Eyes wide open

I don't take note of many anniversaries or important dates, but I'll note that as of this morning, it's been 19 years since I woke up with a hangover. (Except that it turns out it's more the cigarette smoke than the booze that actually causes the hangover, at least for me, and so anytime I go out with other people to watch them get drunk, I end up suffering in the morning just as if I'd done the Bad Thing. So I'm pretty thankful for the upcoming indoor smoking ban.) (Oh, and once, very early into this whole Prohibition For a Nation Of One experiment, I got some kind of pastry at an old-school Italian bakery, and it was just dripping with rum. I spit it out but the flavor lingered and I've felt guilty ever since. Thought I'd get that off my chest.) (People have suggested that perhaps chocolate and/or chocolate ice cream serve as a replacement addiction for me. I suggest in return that they just hand over the ice cream scoop or I will be forced to hurt them.) (James Joyce once wrote 236 pages of dialogue that was entirely parenthetical.) (Not really.)