Okay, it should really say “Sparkling wine?”
Today’s post is all about my ‘first alcoholic drink for one year’, my FADFOY. What it was, why I chose it and how it felt to drink it after taking a year long break from drinking every night. In this post I will address the following postscripts from the previous post:
PS. Tune in for the lowdown (next post) on what it was like to have my FADFOY. I’m sure I’ll have more juicy stuff to share. Hopefully it won’t involve recalling the sight of undigested carrots, bile and other stomach contents puked on the bathroom floor after a belated booze binge.
PSS. I’m pretty sure it won’t!
PSSS. But anything’s possible.
Anything IS possible.
This is proved by the fact I went most of the day after my year of living sober was up WITHOUT A DRINK. I mean, technically I could have risen at one minute past midnight and downed a champagne breakfast (talk about breaking a fast!) before the sun rose on 12th November.
But I didn’t.
Nor did I take an alcoholic drink with lunch whilst out celebrating with my family for my mother-in-law’s birthday (and wouldn’t THAT have been a perfect time to dull the son-in-law senses?).
No. I waited. Even until after we’d all gone back home to share the beautiful cake my wife had arranged to be made especially to mark the completion of my YOLS. There was a perfectly good bottle of chilled champagne ready to go in the fridge, but I felt like coffee with my cake, so the FADFOY moment had to wait even longer.
“It’s gluten-free too!”
I guess I could have popped open a beer before bathing our baby girls. I mean pre-YOLS I used to juggle my first beer and drying off our eldest before getting into making dinner for everybody, but I didn’t. I waited.
Then, once the girls where in bed, and my wife and I had the lounge-room to ourselves I decided it was time: I was ready to have my first alcoholic drink for one year.
So what would it be?
It was a question my friend had asked me a couple of weeks before the end of my year of living sober. We met up in the city and walked around a bit while he filmed me on my HD camera. I think now is the perfect time to look back on how I answered that question of what drink I would choose to break the drought.
Here’s the video.
So, as you can see (if you watched the vid) it looked like red wine was the front runner for my FADFOY. But, and since we know ‘anything is possible’, as it turned out, being ‘in the moment’ meant in the end I decided on a…drum roll please…a…BEER.
A good ol’ frothy-top ale.
And it was AWESOME! I mean, just great. Cold, full flavoured lovely.
So, the answers to: what my FADFOY was, why I chose it and how did it feel are:
What did I choose for my first alcoholic drink in over a year?
Beer*.
* I’d love to tell you the brand but doing so without getting a cash-kickback seems like a waste—hey, I used to do Television commercials for a living (partly!) and I’m not about to do a beer ad for nadda now! N.B. If anyone from Carlton United Breweries is reading this I do have some footage of one of your products being savoured as my first drink post YOLS. In HD too!
Why did I choose it?
It was a hot day and I was thirsty. Plus I love beer.
How did it feel?
Bloody terrific.
Just. Great.
So Where To From Here For YOLS?
I may have reached my goal of a year off booze but I’m going to keep posting about my experience with drinking alcohol again (in moderation and sophistication) after one year of temporary teetotalism.
I’d also like to see this blog become a resource for other big drinker’s who’d like to take a break for a while (remember WOLS=Week of Living Sober, MOLS=Month of Living Sober and if a YOLS is too much to consider why not start off with a DOLS=a ‘Day of Living Sober’).
The ‘Year of Living Sober’ Television Show
At my friend’s suggestion I ended my YOLS by keeping a video journal for the last 14 days. My wife also filmed me drinking my first beer in a year (and, as I said, in High Definition) and so now my plan is to use that footage, combined with the 140 blog posts and hundreds of photos and graphic images Year of Living Sober inspired, to pitch a couple of ’Year of Living Sober’ ideas to TV and film producers.
Maybe this YOLS thing has got some legs? I know there are all those MOLS orgs like Feb Fast, Dry July, Ocsober and Hello Sunday Morning, which each seem to be growing in popularity every year. So I’m certainly not alone in thinking taking a break from alcohol can be really good for you.
And fun too!
My name is Ben and I’m a dipsomaniac and a ‘Year of Living Sober’ survivor!
☆
Little Booze Joke
Big Foot walks into an exclusive bar in New York and orders a $30 Martini. Mesmerized by the strange sight of Big Foot at his bar the barman manages to keep it together as he pours Big Foot his drink and presents it to him. “There you go,” says the barman. “And sorry for staring but you’re quite an unusual sight in a place like this. We don’t get many Sasquatches in here.” Big Foot sips his Martini before replying gruffly, “At your prices I’m not surprised.”
How about you? What do you think your FADFOY of choice would be? Love to get your comment.
