Why people retire early, or Checking into the funny farm

Today was another of those work-related meetings which I dread, the kind of dread that reminds me of the feelings inspired by Dementors in Harry Potter. The meetings revolve around the merger of our current mishmosh of several databases into one unified catalog for the whole system. That sounds like a worthy goal: search once and find anywhere in the 90-something-member system.

However, the procedure--much like a lot of procedures at my church--is a bit like the journey food takes while inside your body....

o n l y
m u c h
m o r e
s l o w l y.

Right now we're approaching the large intestine, where all the water (i.e. brain power) is leached out of our cells.

I think I will try fighting back using this, a list of 40 Rock-Solid Reasons to Get Drunk, from Modern Drunkard Magazine, with the following being the ones that really apply, and with #31 way out in front of the pack:

1. If you don’t drink that booze, by God, someone else will.

6. Word on the street is the booze has been trash talking you all day.

9. It’s far better to have a good time you won’t remember than a dull one you will.

10. Remember that English high school teacher you and your pals used to call “Mr. McTightass?” You are so starting to remind me of him.

12. How the hell can you walk around sober when you’re an insignificant speck in an infinite and uncaring universe?

14. If you don’t you’ll wake up in the morning all bright eyed and bushy tailed, and who the hell wants to go through life acting like a goddamn squirrel?

17. The Man says you shouldn’t and you don’t want to upset the Man, eh slavebot?

20. You’re much less likely to remember doing all that embarrassing stuff.

24. You’re under a lot of stress and if you don’t get crazy drunk you might do something crazy sober.

29. Let’s face it: modern life is a shit storm and booze is the only umbrella without any holes in it.

31. You did your goddamn monkey dance for the Man and now you get your monkey treat.

38. When your coworkers ask “What did you get up to last night?” you can smile all cool like and say “Maaaaaan, you don’t wanna know,” instead of chirping “I alphabetized my DVD collection and found out I have two copies of The Truth About Cats and Dogs! Two!”

And, because you should never drink on an empty stomach:

plan-overs
n. pl. an excess of food cooked so as to have leftovers for future meals. Also planovers, plannedovers, planned-overs, and as adjective, planned-over, planover, plan-over. Less often singular.

from The Double-Tongued Dictionary

Fair cop: I wrote the above post a couple of weeks ago in anticipation of today's meeting, well before the conversation that took place in the car on the 90 minute drive to the meeting. For you amateur (or not) psychologists, here's the Rest of the Story.

I ate the equivalent of three candy bars today, mostly on the way home. Uppon arriving hom, I walked in, kissed Sparky hello, and called Beast, who is on the road; I did most of the talking in the first 45 minutes of the call...out of a 70-minute call during which Beast and Sparky talked to each other as well, and during which I found out what Beast's day was like. I was ravenously hungry the entire time I was on the phone. I made a Marie Callendar's chicken pot pie for dinner and I am currently finishing a bottle of white wine.

These symptoms point to a diagnosis of....
....what?