46 Hours and Counting

That’s right, less than 46 hours to go before Britt and I and the rest of the Quitterati stop smoking. Am I freaking out about it? Hell no! I’m resolute – standing firm – excited as hell. OK, maybe that’s bullshit.

The truth is I enjoy smoking. Even though it doesn’t REALLY relieve stress, I FEEL like it does. And when Friday comes to town – and just to be clear, the quit time is midnight as Thursday rolls into Friday – I’ll likely be battening down the hatches and locking myself in the house for weeks days. I’ve quit smoking before and this works for me.

See, driving? That’s one of the big smoke triggers. So there won’t be any driving for at least 72 hours. And there are MANY triggers, believe me. Eating. There’s nothing like a smoke after a meal. Waking up. There’s nothing like a smoke first thing in the morning. Coffee. There’s nothing like a smoke with your morning coffee. Drinking. There’s nothing like a smoke while you’re drinking. Blinking. There’s nothing like a smoke when you’re blinking. I could go on and on, but you get the idea.

This is going to be a bitch, I don’t deny it. But I’ve done it before and I’ll do it again I know this is the time. I need to do this for my health, before I have any of the inevitable ailments that come from smoking. I just hope I haven’t done irreparable damage to my body already.

In the meantime, I’m a chainsmoking fool. My mom will inherit whatever cigarettes I have left come Friday.

If you’re quitting with me, I hope you’ll leave a comment here to let me know. There are quite a few of you that said you’d quit with me. And it doesn’t matter where you live, whatever the time zone, your last puff comes at midnight August 15.

Tomorrow night, in fact, two hours before I quit, you can join me for SecondHand Radio. It’ll be my first night in the new timeslot, AND my first show on Talkshoe. If you haven’t already registered at Talkshoe do it now. Well, do it after you finish reading this. It’s fast and simple and will let you join in on the chatroom during the show Thursday night at 10pm Eastern time. You can also follow the show after you’ve registered, log it as a favorite so you can always be in tune with the next episodes. Oh, and follow Jester’s show, too, because he rocks. Oh, and Britt’s and Adam’s show.

My guest for the inaugural episode on Talkshoe is none other than my bestest buddy, Hilary! I can think of no other person I’d rather have on as my first guest. She has a big blogiversary coming up on Sunday, so we’ll be talking about that. And my blogiversary comes up on the 25th of this month, too. We’ll talk anything and everything and you’ll want to be there.

Thanks to Jester for his guest post yesterday. I owe him a guest post and will try to get that out in the next few days…once I finish putting out fires. I’m fixing (I hope) a friend’s computer and it’s a real pain in the ass. Don’t get me wrong, the PC is dead after this. I’m only praying I can salvage the data off the hard drive. But hey, five years for a computer is like 80 in dog years or something.

Tomorrow, it’ll be Monty from The Daily Bitch. Can’t wait. For those of you that are new around here, I do a little thing every year called the Summer of Love, which is full of guest bloggers. So you’ll see fresh faces here on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays through the end of this month. Just in time to ramp up for my Birthday Spectacular, where I plan to bring back my Big Birthday Dares.

Now I thought I’d wrap up with a little list that seems apropos.

Top Ten Reasons Why It’s Good That I’m Quitting Smoking

1. I won’t stink. As much. My breath, my hair, my fingers…they’ll all smell much better.
2. My car won’t stink, either. As much. Course, there’s the small matter to deal with that is my rear passenger window. It doesn’t stay up all the way, so it sometimes rains into my car, creating a swamp like environment. I like to think of it as my own little biosphere. Frogs and crickets are welcome.
3. I’ll save lots of money! Who knows, maybe I can get my car windows fixed. Yeah, windows. My driver’s side window doesn’t roll down. Freaking power windows.
4. I won’t be telling friends and family, “Be back in a few. I’m gonna make out.”
5. Making out will once again mean REALLY making out. As in kissing. Not that I’ve had any opportunities for that of late. I’m pretty much a born-again virgin at this point. But still.
6. I suppose I should mention my health in here somewhere since that’s technically the reason I’m quitting. You know, before anything major happens with my body. I watched my stepfather die over four years ago from lung cancer. Wasn’t fun. I don’t want that to be me. I’d like to be around for my daughters’ graduations and weddings and – God help me – children. Not that that better happen any time soon.
7. More time for exercise! Or to start exercising. I’ll have to find SOME way to work through all of the stress from not smoking. And to work off the extra weight gain. And the weight I have BEFORE the weight gain.
8. More time for masturbating!
9. More time for catching up on my Tivo. Because, yeah, I really need to watch MORE TV.
10. More time for beating the fuck out of anyone that irritates me, which is bound to be everyone for a while. OK, maybe that’s not a good thing. But hey, more time for masturbating!