Nicotine is helping me write this post.
According to Wikipedia,
Nicotine is an alkaloid found in the nightshade family of plants; biosynthesis takes place in the roots and accumulation occurs in the leaves. It constitutes approximately 0.6–3.0% of the dry weight of tobacco and is present in the range of 2–7 µg/kg of various edible plants. It functions as an antiherbivore chemical; therefore, nicotine was widely used as an insecticide in the past and nicotine analogs such as imidacloprid are currently widely used.
Delicious!
Now, don’t get me wrong, I know it’s poison, it is from the nightshade family after all, and everyone knows that nightshade is poisonous. (brb, smoke) So, apparently, is caffeine, alcohol, sugar, gluten, plastic, Television, FarmVille, and Liberal Idealogy1. So why then, do I keep smoking it? Why does anyone? Are you people idiots!?
Yes. Shhhh. Don’t tell anyone. We’re all idiots2.
Why have human beings (brb, smoke) been smoking this poison (as well as countless other poisons) for ever and ever?
It’s an addiction! I thought you might say this. Ok then, back to the Wiks:
Addiction is the continued use of a mood altering substance or behaviour despite adverse consequences, or a neurological impairment leading to such behaviors.
Some other things I’ve heard are addictions: food, sex, arguing, flipping light switches on and off three times in a row, video games, acting…
Acting? Well, yes. Think about it: How many other activities can an individual partake in that a). never make money and only cost it b). result in a short-term adrenaline high that c). needs to be repeated in more and more extreme conditions to reach the same high and d). completely ruin people’s lives?
Exactly. Ask Nick Nolte3. (brb, smoke)
But unlike acting, nicotine is simple, much less expensive, and neatly packaged. And it works. Not only for losing weight. (I’m convince that my recent weight loss is a result of cigarette and Hitler4.) But also for concentration and to help adults suffering from autosomal dominant nocturnal frontal lobe epilepsy.
Not to mention a cigarette and a cup of coffee in the morning clearly helps clear the swampy upholstery-head that comes from waking up. See, I’m the kind of guy who needs at least 13 hours of sleep a night to feel rested. I know what some of you goddamn lemmings out there are saying, “I get only 5 hours of sleep and I work all day long!”
Well, good for you, suckers!
I have, (brb, smoke) since I was a child, (brb, smoke) been a heavy sleeper. I’ve been known to sleep through a lot of otherwise unsleepable situations: things like my cousins farting on my face, my sisters grabbing my feet to crack my toe-knuckles, and that of my father ripping off my sheets in the cold winter morning, turning on the light and in his terribly off-key voice, singing ‘good morning’. I can sleep through hell and back. (brb, smoke)
But still, I sleep.
You might call it depression. I just call it ‘being me.’
I’m like a bird, I’ll only fly away
I don’t know where my soul is, I don’t know where my home is
(and baby all I need for you to know is)
I’m like a bird, I’ll only fly away
I don’t know where my soul is , I don’t know where my home is
All I need for you to know is
I’m like a bird!
(brb, smoke)
I may be lazy. I may be worthless, but maybe I’m just more in tune with my physiological needs and refuse to allow the post-industrial 9 – 5 work-week created by insatiable mechanical industry robber-barons to override my natural circadian rhythms.
Also, let’s not forget the immortal words of Bertrand Russell when he said “Time enjoyed wasting is not wasted time.”
That’s right. I’m gonna buck the system! I’m not a cog in a wheel5!
Lions don’t get up, get out of bed, drag a comb across their heads in order to spend a day in the life on the Serengeti. No. They get up, they putz around, and then, when the time is right, they chase gazelles and eat them. Then they sleep again. Elton John understood.
But things aren’t set up that way, and if you buck the system, you’re a worthless piece of crap.
Oh sure, part of it is competition. “You gotta get ahead!” “Work hard and you’ll get ahead!”
But ahead of what? Of who? Of Donald Trump? Bah. I don’t want to be Donald Trump. Also, I’m ok with going bald6
Sounds like it, Dedes. This is the second post in a row where you talk about it.
I have to have another smoke to help the ideas of this post crystallize… brb…
Topic suggestions should be sent to wikiwhatbydedes@gmail.com. For the love of Zero, please send some in!
1 Actually, aren’t all absolute ideologies poisonous? Not to mention just plain stupid? But I guess so is not having any particular ideology… then you’re just an opportunistic libertine, my personal favorite.
2 Actually, I’m more fond of the idea that we’re all ants, as part of a giant, diversified hive.
3 Or Heath Ledger. Or James Dean. Or Chris Farley. Or…
4 Cigarettes kill you, but they go for the cellulite first, and an incessant irrational fear of genocidal government can really get your heartbeats per minute elevated.
5 Unless, of course, that wheel is part of a hamster-wheel sex-orgy!
6 Yes, this is why the West is in decline. Jarvis gets it.
Kevin Dedes 