Any Teetotallers out there?

[Auntbeast]

Since it seems I have thrown my lot with what is rumored to be a bunch of alcoholic pornmongers, I was curious.

How many here don't drink at all or drink very rarely?

[Uthrecht]

I do not get all required liquids from my food, but neither do I imbibe alcoholic beverages.

I don't use any illegal drugs (and I don't believe I've ever used them, except perhaps as second-hand smoke), and I try to use legal ones rather sparingly.

However, I will confess to abusing caffeine in my youth.

[hajario]

I almost never drink alcohol if you don't count wine in cooking. I have never tried anything alcoholic that didn't taste nasty to me and I don't like the feeling of being drunk. When I was dating I always felt it necessary to give a big explanation about how I don't and have never had a drinking problem and that I don't have any moral or religious objections to other people drinking when I would decline having a glass of wine at dinner.

[srzss05]

I used to drink everyday, often 4-6 (or more) beers a day. I realized that wasn't good for me, and about a year ago cut back to about a week of drinking 1-3 a day, every 4 months or so, then stopping again. I haven't had a drink since October.

That must mean it's time to start again.

[hroark2112]

I've been sober for 15 years 7 months and 7 days.

But who's counting?

[SmartAleq]

I hardly ever drink alcohol but I'm rarely sober, make of that what you will!

[Falcon]

I don't. Alcohol started making me sick twenty years ago...my muscles cramp up, and my tolerance started dropping to where I feel the start of a buzz after after about three sips now (I'm not exaggerating). I guess I don't metabolize it correctly or something.

Anyway, I never drank much to begin with, so eventually it was easier to give it up entirely as my reaction to it became more severe over time. Every few years I try a little to see if I'm over it, since it would be nice to have a glass of wine once in a while. But I still have a bad reaction, so I don't think I'll ever be able to drink again. And it makes me sick enough that my inclination to even test to see if it still makes me sick is pretty low. Three sips and I'm pretty much shot the next day and not feeling so hot the day after, either. Bleh.

It's definitely the alcohol itself. If I use cooking sherry, I'm fine...the alcohol burns off during cooking.

Like Uthy, I've never used illegal drugs, either. In fact, I've never tried so much as a cigarette. I'm really sensitive to all kinds of stuff, and struggle to even tolerate things that are prescribed to me. My doc tried to give me pain meds for my shoulder, which is seriously hosed up at the moment, and I refused...the pain relief would be nice, but the side effects would be intolerable. Not thrilled about that, but that's life.

[Veb]

I very rarely drink anything alcoholic anymore. I like it it, especially good wine, beer and Scotch, but just don't bother with it much. Living with my-ex-the-drunk was the first step toward severely limiting intake. 1. His single-minded self-destruction was disgusting and 2. I removed anything with alcohol from the house, including extracts for cooking because he'd drink them. After I booted him out I just never got back in the habit of casual drinking. So I cook with wine and might drink a glass with dinner once in a while but that's about it. A glass of good Scotch now and then on weekends is about the extent of non-meal drinking. A bottle of good Scotch lasts me a couple of years.

[OutStandingInTheField]

I have never drunk alcoholic beverages, aside from a sip here and there over the years for various reasons.

Originally Posted by hajario

When I was dating I always felt it necessary to give a big explanation about how I don't and have never had a drinking problem and that I don't have any moral or religious objections to other people drinking when I would decline having a glass of wine at dinner.

Been there, done that. I never felt I had to volunteer such an explanation, but one was inevitably sought.

[Canuck_Kat]

I will have a drink once in a while, probably about 3 or 4 times a year. There is a long history of alcoholism in my family and memories of my father crawling on the ground because he was too drunk to stand up has coloured my perspective. It has been only in the past decade or so that I can be around people drinking without panicking, in my life alcohol=violence. I am much more comfortable around people drinking these days although I will make a quick exit once the drunks come out.

I have had some of the same experiences as hajario, when I was younger there was lots of pressure to have a drink and when I refused it almost became a battle of wills. That has definitely decreased as I have aged.

[severe delays]

I very rarely drink. In part this is because I often dislike the taste of alcohol unless there's a really nice drink to go with it. Some of my relatives also dislike the taste and rarely drink so I'm assuming there's a genetic component to that. It's also because my employer has very strict rules about when and how much we can drink on our own time and it's often not worth the bother of counting units of alcohol. I find a lot of my colleagues are either like me or the absolute opposite - save their units obsessively and have them all on their day off.

In terms of what I'll drink, I'll sometimes have a glass of nice wine or Bailey's or something like G&T. So long as the drink is not utterly vile I don't mind having one. I had wine in early January when I was having dinner with a friend and before that I had some at Christmas and in early December. Before that I don't remember but it's not unusual for me to go months without a drink. Of course, the big drawback to rarely drinking is that it easily affects me which makes me less inclined to drink....

[Khampelf]

No one's said it yet?

Alcoholic Pornmongers? Band Name!!

[drewbert]

I'll drink the occasional beer, two in an evening is pretty much my limit. I might drink a glass of wine if one is offered. I wouldn't know liquor or a mixed drink if someone spilled it in my lap.

[Zeener Diode]

Originally Posted by drewbert

I wouldn't know liquor or a mixed drink if someone spilled it in my lap.

If they dove in headfirst to "salvage" the spill, then it would be a licker.

[Monstera deliciosa]

Another light drinker here. I probably average around two drinks a month, over the course of a year.

[WormTheRed]

I haven't drunk anything... today. Does that count?


_{slinks out of thread, hanging his drunken f-d up head in shame}

[Dragonlady]

Very seldom. Only because I don't often think about it. I'm not terribly social, so I don't see others doing it, either. I think I had two drinks last year at the Company Xmas dinner.
I LIKE a few things (margaritas..MMMMM) just don't do them at home and don't often go out. Also, it flares up my rosacea something fierce. A half glass of wine and I'm bright red. Sexy, that!

[Panacea]

I love beer. LOVE IT. But as I approached 50 years of age I began to realize that drinking a lot of beer would 1. make me fat and 2. wasn't really good for me. Not to mention the two cigarettes per beer I was smoking.

When I got out of the hospital after having had an emergency appendectomy, I realized that it was a good opportunity to quit. So I did. That was two Halloweens ago.

I don't mind people drinking around me though. Once I made my mind up to quit, I haven't had any cravings.

[SoylentPopTart]

I'm going to chime in and say I drink a couple times a week, usually have 2 or 3 when I drink. I can't tell you the last time it made me anything more then sleepy, I'm never violent and only occasionally extra giddy.
I like to look at the porn as much as the next guy and I'll occasionally have a smoke, although much more rare these days as all my old friends have responsibilities and families. The war on drugs has only served to make it more difficult to find for the otherwise responsible people.

If that makes me an alcoholic pornmonger, then I don't want to be right.

[HongKongFooey]

I drink probably three or four beer a week. Maybe a glass of Scotch here and there. What I really came in to say though is that I hope teetotalers aren't avoiding the DTP because of it. I think most of the regulars treat it more like a tavern than a party. Some will drink alcohol, some will sip juice. You can just sit around and shoot the shit if you want. It's much more fun with a variety of posters, hope to see you at one soon.

[Taur]

At most, I drink a few times a year since I either get a headache or heartburn from it while I'm drinking--a condition I don't find endearing or beneficial in the least. I've long passed the days of getting wasted on alcohol virtually every weekend, and how thrilled am I that those days were pre-internet?

What I drink when I drink is either a liqueur with coffee, a glass of wine with a GOOD meal, a Caesar, or a few gulps of ice cold beer if it's a blazingly hot day.

As for the herb... well, I have no thoughts of removing it from my life and I've used it in varying degrees over the years depending on the level of stress in my life, the worst of which was a couple of years in the grip of a panic and anxiety disorder.

[Amythyst]

I've never tasted an alcoholic beverage that I liked. I'll use wine in my cooking on occasion, but wine by itself? No thanks.

[Illuminati Primus]

I'm tee-total, never had a full drink or been drunk.

[Jaglavak]

Well, I'll be a teetotaller for at least a week after last weekend. Ow!

But it sure was fun playing pool at 2 AM with a bunch of vatos who didn't speak a word of english. They thought we didn't speak a word of spanish. Heh.

Originally Posted by SoylentPopTart

If that makes me an alcoholic pornmonger, then I don't want to be right.

You say that like it's wrong or something.

[Islander]

I cook with wine, and I'll occasionally have wine with dinner, but basically I'm not interested in drinking alone. Wine is a social drink for when friends get together.

I never really understood the DTP culture here. I stepped into one or two threads and thought them sophomoric. Once you graduate, don't you leave the frat party stuff behind? I just don't get the "it's Friday night, can't wait to start drinking through the weekend" attitude. So no — along with Sports and Mafia, that's another thread I don't look into. Plenty other stuff to keep me amused!

[Icerigger]

I do not drink at all. Over decades I have lived nightmares because of the abuse of alcohol in my immediate family. I have seen alcohol destroy people and families. It is more than simply not partaking it is outright hatred and fear of drinking. I will never touch the stuff even if I liked it which I don't.

[Jeff]

I'll usually have several drinks per week. I find that as I get older, having a drink helps me relax after a stressful day at work. Sometimes I'll have a beer or two with dinner depending what's on the menu, or baileys in my coffee.

I don't mind the taste of alcohol but I've never really gotten the knack of drinking the hard stuff straight. I bought a bottle of bourbon thanks to the thread in Better Living, we'll see if my tastes change.

[Zucchini Paw]

Actually i've started drinking a hell lot more during the past year. I don't like being drunk at all, i stop after 1 beer (don't particularely like the taste, but i can't keep drinking the hard stuff all the time).
I'm not social, so i drink at home (or at friend's home where i can crash). I don't like feeling even the slightest buzz if i'm outside. I'd rather have my wits about me in case something happens.

[Tripler]

I used to drink, but drifted away from it, and now I don't at all.

Back in the "Lieutenant Heydey" I would raise the roof. Disposable income, North Dakota, young guy. . . hell yeah! Then I got deployed a few times, and the hangovers lost their charm. Then I started getting into school for my Masters, and was working long hours. Then I got into EOD. Now, I just don't care for it at all. Not to be melodramatic, but I just can't afford it: I simply do not know when the BatPhone will ring.

So, I gave it up. For Lent/wife/health/looks/luck/posterity/etc. And I got my arse into shape and dropped thirty pounds too.

Tripler
- Dry.

[Solfy]

Originally Posted by Islander

I never really understood the DTP culture here. I stepped into one or two threads and thought them sophomoric. Once you graduate, don't you leave the frat party stuff behind? I just don't get the "it's Friday night, can't wait to start drinking through the weekend" attitude. So no — along with Sports and Mafia, that's another thread I don't look into. Plenty other stuff to keep me amused!

IME the quality of the DTP threads varies. When I do jump in (sober or not), they're more like chatting because they move fast and the conversations aren't what you'd call deep.

[HongKongFooey]

Originally Posted by Solfy

IME the quality of the DTP threads varies. When I do jump in (sober or not), they're more like chatting because they move fast and the conversations aren't what you'd call deep.

Some of the DTPs seem to be more like getting caught up with how people are doing or how their day wen t than anything else. I like those ones.

[Jeff]

But we have a chatroom for that.

[iampunha]

I haven't drunk alcohol because I wanted to drink alcohol since before I was allowed to drink alcohol.

• Sake at a restaurant some months ago -- I initially thought it was rubbing alcohol because it tasted so foul.
• Accidentally had some of what my wife and I call adult bear juice because there's alcohol in it.
• Testing a drink for the wife to see if it was still good.
• Testing a drink for the girlfriend to see if it was still good.
• Having some O'Doul's at a bar in New York because I'd gotten in through some amazing luck and I wasn't going to actually tell the guy I was underage.
• Having some hard lemonade at a dopefest and quitting halfway through the bottle -- upon realizing it had alcohol in it.

Before that, I wanted some wine at a family event, so my father poured me about a tablespoon, I tasted it, and I thought it was about the worst stuff I'd ever tasted. And I couldn't have been older than 19 for that.

Why nothing on purpose since then?

Don't need to spend money on alcohol, don't need to test the family genes (my grandfathers both drank way more than they needed; one of them stopped when he had an accident, though even that much is more a guess than a known fact), don't need a weaker mind with what's already in it.

[HongKongFooey]

Originally Posted by Jeff

But we have a chatroom for that.

Don't take it personally. I sometimes post in the DTP from work (sober obviously) but chat is blocked there so I just stick with what I have access to.

[Victor Frankenstein]

Originally Posted by Auntbeast

How many here don't drink at all or drink very rarely?

I reserve my drinking of alcohol to only 10-15 nights of the year. But on those nights, watch out.

Outside of those nights, every now and then I'll have a beer or something. Not very often though.

[Jeff]

Originally Posted by HongKongFooey

Don't take it personally. I sometimes post in the DTP from work (sober obviously) but chat is blocked there so I just stick with what I have access to.

I'm not taking it personally, I'm just crying because I've got something in my eye.

[Clayton_e]

iampunha my roommate got some sake not too long ago and I found it to be horrid.. I guess there's different qualities of it, though, and he might've gotten the equivalent of bathtub gin.

And r.e. wine in cooking.. Alcohol has such a low boiling point it is boiled off completely while you cook it. All that is left is what was non-alcoholic in the wine.

Example: Rubbing alcohol feels really cold on your skin because it evaporates much faster than water, which has a strong hydrogen bond that keeps it together and from flying off into the air. The atoms of alcohol take energy (heat) with them and make you feel cold. Alcohol does not have the strong hydrogen bond and therefore requires comparatively less energy to "fly off" per molecule.

So even if you have cooking wine anything you make with it could be consumed by someone who says they never consume anything alcoholic.

[HongKongFooey]

There are cooking charts available for cooking with alcohol. The amount burned off varies according to the type of liquor used and the cooking method. Unfortunately it is rarely 100% burned off.

[Zombies!]

Zombies! Drunky! Woo! is legendary and beloved around here.

I have, however, stopped drinking more or less. With my husband being so ill over the last couple of years, and having various times where I could be rushing him off to hospital in the middle of the night or at any random time, it became too much of a crapshoot to drink/be hung over.

Also, I binge drink, badly. I enjoy vodka and gin-based drinks, and I LOVE the feeling of being drunk. So even if I resolve to only have a drink or two, it very quickly becomes a GREAT idea to pour as much as I can down my throat as fast as possible. There have been a few occasions where I've passed out, I've been so drunk. Mainly I drink at home, so that's not a huge issue. It's not like I'm driving or staggering around town in the middle of the night drunk. But that combined with a family history of alcoholism and my own tendencies towards obsessive/addictive behaviours mean that in the long run, it's not a great idea for me to drink.

That said, it doesn't mean Z!D!W! is gone for good. I can never say never, because god knows, as I said, I love drinking and being drunk. My birthday's coming up shortly, it falls on a long weekend, and hubby's better than he has been in a couple of years, so there's a good chance she may make a reappearance.

[Clayton_e]

Huh, ok, well thanks for that info.. I was always under the impression that it was burned off completely.. but maybe that's because growing up I always watched my dad cook, he cooks stuff like that at high heat and longer periods of time, so maybe it was just his style and him telling me it was all burned off.

[HongKongFooey]

Originally Posted by Clayton_e

Huh, ok, well thanks for that info.. I was always under the impression that it was burned off completely.. but maybe that's because growing up I always watched my dad cook, he cooks stuff like that at high heat and longer periods of time, so maybe it was just his style and him telling me it was all burned off.

I always believed that too. Live and learn. Longer periods of time are definitely best. Here's one of the charts available.

[Random Precision]

I started drinking when I joined the Navy at 17, and since the legal age was 18 most of the places I was stationed, I didn't have any problem with being underage. I was never a habitual drinker - it was more of an out with the guys thing a couple of times a month for the most part. I did get completely snot-slingin' commode-huggin' drunk on a number of occasions (like in Hong Kong - oh my).

I started smoking cigarettes at 21 (while drinking - duh) and had the first hangover of my life shortly after. Then I found that I always had a hangover after a drunken evening. So at age 23, I stopped getting drunk, although I would still drink. If I found myself getting a buzz, I slowed to nothing or switched to soda for the rest of the evening. I told everyone I hadn't given up drinking - just hangovers.

Now, I drink virtually never. I may have a beer with friends once a month or a margarita at a Mexican restaurant, but rarely more than one. Of course, I suppose I could go back to getting drunk since I quit smoking 3 years ago, but somehow it doesn't have any appeal for me.

Also, while I have no problem with anyone else enjoying an alcoholic beverage, I absolutely cannot abide a drunk. Good thing I don't go out to bars very much anymore, either.

[Solfy]

Originally Posted by HongKongFooey

I always believed that too. Live and learn. Longer periods of time are definitely best. Here's one of the charts available.

Thanks for speaking up on that note, HKF. I let it slide the first time, but was all set with cites before I read your post. I attended an entertaining lecture on "Substance Abuse in the Kitchen" by Robert Wolke a couple of years ago. He's written some books debunking common cooking myths that, while I haven't got a hold of myself, should be an entertaining read. I liked his newspaper columns in the Washington Post. (he's also a fan of the SD, but I think not a Doper)

[HongKongFooey]

Everything I Know About Chemistry I learned In The Kitchen.

[Elyanna]

I drink fairly frequently, usually about once or twice a week, and typically only one drink a night that I sip on for a few hours, although that one drink is often a strong one. I like the warm buzzy feeling, but not so much the woozy drunky feeling. Never been drunk to the point of vomiting or fainting or doing things I regret, and I never want to be that drunk.

[Hokkaido Brit]

Itch, Itch, ITCH!

I just had a swig out of the bottle of wine left in the fridge from friends who came round the other day. One mouthful and my excema is ON FIRE. I want to claw my face off.

Then I read this thread. Yes, I'm a teetotaller. My face keeps me in check. Booo.

[MissJeanLouise]

Originally Posted by severe delays

It's also because my employer has very strict rules about when and how much we can drink on our own time and it's often not worth the bother of counting units of alcohol. I find a lot of my colleagues are either like me or the absolute opposite - save their units obsessively and have them all on their day off.

Can you explain this? Is it because you are on call that your employer is allowed to have such rules?

Oh, and as for me...I'm no teetotaller, but I don't drink very often anymore. Holidays and the like. Like Zombies, having people at home in my care (kids, in my case) makes drinking at home a bad idea.

[Falcon]

Originally Posted by HongKongFooey

I always believed that too. Live and learn. Longer periods of time are definitely best. Here's one of the charts available.

Gah! Thanks for posting this...I'll have to be careful. I think the last time I used cooking sherry, it was a couple of tablespoons in a marinade. So maybe that's why I didn't react to it? Must have stayed under even my pathetic threshold.

[scareyfaerie]

I have been sober, tipsy, merry, blind drunk, falling down drunk and probably worse states than that. Over the years I've learned my lessons and these days I drink when I feel like it and I know my limits. There aren't that many days when I get to work with a stonking hangover, but they have been known. I don't go out as much as I used to, but if I want a drink then I'll have one.

[Islander]

Originally Posted by HongKongFooey

I always believed that too. Live and learn. Longer periods of time are definitely best. Here's one of the charts available.

That explains a lot about my so-good homemade mushroom soup! Hic!