I quit....and this time, I mean it. I hope.

Well, it's been almost 3 days without a smoke. Not even a puff. Shit, I won't even inhale when I pass a smoker in the street. So, far, so good. Around 11 PM on New Year's Eve I had my last smoke and the urge, while there, has yet to get the best of me. Sure, I haven't fully tested myself yet but I have certainly given myself many reasons to hit the stick.

My normal routine during the week is to wake up, shower and help the wife get the kids ready for school. Then one of us takes my daughter to school. If it is me, I drop her off and walk the ten or so blocks to my office. 2 butts smoked during the walk. Then I hit the office and I light up whenever I leave to get food, drinks, hit the bank etc. No smoking in my office. I smoke on the walk home. A mile, maybe a mile and a half walk. Several smoked along the way.

On weekends, the smoking is actually reduced. Wake up, toss on some clothes and get Starbucks. Smoke on the way to Starbucks and on the way back. Add another butt if I also pick up food for the kids (doughnuts, bagels etc). Then I smoke whenever I am alone. So, the wife realizes we are out of something I am very quick to run and get it. We need the car? I get it and pick the family up in front of the building so I can get one last smoke in before we hit the road.


So, I stopped on Wed. night. Yay me but the work day, the stress and the need for a break will put me to the test for sure. That said, so far, here's what I've done that has not resulted in my enjoying a long deep breath of carcinogens settling into my already scarred and tarred lungs.
1. Got the coffee two days in a row.
2. Ran several errands for the wife.
3. Two pointless, I am stressed and suffering from nicotine withdrawal fights.
4. One trip to get the car, on trip returning alone from the garage.
5. One long day at my mother in law's. That's right, I spend an afternoon with my wife and kids at my mother in law's apartment. To make the time there more enjoyable, my sister in law and her husband and kids were there. 9 people stuffed into her apartment while she berated and yelled at her daughters for infractions like trying to clean up, offering to help and being blond (not even natural).
6. Walked to my office from Times Square. Dropped the wife and kids off with her sister and her kids so they could do some touristy shit and, since my brother in law was not coming, I figured I'd head to the office, go thru the mail, fuck around and kill time. Freaked me out when I walked in to find someone else in the office - employee of the web design firm we share space with.
7. Took copious amounts of pain meds. The ankle has been acting up quite a bit lately. Might be the walking around, climbing up and down steep steps in the Intrepid (awesome, heading back on Wednesday I think) or just that the ankle is getting worse and, therefore, hurting more but I had to loot the percocet supply big time over the last 2 days and I do so love me a perc haze smoke. Still, I haven't had one.

I hate to be a gun jumping jackass but I will say that I have quit for extended periods before, once for about a year and the first week is usually tougher than the last few days have been so, perhaps, the whole mental planning, promising myself that, at 40 (3/12/09 start shopping now) I would no longer smoke etc worked as intended.

Who knows, maybe my seeign two movies in a row last week where one of the lead characters coughs up blood freaked me out enough. Don't care why it has, so far, been this easy. Just know that it has.

Oh, the two movies?
Bucket List which I had seen before but I was one of two people that really enjoyed the film. My wife was the other.
Gran Tourino - new Clint Eastwood movie. Fucking brilliant. Clint at his grizzled, crusty, angry codger with a heart best. Even if you removed Clint's oscar worthy performance, took away every other actor's incredible performance (they were all incredible) and you took away the amazingly emotional, comical, nerve wracking, heart wrenching story, you'd still have a movie worth seeing. The stereotypes, the bigotry and the ethnic slurs are genius. With about 8 minutes left in the movie, when you think you have heard every single asian slur known to man thru the course of the movie, Clint drops 4 or 5 new ones in a row.

While smoking.