Addiction

Earlier this year I got a cough, not a bad cough, more of an annoyance, but annoying enough that I wasn't getting much sleep. After a week of that I had had enough and I broke out the cough syrup. The good stuff, mind you, not that weak-ass Robitussin. Took two teaspoons at bedtime and slept like a baby. It was great. I took it four more nights and it was like being on vacation. All my troubles kind of melted away. I was able to turn my head more than ten degrees for the first time in months. Then I stopped and life slowly went back to normal. The next weekend my cough was still bothering me a bit so I took another dose. This time it didn't help at all. Didn't sleep for beans, so I put the cough syrup back on the shelf. Maybe in another five or ten years the effects will have worn off and another dose will give me another vacation.

Several years ago I was riding a ski lift with a couple of younger guys and we were talking about swearing. My grandfatherly advice (which I am sure I picked up from someone wiser than me) was that swearing should be used sparingly, and only when you are angry. If you swear all the time, how is anyone going to know when you are really angry?

My wife and I watched an episode (Speed Bump) of The Closer this evening. Brenda Lee (comin' on strong) Johnson's boyfriend hurts his back, and Brenda's first reaction is to dose him with Vicodin, which he refuses, on account of being an addict. Now isn't that a bitch? Being in pain, and having to turn down really good pain killers because you know that once you take them, you may not be able to stop taking them.