So yesterday was a little rough.  As I mentioned I met up with some old classmates and had some drinks on Saturday night and I paid for it all day yesterday.  I feel better today, but I'd say still a little lethargic.  I used to really enjoy going out drinking with friends in my younger days.  Considering I'm a bit of an introvert, alcohol was a nice social lubricant for me and it felt like it made it easier to talk to people.  I used to get hangovers sometimes, but it seemed like I could bounce back from them pretty fast.  Nowadays a hangover is just miserable.  I do feel like I still have fun in the moment when I indulge in drinking, but it honestly feels like I'm stealing all the fun I would have had the next day and the fun that I'm having isn't a long lasting fun.  It's fleeting.  And whether I actually did or not, I often feel afterward as if I somehow made an idiot out of myself.  As a result I don't really drink all that often anymore.  During college and for a while after it was like every weekend and sometimes during the week.  Nowadays the idea of drinking every weekend is so incredibly unappealing to me, I can't begin to describe it.  I'd almost rather be tortured.  I think it would be a form of torture.

It's funny, because in my younger days one of the things I feared most about getting older was becoming boring and lame.  Now I am older and from the perspective of my twenty year old self, I AM boring and lame.  But I can honestly say being boring and lame isn't so bad.  I had a lot of fun drinking frequently in my youth, but I don't really miss it.  I still manage to have a pretty good amount of fun most of the time now without it.  And honestly one of my biggest "for fun" hobbies is being creative.  I know a lot of great writers were alcoholics, but I have no idea how they do it.  I can't seem to create much if I'm plastered, and I certainly don't feel like doing it if I'm hungover.  I don't really seem to need it to come up with some halfway decent ideas, and honestly if I actually do try to write down ideas whilst drunk, a lot of them are kind of stupid after the fact.  I'm not saying you can't ever come up with some comedic gold, but I've also found most drunk people aren't quite as funny as they believe they are.  

Even when I was in my twenties, I enjoyed being creative and I don't think I usually did it while drunk.  I wrote my first book Tourist Trap from the ages of 24 to 26 and, while it certainly drew inspiration from the experiences of hanging out and partying with friends, I only worked on it while I was sober.  And I'd say the majority of the best and weirdest ideas I had while writing it came while I was clear headed as well.  

None of this is to suggest I'm demonizing alcohol or judging people who drink it more frequently than I do these days.  Live your best life and do what you find fun.  I'm not quitting it all together either.  If I run into an old friend I haven't seen in a long time and they want to drink some beers, I'm not going to say no.  Every once in a while after a really stressful week the temporary escape from reality it can provide can be a positive thing.  Sometimes you just really need to blow off some steam and it can help.  Like a lot of things in life it's not all good or all bad.  Some people are alcoholics and it can be really damaging to their lives, but it can also be a source of harmless fun for a lot of people.  For me personally, it's just a good "once in a while" thing now.  I can bring the party for a night if circumstances warrant it, but then I'm good for a while not doing it.  If that's boring and lame, then so be it.  But I honestly wouldn't really want to be the forty-plus year old dude that's at the club every weekend either, because it's not like that's exactly the height of coolness.