Syllabus #234

First post of the new year.  Please stand by for my tedious list of grand proclamations about the New Me that I expect this New Year to bring.

Actually, I didn't make a single dang resolution, because I'm already perfect realistic.  

You know what, though?  That's not entirely true.  The other day at work, a bunch of us were kvetching in the copy room about how the building's HVAC system has been on its last legs for as long as most of us can remember, and there's almost always at least one wing of the building that has no heat on the coldest days.  I declared to all within earshot, "Hey, I made a New Year's Resolution...just now...that whenever my heat isn't working, I'm just gonna go home."  I'd rather burn a sick day than lose a digit to Reynaud's-related lack of circulation.  New Year, Warm Me.

According to my media consumption, we are doing Dry January along with most of the rest of the adult populace of the country.  It has been my custom for the past 6 or 7 years, and lately, Andy has been joining me.  We usually let it ride for several additional months.  Last year I think I abstained through at least the end of April, and then I went on another sober-bender from August through mid-October.  If you see me wearing a lampshade at a party, I'm almost certainly not drunk, I just have social anxiety, okay?

I'll tell ya though, nothing makes you feel more smug about your drinking choices than going for a jog in bracing 38-degree weather on New Year's Day and hopping over puddles of vomit and soda bottles full of peepees as you trot past your favorite bar.

---

Naturally, all of these offerings this week are on the theme of wringing out your liver, or maybe just re-evaluating your habits, after the inevitable holiday binging.

To detox or not to detox?  That is the question, that is apparently answered in this article.  

Do you call it Dry January, or Drynuary, or something else entirely.  Drynuary sounds like an STI.  

Do you need to meticulously prepare for your dry spell and trick yourself with NA replacements, etc., or do you just rip the bandaid off and raw dog the experience?  

Amanda Knox bringing more wisdom hard-earned in an Italian prison cell.  This time, it's about cutting alcohol, cold-turkey (except for toilet hooch, once).

Analog Reading:

Finished Lauren Groff's The Vaster Wilds in the wee hours of January 1st.  Great story.  The visceral details really helped me identify with the protagonist.  Every time she had diarrhea in the woods, I was like, It. Me.

Read all of Lore Segal's short story collection, Ladies' Lunch, in one day.  It was short, but not sweet.  Bittersweet, maybe.  I didn't love it, but maybe I just wasn't in the right headspace for it.

Now I'm about 2/3 through Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton.  It started out slow for me, and the prose felt a little stilted somehow, but now that the element of intrigue and scandal in the plot is really picking up, I'm here for it.