What's to stop you from having a couple?
Getting smashed all the time is a hopeless waste of money, brain cells and life in general.... But I fail to see why a hardline, black and white approach to alcohol and cigarettes is needed unless you simply cannot control yourself.
Why not treat yourself to a couple of nice German beer every now and then. Go to a good liquor store and just by yourself a couple of bottles once a month/fortnight/week or whatever?
I work in the liquor industry and it taught me one thing very quickly.... Alcohol is very easy to abuse and is far too often entirely misunderstood as far as drunk-driving, health risks and the after effects of a big night (in regard to the time it takes to full recover). If for no other reason alcohol is best in fairly strict moderation because it makes you fat. Even white spirits are full of calories.... brown spirits are worse and beer..... well, they call it a beer-gut for a reason.
Alcohol is also a major contributing factor for early-onset dementia, Alzheimer's and a myriad of other degenerative disorders of the brain and let's face it, without our brain we are nothing. Australian research has recently shown that what was previously considered to be the safe consumption of alcohol (4 standard drinks per day with 1 alcohol free day for men (half that for women) and a standard drink being roughly one beer (one 330ml bottle of beer at 5.0% alcohol/vol = 1.3 standard drinks) is actually dangerous and can contribute to the afforementioned medical conditions. The research suggests that half of what was previously considered safe is actually safe... so no more than 2 standard drinks per day with at least 2 (or 3? I cannot recall) alcohol free days per week (and again, half of that for women). According to this research it is very, very easy to drink 'too much'.
Having said all of that, red wine has been proven to have a positive effect on our health (1 standard drink per day IIRC) but this is only for red wines, not white.
Now that I've pissed on about all of that (hopefully it was an enlightening read for at least some) I will list some of my favourite drinks, as I do very much enjoy a good beer, wine or spirit.
Beers:
Hot Days;
- Kozel Premium (Czech)
- Brok Sambor (Polish)
- Peroni Nastro Azzurro (Italy)
Cold Days;
- Erdinger Weissbier
- Schofferhoffer Hefeweizen
Wines:
- A nice Shiraz Viogner for something soft or a good Shiraz or Cab Shiraz... nice and sharp but without the bitter after taste.. Any decent red, basically.
Spirits:
- Zubrowka Bison Vodka.... I don't like Vodka usually but this stuff is phenomoinal. Absolute pleasure to drink and far too easy to sip away at all night.
- Dewar's Single Malt Scotch... Not too expensive and still a decent taste.
