On Wednesday night I broke the first rule of drinking - I drank alone.

At this point I’m paranoid about drinking anything and driving home without a huge buffer to sober up. Your body processes alcohol at 0.015 percent of Blood Alcohol Content per hour. Your BAC is dependent largely on your weight and body fat content, but let’s say an average person of about 150lbs drinking a 1 ounce shot of 80 proof whiskey would be somewhere around 0.02% BAC.

That means I need about an hour and a half to get all of the whiskey out of my system for a single shot.

A shot of 1 ounce 80 proof Whiskey is about 0.4 ounces of alcohol. Your average beer, glass of wine, or mixed drink is about 0.6 ounces of alcohol. So that means I need nearly two hours to process the alcohol and get back to normal.

Now, the legal limit for being declared intoxicated while driving is 0.08% BAC. That means I could have about four drinks before I hit 0.08%, but then I’d be right on the edge. I haven’t really passed two drinks at this point but I don’t think I could drive after even two.

So that’s my current math. If I need to drive, I need about 3-3.5 hours to process two drinks. If I’m not within that limit, I’m not going to drink (or I’m not going to drive).

Yesterday was a pretty crappy day. When most people have a crappy day, they say “I need a drink!” So I declared to my empty house that I needed a drink. But then all of the drinking math came back into my head and I realized I couldn’t go out somewhere and get a drink and then just come back home. There’s no bar even sort of within walking distance of me.

So I was left with a few options. I could get on the bus and drink somewhere and then tack a note to my forehead hoping on the goodwill of others to get me home. More likely that my wallet would be stolen or someone would kidnap me because I’m so adorable.

Option two was to walk to the “package store” (what we call liquor stores here in Boston) and get … something. This something will probably be in a paper bag and I’ll almost certainly forget my way home after drinking some of it. Then I become the drunk dude leaning against a wall drooling on himself.

Not a bad option, actually.

Option three was to drink the vodka I have in my freezer.

“Christian, why do you have vodka in your freezer”

I have vodka in my freezer because once upon a time I met a crazy Russian who insisted I have vodka in my freezer. He’s currently terrorizing Puerto Rico or some tropical place but being the crazy Russian that he is he is very likely to just appear on my doorstep some day and when he does I don’t want to be without vodka.

Vodka, as it turns out, smells like nothing. This is very odd. I poured about an ounce of it into a glass completely inappropriate for drinking and stared at it on my kitchen counter.

Odorless, colorless, and it could probably kill me. It’s like iocane powder but in liquid form.

It’s kind of amazing how something that has no color or smell can have such a strong taste. Except for beer, this is my first experience with unmixed alcohol. Without realizing it, I have just poured myself a shot. I am an idiot.

After the first sip, I realized why people in movies make that sort of gasping exasperated face when downing a shot. Cough syrup immediately came to mind. I didn’t like drinking that stuff, either. But the best best with cough syrup was to just down the stuff and get it over with so the same principle shall be applied to vodka.

I drank the last of it down in one gulp and stowed the bottle back in the freezer. I hid it beneath some ice in some weird attempt to convince myself it isn’t there so I don’t get any stupid ideas again. I washed the glass and leaned against the counter while taking in what just happened.

Supposedly those who drink alone in their houses are the people you’re supposed to watch out for. I’m not sure how true this myth is, but I can say that I didn’t feel invigorated or happy or motivated or even cool. I just felt kind of sad with a twinge of desperation.

I was using vodka as a tool to escape my crappy day. Only 9 days into this thing and I’m already exhibiting signs of alcoholism. And I’ve only had four drinks.

New rule: don’t drink alone.