, not inhibition. It's hardly an aid to anxiety as well, in my experience.

I wouldn't advocate refusing drinks in social environments, however. The advantage of social drinking is that the mild high puts people in a better mood, which helps keep gatherings pleasant during the long interludes between anything remotely interesting happening. If you aren't an alcoholic, moderate drinking in these situations helps keep them from being miserable or boring experiences, and not being miserable makes you more pleasant for others to be around. This doesn't carry over in the slightest to drinking alone.

[Frumple]

That sounds like fear-mongering to me. Thinking that you'll become an alcoholic the moment you taste booze is just as dangerous as thinking that you can drink as much as you want with no consequence. Fear is healthy, but irrational fear only weakens the healthy fear.

Pretty sure it's rational fear to acknowledge you're damned likely to not stop at one if you start, like the dozen+ people before you. Least when you have a serious history behind you, you're probably real damn better off not even running the chance.

Surest way to not get caught in the same shit is to not step in it to begin with, and unlike some things it's pretty damn easy to just... not. "Family has a history of alcoholism so I don't touch the stuff" is just about universally accepted as a reason to not drink, from what I've encountered over the years.

[Dunamisdeos]

I also think that the former is far less dangerous than the latter on account of how it's guaranteed to stop you from developing alcoholism.

I also, however, recommend having a friend present/accountable if you go through with your "experiment".

[Yoink]

I have both personal experience and anecdotal evidence to suggest that alcohol is pretty much the ultimate anxiety cure. Well, short of hard drugs. Or actual medication, presumably.

But as for straight-up depression, I'm really not sure staying in and getting smashed is going to be all that helpful. Especially not having drank much in the past - alcohol affects different people differently, so where solo boozing (preferably accompanied by blastbeats on the stereo) is an enjoyable and refreshing experience for me, a happy drunk, someone else in the same boat might just get thoroughly maudlin.
You don't know what kind of drunk you are, so just loading up on fat sacks o' goon and going to town on 'em could have unexpected results.

I would rather suggest you get out of the house for your first attempts at tippling. I know I've suggested going to a metal show in the past as a source of camaraderie, but obviously that's just something that works for me - if you can't stand the music, no amount of drink is likely to make it enjoyable.
Or maybe it would, I don't know.

But anyway, even if you don't want to hit up any live music, go to a bar or something. Pull a Kagus, just go to yon local pub at have a few drinks and see how the experience takes you.
Bear in mind that it could easily leave an unfairly bad first impression depending on the establishment and clientele.


As a sidenote: it's generally pretty safe to ignore anything Frumple says on the subject of alcohol and/or addiction (not his fault, really), but one point he makes that might be good is the genetic alcoholism one - if your family has a solid, consistent history of alcohol addiction (and I mean more than just your mother), don't be surprised if you tend towards that as well. Be careful.

I'm sorry, I can't help but to read R2D2 and think about a rolling astromech abusing its moral system in the wild west every time you post about it.

Great, now I won't be able to shake that mental image, either. He's got a li'l stetson on and everything!   

Ok gimme like.... I got this ok.

Spoiler: I'm not sorry. (click to show/hide)

...Though I am out of post-it notes today, apparently.

Can't run out of MSpaint, though.

This is wonderful. That's pretty much how I'd imagined it, but even better!

[Bumber]

Though for not noticing the power rail was loose to the motherboard on a lit up clear case PC for over a month, I feel I need to turn in my computer nerd licence. Do I take it to the DMV or do I have to find a Radio Shack?

I'm not sure which casual gave you a physical license, but I'm pretty sure it's meant to be invalidated digitally using the blockchain.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[Yoink]

I also, however, recommend having a friend present/accountable if you go through with your "experiment".

This. A safe enviroment for discoveries is advised though. Who knows what might get flushed up.

Y'all are making it sound like he's planning on dropping acid, not having a drink of wine.

Oh also - in my experience wine tends to lead to the worst hangovers. Something to do with the sugar content, perhaps, or maybe just how it (white wine at least) tastes so sweet and harmless that it's easy to drink way too much.
I dunno, I'm not much of a wine drinker 'less it comes out of a bag. Maybe someone else could advise you better on how to have a good wine sesh without feeling (even more) like death in the morning.

[JoshuaFH]

I appreciate all the advice all. I just want to find some way to lighten myself up, since I feel that the normal functioning of my brain only allows it to operate in a way that inhibits and torments me. Sometimes I feel much better when I'm impaired in some way (like when I'm very tired) but that's very inconsistent and can't be reliable reproduced.

The initial idea was to test it out within the confines of my home so as to avoid disaster in case of a bad reaction.  But the overall idea is to loosen up and try to be more social. I don't know how or when that would occur, I just want to try to engineer the correct mental disposition to allow it to happen. 

The whole alcohol thing was just a whimsy I had when I was lying in bed. In my half-sleep daze I can imagine myself as a strong free spirit that lives life on his own terms without worry or hesitation, though when I get up that immediately dispels as I wake up and remember "oh yeah, life sucks and I suck."; it was just coincidence this morning that that fantasy entailed alcohol, and I wanted to fact check with you guys so I'm not barrelling into a bad idea that just winds up being a mistake.

[Yoink]

The initial idea was to test it out within the confines of my home so as to avoid disaster in case of a bad reaction. 

I mean, I have no idea what the watering holes in your area are like, but a bar or pub is generally a pretty safe, suitable location for such things.
Sure, you might act a bit silly and maybe say stuff that would normally embarrass the shit out of you, but you just need to bear in mind that, in any drinking establishment worth its salt hops, everyone else is likely drunk or on their way to being drunk, too.   



Edit: these imbeciles my housemates have staying still haven't figured out how to use the hot tap correctly.
Y'see, this is an old house with a plumbing system to match, and when using the hot tap in the kitchen sink, if you don't turn it on fully enough it will screw up and rattle the bejeezus out of the pipes leading to the hot water system.
When my housemates and I moved in, it took maybe a few instances of this happening for us to realise it was an ongoing issue and make a habit on turning the tap on correctly.

But these fucking morons are still struggling with it, evidently. They like fucking around in the sink, too, so prolonged and irritating outcries of the poor, tortured pipes are an infuriatingly common occurrence.
I wish my housemates would hurry up and explain this basic shit already. I swear if I have to break my non-confrontational ways and speak up about it I will most likely skip straight to... well, shouting at the cunts, at least.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[Kagus]

Drinking alone tends to make me write messages to several people on my contacts list, regardless of how little I have to do with them and how many years it's been since we had any kind of interaction at all...

Basically, it can go either way. If you're in a good place, it feels even better. If you're in a bad place, oh boy. Being around other people tends to help a lot in moving it towards the "good place", but that also depends a lot on various factors.


Anyways, Indian scientists discover incredible facts about the universe, in the most literal sense of "incredible".

[George_Chickens]

Anyways, Indian scientists discover incredible facts about the universe, in the most literal sense of "incredible".

Watch out, they'll cut off your water supply by turning some taps on the moon.