I wish I enjoyed alcohol more - or rather, more consistently. I drank like a fish in high school, but became far less interested in booze once I discovered the joys of other drugs. When it works well, it's great - mutes my social anxiety somewhat, makes me actually want to socialize with people I don't already know super well - but it seems like it's just as likely to make me feel nauseous and braindead, in which case all I want to do is go home and smoke a bowl. I like drinking a lot more at a party where I can smoke weed whenever I feel like it would help instead of having to wait for a good opportunity to leave the social setting I'm at to burn, but opportunities for that have become fewer and farther between since I finished undergrad. Law student social drinking mostly happens at bars. I fucking hate drinking at bars... It's so goddamn expensive, if I'm gonna drop $20+ to get intoxicated it's gonna be something much more exciting than a few drinks. And I can't blaze without leaving, which makes it hard for me to relax and get into the idea of hanging out and socializing. Sometimes my metabolism, brain chemistry, and rate of consumption all align just right and it's lovely - but at least as often as that happens, I find myself feeling a bit nauseous, not all that social, and just wanting to leave so I can smoke and feel an intoxication I know I'll actually enjoy. I'll probably drink in A'dam, since being able to smoke won't be an issue. I'm not sure if you can smoke at bars per se (I know places with liquor licenses can't sell weed and vice versa, but I'm not sure if bringing your own to smoke outside or in a smoker-friendly area is allowed - I'm sure I'll find that out soon enough, haha)... But you can smoke in public on the street as long as you're not too close to a school or public park and you don't create a public nuisance, so I can just step out for a jay the same way I'd step out for a cig in a US bar. But given how fucking expensive everything else about that city is, I don't think I'll wanna waste too much of my precious weed/hash money on booze. Maybe I can find a cheap-ish local dive bar near my hostel and avoid the inflated tourist prices. Aside from the free beer I had on the flight to Rome and a glass of wine here and there in Italy, I can't remember the last time I drank. It's prolly legit been years since I drank more than 1-2 drinks in a night.
I'm reallllly looking forward to ending this tolerance break tomorrow. My vacation is about to go from bourgie museum tour to Eurotrip partying shenanigans. I think I'm gonna pick up some philosopher stones (aka psilocybe mushroom truffles/sclerotia) for at least one of my days in A'dam. They banned fresh 'shrooms a while back, but the ban only applies to fruiting bodies, so smartshops are still allowed to sell truffles. I guess drug policy being arbitrary and stupid is one constant in this world, even in the legendarily tolerant and rational Netherlands. Given my history with shrooms, I don't know if they'll do much of anything for me, but it's been years since I last gave psilocybin a try and I'm not sure when I'll have an opportunity to trip in public knowing that it's 100% legal and tolerated again. Maybe I'll dose up and head to the Rembrandt or Van Gogh museums... Could be fun. And a Dutch coffeeshop sounds like a perfect setting for a shroom comedown... Nothing like a hash joint or three to get the trip going again, right?
Honestly, I'm more excited at the prospect of enjoying Dutch drug policies than I thought I would be. I figured it would be little more than a novelty really, since great weed is readily available to me in Chicago and it hardly even seems illegal since I can smoke whenever I want without issue, but I still can't just walk down the street in broad daylight smoking a joint without being at least a *little* paranoid about cops/narcs spotting me. I think my drug use has greatly exacerbated my social anxiety over the years, since I've just become used to the idea that I always have something to hide and can't really let my guard down in public. It got better once I realized that, in 99% of places and situations, nobody gives the tiniest of shits that I'm stoned and I don't actually have to hide it at all as long as I don't have anything on me... But still, knowing that something I do multiple times a day is illegal and could theoretically get me in a fair amount of trouble even in liberal Chitown is a little dark cloud that's always overhead when I'm in public or with people I don't know to be fellow stoners. And my social anxiety reinforces that by making me less likely to find out whether people I know but not super well smoke or not. I've never actually had someone my own age who I had any interest in being friends with in the first place react negatively to the fact that I smoke pot, but that doesn't make it any easier for me to broach the subject.
So in other news, there are some peeps beatboxing and freestyle rapping in the street outside my flat in Paris. If I didn't have to get up early tomorrow I'd pop out for a cig and see what's up, cuz it's a pretty safe bet there's weed involved. At least, I hope so... This girl has no business freestyling if she's sober. Maybe they're just drunk, though... Fuckin' alcohol. There, brought this post around full circle :D
The first half of my third decade is proving to be way less fucking shit the last quarter of my 6th half-decade. 
