F**K I did it….Shanghai Nights
24/08/11 • 10 Comments

So here i am on day 92 and i have made it through my 90 day goal BOOZE free! And amazingly i did it with relative ease but admit the last few days were the hardest of all. In fact it would nearly defy belief how days 88 and 89 panned out. Never mind days 90 and 91! So getting so close to the end the thought of returning to the demon drink consumed my thoughts at every turn. The glistening silver beauty of “Madge” the friday night  after work drink trolley, the apparent massive increase of alcohol related advertising, laughter emanating from every bar as i walked the streets of Shanghai after work. The demon drink was testing me like no other day and she wasn’t even close to playing her best card. That night one of my very talented staff was to be one of the finalist’s in the [...]

Shanghai Nights – Mr Li Pt 2
25/07/11 • 3 Comments

So i passed the 2 months mark and didnt even remember to write a new post. In fact i have now completed 62 days with 28 to go. I’m not sure if it  will get harder the closer i get but right now i barely think about it other than when people freak out that Im not drinking. Its amazing how ingrained drinking is! So for some of you who haver read my posts you will know that Mr li is my personal trainer. I decided when i started that i would use the money i usually spent on booze on a PT. Now for those of you who dont know Mr Li he is a man mountian, ex People’s Liberation Army, personal trainer whose broken English can have some amusing side effects. He started this whole thing by calling me “fatty” and told me he was going to “break [...]

shanghai nights – i survived melbourne
13/07/11 • 2 Comments

Well again its been a while since i blogged, and in that time i made it home for a week to a freezing cold Melbourne. More importantly i made it through a lunch and dinner with my close friends without a drop of the demon drink. I dont even know how long i have left other than the actual date of August 22nd. At the start i counted the days religiously but find myself now not thinking about it too much at all. Im enjoying not drinking and to be frank im not sure i will stop on August 22nd. When i started i imagined a magnificant party where i drank, was merry and generally slapped myself on the back for my efforts. But now things have changed a bit and simply getting there might just be reward enough.

Shanghai Nights – I nearly broke !!
30/06/11 • 2 Comments

Well, not really…..but there i was at The House of Roosevelt on The Bund in Shanghai and laid out before me is a 7 course meal with brilliant wine to accompany every course. And all of it FREE courtesy of a dinner hosted by Google. Now i like my drink and probably would not being doing HSM if I didnt love it just a little too much at times. But when it comes to TRUE love red wine is to me is what sport is to Australia. I love it. I love it, i love it…..you get the picture? So there i was drinking my lime and soda while all around started with a variety of cocktails. You know the standard cosmopolitan, dirty martini etc etc. I was stoic and barely noticed the demon drink other than the rather beautiful girls serving it all. But then we sat down. And [...]

Shanghai Nights
28/06/11 • 2 Comments

As it seems with most people on HSM the deeper you get into the journey the less you seem to blog! Im now 36 days into my 90 and Ive really started not to think about it too much at all. Its quite amazing really given that drinking and going for a drink took up so much of my time until recently. I see people are starting Dry July for charity in Australia. Thats a great cause although i must admit that i think of them as “soft” for only doing 31 days LOL! Heading back to Australia on friday for a week and will be interesting to catch up with friends who have never know me not to drink. It wont be a problem for me, im long past the stage of having to drink to fell like i fit in. I hope all of you who are just [...]