Since I've started working full-time with office hours, I've noticed a change in my views on stimulants. I used to avoid them psychotically. They're not healthy. But things change; now I'm working, doing computer dork shit with computer dorks all day. We're not really a heavy sleep breed, and there's a lot of (really, really bad) coffee here as a result.
It all started with the (really, really bad) coffee. I would drink a little basically just to drink it. I have a coffee cup; what else should I do with it? When I started working here, coffee still had little effect on me (I have this mysterious natural tolerance to all kinds of shit). The mornings hit me hard, but I didn't try to keep awake with coffee or anything because I knew it wouldn't help me.
Eventually, it started helping. I liked coffee a bit just to speed a little. The nights never shortened (I still stayed up all the time) when I started working, so I was still staying up ass-late and getting up at 8 or whatever to walk to the bus stop, to go wait for the bus, to take the bus, and then to walk from the bus to work. I started drinking more and more, and I was barred from making coffee at work as well because I made it way too strong and no one would drink it. Coffee hurts my stomach pretty bad though.
I stopped with the coffee for a while. Started with guarana. SoBe, Bawls, and other seemingly innocent drinks would be my source for energy. They proved much more polite than coffee, and sometimes much more effective. The love of guarana also was fueled by my favorite herbal crack, which goes by the name of Up Your Gas. The shit's the absolute most ridiculously named herbal supplement in existence, but I don't care; it works. The shit's jam-packed with goodness. The Up Your Gas "Blend" as it says on the label, is a 695mg mix of, well...
Guarana concentrate (seed), mahuang extract (Ephedra sinica) (stem) (285 mg of 6% alkaloid extract), ginseng extract (root), bee pollen, spirulina blue green algae, gotu kola (leaf), inosine monophosphate, pyridoxal-alpha-ketoglutarate, wheat grass, cayenne pepper (fruit), lipoic acid, co-enzyme Q-10 and octacosanol.
If that's not enough, then you're not looking for herbal crack. There's also a mahuang-free version, and it's got a lot more weight to it, but...But back to what I was saying...Yeah, I was all a speed freak there for a while. At the time I was also reading Neuromancer, which kinda just made it worse. Guarana became like a religious figure for me. I practically collected the shit. With that and regular caffeine, I was really packing. With this arsenal I could stay up as late as I was used to, and in addition the shit would make me happy. So eventually I realized this happiness and alertness shit just wouldn't work well with my family's heart attack history, and I stopped...cold turkey.
Another weird thing about me and chemicals is that I'm extremely prone to addiction...but I don't really get addicted because I can stop something basically on command. In other words, I stopped with all this crack, and didn't really suffer any withdrawal or anything like that. Now I try to limit the intake of all stimulants as much as I can. The bottle of Up Your Gas I had is gone now, which really helps with my rehab attempts. On the other hand, I do have a box of Vivarin now, but I'm sure to never take it more than once a week...which means I've already blew this week. Mondays hurt.
Mornings have totally fucked up my view and usage of stimulants. It's weird. I never really drank coffee or herbal drinks or anything like that before I started working here. I'm gonna go ahead and call that bad. Hey, the shit costs money. And I also found fear in the fact that herbal crack makes me happy (like giddy). I don't like that at all. I need to be happy naturally, or not at all.
Mornings hurt.