Today sucked. I did well - I’ve had one today, which I bummed off a co-worker this afternoon. Other than that, smoke free since Saturday night. But it sucks. I’m so close to getting in the car and going to 7-11 right now I can’t even describe it. I’m going for a walk - try to clear my head.
Archive for the 'Daily Grind' Category
11
Jul
Quit-Log, Day 7
10
Jul
Quit-Log, Days 5 & 6
As of day 5 (Saturday), I still had 4 cigarettes left in the last of the two packs I had bought before deciding to quit. I finished those off by about 9:30 Saturday night and decided that was it - I wasn’t buying any more.
It’s now 10:15 PM on day 6 (Sunday), and I’m still smoke-free as of last night. Not the easiest day, and there were a couple of points I found myself justifying going out and buying a pack. But I squashed those thoughts and stuck it out. Hopefully, tomorrow will be at least a little bit easier. The whole “at work” thing is going to be tough, though. I may wind-up with a pack of smokes I leave in my desk. We’ll see.
When we pulled up to the first bar last night, we took at shot at finding a parking spot in front since it was raining (and a hurricane was looming). Sure enough, we snagged a metered spot right outside the front door. It was a 2-hour limit, but we didn’t figure on being there that long. We left about two-and-a-half hours later and found a present waiting on my windshield.
I figured, “Sweet! I’m good for the rest of the night, as long as I leave this on my car!”. Yeah…that wasn’t terribly smart. The cops figure, if you’ve already gotten a warning for an expired 2-hour meter, and another couple of hours goes by, you must not have any intention of honoring the meter in the first place. Hence, the second present waiting on my windshield when we left at 2AM.
It was worth it, though - it was a great spot, it was raining when we got there and raining harder when we left, and it would have been $10 to park in the garage several blocks away.
09
Jul
Quit-Log, Day 4
Bad, bad day for me and not smoking. I had smoked 5 during the day at the office (strange mood that day - couldn’t help it), and then I went out with a couple friends. I was doing ok at the first bar, as I left my cigarettes in the car. I had one when we left that bar and started walking to the next, but just the one - I got it out of my car and left the rest in there. I bought a cigar on the way to the second bar, as well, and smoked that between the second bar and the club. Once we were in the club, I knew it was all over. They sold cigarettes - which most places do, but they don’t usually have them on display at the front door - and there were just too many people in there smoking. I wound up with a pack of camels and smoked at least 4 or 5 before throwing the rest away. What can I say…I was weak, I was fairly drunk, and I cracked under the pressure.
Today should be a pretty damn good day, though, as I didn’t get out of bed ’till 3PM (got home at 4:30 AM from being out last night). Considering I slept most of the day away, my total for day #5 should be pretty low. We’ll see. Oh…and before I forget…thank you, thank you, thank you to my friends who have been giving me shit the last couple of days about slipping. You guys rock, as that’s exactly what I need. Keep it up, please.
07
Jul
Quit-Log, Day 3
I smoked 5 today. Not as good as yesterday, but definitely good enough. Overall, it wasn’t a good day. Too much on my mind, too much going on at work and way too damn hot in my office. Seems the last time the A/C guys did some work, they disconnected the vent to my office. By 3:00 PM, it had gotten up to 79 degrees in there. Lovely.
If it the temperature in my office hits 77 tomorrow, I’m walking out and calling it a day.
06
Jul
Quit-Log, Day 2
Today didn’t go quite as easy as yesterday. I smoked my first around 10:15 - about an hour after I got to work. Around noon I tried my first piece of Nicorette, which at least gave me something to focus on as I tried to avoid chewing constantly (didn’t work - still got a little dizzy). I figured I would be smart today and wait to smoke after eating lunch. I didn’t finish eating ’till around 1, so I just figured, “let’s see how long I can coast” and I chewed some regular gum. We finished deploying a large update to a major application around 2, so I figured it was time. It had been almost four hours, and I needed to step away from work-things for a few minutes after getting that update deployed. Celebratory cigarette = #2 for the day.
Late afternoon was tricky. I had another piece of Nicorette around 4:30, and figured I’d try to make it to 6 before smoking again. That was a pretty looooong 90 minutes. I got there, though, and had smoke #3 right at 6. I left the office a few minutes before 7, came home and ate, cleaned the kitchen up, blah, blah, blah. I had my last-of-the-day smoke at 10, which puts my total for the day at a very respectable 4.
Let’s re-cap:
- average day for the last 14 years = 18-22 cigarettes
- yesterday = 7 cigarettes + 0 pieces of Nicorette
- today = 4 cigarettes + 2 pieces of Nicorette
I think I’ll hold at 4 cigarettes / day for tomorrow. Today was a little too sketchy to push it further just yet. Plus, the weekend’s coming…there will be drinking…Ughh…
06
Jul
Quit-Log, Day 1
Technically, today was actually “day 3″, but everything is more “real” in the light of a weekday - dealing with work and standard grind. So, we’ll call this “day 1″ for log purposes.
Today I smoked at 10, when I first got to work, and then again at 12. That second one was stupid - I should have smoked at 12:45 - after I ate lunch - as not smoking after lunch was pretty tough. I smoked again at 2, and then I was in meetings from 2 ’till 5, which is when I smoked again. One more at 6:45, just before I left the office, so that was only 4 during work hours which is very, very good for me. I stopped by the drug store and got some (more) chewing gum as well as some (orange-flavored) Nicorette. I realize, without a doubt, that not smoking is better in many, many ways and over the long run will be cheaper, but shit - $50 for nicotine gum? I should be able to use my health insurance for that kind of thing. Oh, wait - this is the US and we only pay for treatment, not for prevention. My bad.
Anyway, I didn’t break open the Nicorette just yet (the shit’s expensive, after all), as I had no intention of truly going smoke free today. I had one at 9:30, after dinner and cleaning up the kitchen and blah, blah stuff, and then one more about 20 minutes ago, as I could tell I would get twitchy if I went to bed without one last one. Of course, that’s going to be a problem in the coming days as I’m already able to actually feel the affects of each cigarette, and of course the nicotine is going to keep me up. It probably always did, but the mental aspect is going to be worsened as I ween myself off of these things. All in all, though, I think today was a big success. Pick a day last week, and my tally by bed time would have been in the 18-22 range, whereas today was only 7. Sure, 7 may still seem like a lot to most non-smokers, but it’s all relative and we’re in the ball-park of a 66% decrease. I’m calling that a good day and heading to bed.
Side note for coworkers: if you happen to read this, please, please, please schedule me for some meetings. It’s a hell of a lot easier to do this when I’m busy with meetings than when I’m busy but alone at my desk.
04
Jul
Time to Quit
It’s time. I’ve been smoking for almost 14 years, and even I have to admit – it’s time. I started yesterday by trying to get myself on a schedule. The idea being, I would prevent myself from smoking “for no good reason”. Granted, there is no “good reason” to smoke, but after so many years it’s better to say I’m smoking because it’s been exactly X-number of hours rather than not even noticing I’ve gone through more than a pack a day.
So…for yesterday it was once every couple of hours at most, though I didn’t start the plan ‘till after 6 PM or so. Today, it was the same. There were a couple of stretches early afternoon (I didn’t get up ‘till noon) that didn’t look too promising, but I was alright. I slipped a little late this evening, but I had half-a-dozen beers between dinner and the fireworks (next post for more on that) and everyone smokes more when they’ve been drinking. Hell, most of my non-smoking friends have been known to take at least a drag after a night of drinking. It’s just harder, ya know? So…here I sit at 10:55, having been up for 11 hours and having smoked 7 times. It’s really only 6 against me – there was one that I didn’t even want but it was an excuse to walk away from a bad situation – but I guess I have to count it. I’ll try to go for only one more before bed, if any, and tomorrow I’m gonna get some Nicorette. I hear they have new flavors since last I bought the stuff.
All messages/wishes of encouragement are welcome. I’m trying to be open about this so that the shame of failure goes beyond my own mind.
Taking six days off of work has got me all screwed up, and not just my “schedule”, though that’s whacked all to hell right now also (case in point: I should be sleeping right now!). Monday - the first (official) day back - was fine. I had actually gone in for a few hours Saturday and Sunday, so I was mostly caught up on email and ready to get something done. I actually got up when the alarm went off - despite having only slept five hours - and was all about getting to work. That lasted one day.
Today sucked. My interest in the work to be done is practically non-existent. A review late yesterday of what’s coming up in the next few months lowered my motivation level even more. The entire dynamic within my group had changed a couple of months back, and that’s not helping either. Top it off with my usual “anniversary-depression” - I’ve been there six years as of tomorrow, the 25th. Add it all up and the summer is looking pretty bad.
I’ll try to latch on to my belief that this is all really just the usual anniversary-related crap, and it’s really no worse than years gone by, so there’s nothing to get all worried about. Still, though…I spend too much of my life focused on work - despite wanting and planning to do other things - to be content with the drudgery that makes up 90% of my job.
12
Mar
It really is magic!!!
Holy cow! The Mr. Clean Magic Eraser
is freakin’ amazing! A quick Google search will show I’m late to the
party, but I had to post something anyway because I was absolutely
floored by this thing. I picked up a pack a week or so ago while buying
stuff to wash my car. I picked up a standard monster brush to use on
the rims, along with one of those �spray-on, wash-off, you’re-done�
products. I saw the Magic Eraser sitting right there and thought, �No
way is this gonna do anything on my nasty wheels�, but it was very
cheap so I thought I’d give it a shot. I started with the spray-on
product, and it did absolutely nothing, even after two applications on
one of the rims. Then I tried the Magic Eraser. Honest to God, it was
effortless and the rims look brand new!! The months of
dirt/grime/brake-dust just wiped away with no force whatsoever as
quickly as I could move the eraser over the rims. It probably took all
of 10 minutes to clean all four, despite how aweful they looked when I
started. I was truly, truly amazed (enough to write this blog post).
If you haven’t tried these things, by all means go pick up a pack
and give ‘em a shot. They’ve also got a Magic Erasor Duo which is two
sided and meant to be used indoors (you use the non-eraser side to wipe
up whatever it is you’re trying to get rid of after going over it with
the eraser). I’m definitely gettin’ me some of those. Granted, there
are some surfaces you’ll want to keep these things away from, but they
still�work on a ton of stuff (even sneakers, according to some
posts I found with Google). Check ‘em out!
