Effects of the Bottle

What can happen when I drink too much?

Drinking does not go without consequences—some often tragic and fatal.  This year alone, numerous instances of binge drinking on college campuses across the nation have led to students dying.  Excess drinking is certainly dangerous, but even moderate drinking can have long-term negative health consequences.  Drinking can lead to life-long problems with relationships, work, and quality of life. 

Here are some consequences of drinking to consider closely:

ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

• About 25 percent of college students report academic consequences of their drinking including missing class, falling behind, doing poorly on exams or papers, and receiving lower grades overall (Engs et al., 1996; Presley et al., 1996a, 1996b; Wechsler et al., 2002).
• Alcohol impairs abstract thinking—the ability to put ideas together to solve problems and form rational thought is impaired by drinking and can last from days to weeks, depending on the amount and frequency of drinking.
• Alcohol impairs memory, reducing one’s ability to remember information that he or she learned prior to drinking.  In addition, one’s attention span is shorter for periods up to forty-eight hours after drinking.      
• Alcohol impairs REM sleep, preventing quality sleep and causing a person to feel tired after he or she wakes.  Inadequate rest makes it more difficult to concentrate, focus, study and retain information.
           

ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE

• Research  overwhelmingly suggests that alcohol use and athleticism do not go hand in hand.
• Dehydration.  Alcohol is a powerful diuretic that can cause severe electrolyte imbalances and dehydration —which can take up to a week to fully recover from.  While dehydrated, an athlete is at greater risk for
  musculoskeletal injuries including: cramps, muscle pulls, and muscle strains.  Dehydration also leads to decreased appetite and muscle wasting—where you can lose muscle mass, resulting in a decrease in strength and performance. 
• Lowers Testosterone.  Alcohol, when consumed in amounts typical with binge drinkers, can dramatically decrease serum testosterone levels, which is most commonly seen in college athletes.  Decreases in testosterone are associated with decreases in aggression, lean muscle mass, muscle recovery and overall athletic performance.  In males, this can also cause testicular shrinkage, breast enlargement, and decreased sperm development.  In females, this may cause an increase in the production of estradial, (a form of estrogen) which may increase the risk of breast cancer.
• Impairs Reaction Time and Mental Acuity.  Alcohol can impair reaction time and mental acuity for up to several days after consumption, which is a severe consequence to the athlete.  Performance will be reduced and
  thus, injury risk increased.  Athletes will have a decrease in hand-eye coordination and judgment will be impaired.  Alcohol can also cause nausea, vomiting, and drowsiness for days after consumption.
• Increases Fat Storage.  Alcohol consumption effects body composition by increasing one’s percent of body fat.  Powerful energy pathways (like glycolysis) are impaired and large amounts of lactic acid are produced, this results in decreased energy, decreased muscle recovery, and increased muscle soreness.

DRINKING AND DRIVING

• Did you know that in 2002, an estimated 17,419 people died in alcohol–related traffic crashes—an average of one every 30 minutes. (NHTSA, 2003).  AND in 2001, 2.1 million students between the ages of 18 and 24 drove under the influence of alcohol (Hingson et al., 2002).
• It doesn’t take as much alcohol as you think to impair your driving skills. 
• Steering a car while, reaction time, alertness, coordination—all of these can be impaired by BACs—even as low as 0.02.
• After consuming two drinks in one hour, a 180 pound male will have a BAC of .05 and will be susceptible to diminished driving ability. 
• The more alcohol you consume, the more impaired your driving skills will be. 
• Although the legal BAC limit for adults who drive after drinking is 0.08 in most states (including Nebraska), impairment of driving skills begins at much lower levels. 

DEVELOPING ALCOHOLISM

• Many students don’t realize that excessive drinking in college leads to the development of alcoholism. 
• Some students enter college already having experience drinking heavily in high school or even earlier and continuing their excessive drinking only increases their risk for developing a problem with alcohol.
• Other students come to college not having much experience with drinking alcohol, but become immersed in the culture of binge drinking and excessive use and start along a path toward addiction and/or alcoholism
• Other factors that can affect the development of alcohol addiction include family history of the disease or other addiction problems as well as use of or addiction to other drugs (i.e. marijuana, methamphetamines, prescription drugs, etc.)
   

INTERACTIONS WITH MEDICATIONS

• Alcohol interacts negatively with more than 150 medications.  Combined with antihistamines (for a cold or allergy) alcohol increases the drowsiness that the medication alone can cause, making driving or operating machinery even more hazardous.
• Combined with large doses of the painkiller acetaminophen, alcohol can cause serious liver damage.
• Check with your doctor or pharmacist before drinking any amount of alcohol if you are taking any over-the-counter or prescription medications. 
• The NIAAA provides an extensive listing of harmful interactions.

INTERPERSONAL PROBLEMS

• Drinking can effect more than just our bodies: it increases the potential for problems in relationships with friends, family, coworkers, significant others, and even strangers.  Alcohol can:
  • lead to arguments with or estrangement from your spouse and other family members
  • cause strained relationships with coworkers
  • cause absence from or lateness to work/class with increasing frequency
  • lead to loss of employment due to decreased productivity; and 
  • lead to committing or being the victim of violence.

Source: www.jointogether.org/as/learnMore/effects/0,2956,86%255F1,00.html

LONG-TERM HEALTH PROBLEMS

• Brain Damage – Students who drink have a significant reduction in learning and memory and are most susceptible to damaging two key brain areas that are growing and developing.
• The Hippocampus handles many types of memory and learning and suffers  from the worst alcohol-related brain damage in young Americans.  Research shows significantly smaller hippocampi for those who had been drinking more and for longer.
• The prefrontal area (behind the forehead)—sometimes referred to as the “CEO of the Brain” undergoes the most developmental change in adolescence and into early adulthood.  Heavy drinking during these years can cause severe changes to this area—which plays an important role in forming adult personality and behavior. (Source)
• Liver Disease – More than 2 million Americans suffer from alcohol-related liver disease.   Because the liver’s primary purpose is to process nutrients and filter the blood, it suffers the most life-threatening damage from alcohol.  Too much alcohol use can cause a slowing of liver function, a swelling of
  liver, cirrhosis or cancer.
• Heart Disease – Although  some believe moderate drinking can have beneficial effects on the heart, heavy drinking can lead to: 
  • high blood pressure
  • enlarged heart – cannot be repaired
  • coronary heart disease – narrowed arteries lead to heart attack and death
  • irregular heartbeat, which can lead to heart attack and death: decreased bloodflow to the arms and legs
  • stroke – blocked bloodflow to the brain or bleeding in the brain; stroke is a major killer
• Pancreatis – the pancreas has a role in digesting food as it regulates blood sugar levels and releases insulin accordingly; long-term drinking can cause inflammation of the pancreas.  This condition—known as pancreatic—is associated with severe abdominal pain and weight loss and can be fatal.
• Cancer – heavy alcohol use increases the risk of developing the following cancers: esophagus, throat, mouth, voice box, colon or rectum; women who drink excessively have a great chance for breast cancer.

No risks

Cancer – heavy alcohol use increases the risk of developing the following cancers: esophagus, throat, mouth, voice box, colon or rectum; women who drink excessively have a great chance for breast cancer.

What?

What Kind of Drinker Are You?

Use the following phases and their descriptions to determine what kind of drinker that you, a friend or family member is.

Occasional Drinker: Phase 1

• Joe and Jane may choose to drink once in awhile.
• When they do drink, they do not get impaired. Since they do not drink to impairment, there’s no increase in their tolerance.
• There are no negative outcomes from their drinking.
• They have a take-it-or-leave-it attitude about drinking.

Social Drinker: Phase 2

• Jane and Joe enjoy drinking. They drink regularly, perhaps two or three times per week.
• When they do drink, they usually get impaired. Because they are drinking to impairment, their tolerance is increasing.
• There are no apparent negative outcomes from their drinking, except maybe a hangover once in awhile. 
• They generally look forward to the weekend so they can “really let loose.”

Problem Drinker: Phase 3*

*At Phase 3, an individual still has the option of going back to being an occasional or social drinker.*

Early Phase:

• Jane and Joe drink regularly.
• They get impaired regularly. Their tolerance is continuing to increase.
• They arrive late for classes and sometimes cut classes due to drinking and/or hangovers.
• The quality of their school work is inconsistent. They are missing deadlines.
• They seem to be preoccupied with drinking.
• They might experience a blackout.

Middle Phase:

• Jane and Joe begin to cut classes regularly.
• They become unreliable. Their personal relationships begin to suffer from disagreements with roommates, teammates and/or friends.
• They avoid situations where there is no drinking.
• They become ill more frequently.
• They experience more money problems.
• They drink in the morning once in awhile to cure their hangovers.

Late Phase:

• Jane and Joe cut classes a week at a time.
• At times their attitudes are belligerent and aggressive or passive and withdrawn.
• They experience many personal problems with friends and family.
• They have more money problems. Maybe they get a job to support their partying.
• They may get a DUI violation or encounter serious trouble with school administration.
• Their academic performance may deteriorate drastically.

Addicted to Alcohol: Alcoholic: Phase 4*

*At phase 4, an individual CANNOT go back to being an occasional, social or problem drinker; the person has become an alcoholic and always will be.*

• Jane and Joe become totally undependable. They experience serious family and other relationship problems.
• They drink to cure their withdrawal from alcohol.
• They experience serious legal difficulties.
• They get suspended or drop out of school.
• They experience many other negative outcomes.

Can someone consume alcohol and not experience any serious alcohol problems? As you can see, drinkers in Phase 2 may be doing just that. They are out drinking, getting impaired yet not experiencing any problems. But—and it’s a huge but— each time we drink to impairment our tolerance increases. We know that if we continue to drink to impairment, our tolerance will continue to increase - it is a biological fact. As a result, the increasing tolerance moves us eventually to Phase 3 and eventually to Phase 4. (That is why increasing tolerance is always an indicator of increased risk for alcoholism. The student who brags about his or her ability to consume excessive quantities of alcohol is actually revealing, and ignorantly bragging about, his or her increased risk for alcoholism.)

Remember to make good decisoins.

Alcohol Poisoning

When should you seek professional help for a friend?

Students often laugh at the behavior of others who are drunk. Some think it's even funnier when they pass out. But there is nothing funny about the aspiration of vomit leading to asphyxiation or the poisoning of the respiratory center in the brain, both of which can result in death.  Sadly enough, too many college students say they wish they would have sought medical treatment for a friend. Many end up feeling responsible for alcohol-related  tragedies that could have easily been prevented.

Sobering-Up MYTHS

• Drink black coffee
• Sleep it off
• Take a cold shower   
• Eat fatty/greasy foods        
• Walk it off

These are just MYTHS and they don't work!!  The only thing that reverses the effects of alcohol is TIME -- something you may not have if you are suffering from alcohol poisoning.

 Risk Factors

• Amount of Alcohol you Drink – the more alcohol you drink, the higher your risk for alcohol poisoning.  REMEMBER: the average person is only able to metabolize about 1 standard drink (.5 oz) per hour.
• How Fast You Drink – playing drinking games, doing kegstands or powerhours, or chugging alcohol greatly increases your risk for getting alcohol poisoning.  Rapid binge drinking (which often happens as a bet or dare) is extremely dangerous because the victim can ingest a fatal does before becoming unconscious or showing signs of poisoning.
• Use of Marijuana or Medication – using certain types of medications or  marijuana decreases nausea and puts you at higher risk for alcohol poisoning because your body is unable to vomit and rid itself of the toxic levels of alcohol before they are dumped into the bloodstream.
• High BAC Levels- Alcohol Poisoning corresponds with high Blood Alcohol Content levels.  Click here for more on the Factors that Affect BAC.

Signs of Alcohol Poisoning

• Mental confusion, stupor, coma, or person cannot be roused
• Vomiting
• Seizures
• Slow breathing (fewer than eight breaths per minute)
• Irregular breathing (10 seconds or more between breaths)
• Hypothermia (low body temperature), bluish skin color, paleness, discolored lips

What Happens to Your Body?

• Alcohol depresses the sympathetic nervous system, which controls involuntary actions such as breathing and the gag reflex (which prevents choking). A fatal dose of alcohol will eventually stop these functions.
• Alcohol irritates the stomach, so it is common for someone who drank excessive alcohol to vomit.  There is then the danger of choking on vomit, which could cause death by asphyxiation in a person who is not conscious because of intoxication.
• A person's blood alcohol content (BAC) can continue to rise even while he or she is passed out. Even after a person stops drinking, alcohol in the stomach and intestine continues to enter the bloodstream and circulate throughout the body. A person does not reach his or her peak BAC until about an hour after he or she stops drinking.  It is dangerous to assume the person will be fine by sleeping it off.

What If Alcohol Poisoning Goes Untreated?

• Victim chokes on his or her own vomit
• Breathing slows, becomes irregular, or stops
• Heart beats irregularly or stops
• Hypothermia (low body temperature)
• Hypoglycemia (too little blood sugar) leads to seizures
• Untreated severe dehydration from vomiting can cause seizures, permanent brain damage, or death

REMEMBER…

• Even if the victim lives, an alcohol overdose can lead to irreversible brain damage.
• Rapid binge drinking (which often happens on a bet or a dare) is especially dangerous because the victim can ingest a fatal dose before becoming unconscious or showing signs of poisoning.
• Don't be afraid to seek medical help for a friend who has had too much to drink.
• Don't worry that your friend may become angry or embarrassed-remember, you cared enough to help. Always be safe, not sorry.

Red Hot Morals from B Rose

  When I was a kid; probably in first grade, my mom worked at a convenience store. It was an AM/PM. When I would get home from school she was still at work, so I had the apartment to myself.

  One of the things I had plenty of in my life was slim jim tubes, you know the tall plastic tube/ canisters that beef sticks used to come in. Mom would bring them home for me. It was probably the most plentiful toy I had.

  I didn’t understand how thermostats worked, so It would get pretty cold in the winter in our little apartment. And since there was a problem to be solved I set about it. I had seen space heaters before at some of my more affluent friend’s houses and they seemed like a great idea.

  I took a hair dryer and pulled all the guts out, easy enough I was pretty good with a screw driver. Then I installed all those guts into one of the jerky tubes, I remember how easy it was. The self tapping screws of the hair dryer went through the plastic of the jerky tube really easy. Looking back; in my minds eye, it went together really smoothly and looked really pro. It was a transparent space heater, a real DIY success.

  Exuberance would best describe how I felt as I basked in the warmth of the world’s finest space heater… then it melted and started to smoke. I got in trouble for ruining a hair dryer and making the apartment smell like burnt plastic.

  That year I asked for a space heater for Christmas but there was no budget for something like that. I think that year I got half a slinky, but I straightened it.

  The moral of the story is, I didn’t invent anything.

Binge drinking is a sign of Assholeism

What is Binge Drinking?

Binge drinking = the consumption of five or more drinks at one sitting or in a row for males and three or more drinks at one sitting for females. (Source: Harvard School of Public Health)

Binge drinking is the type of problem drinking most often engaged in by young people in the 18- to 21-year-old age range, most prevalent with college students.

Binge drinking is irresponsible, heavy drinking that often comes under the disguise of fun and games—it is terribly dangerous to the drinker and to people around him or her.

Binge drinkers:

• Drink "to get drunk." The goal is to lose control. A person can’t lose control of just some of his or her body, mind, and behavior; the loss of control regularly crosses over into hazard zones and reaches dangerous levels with serious consequences (i.e. blackouts, alcohol poisoning, etc.).
• Drink large quantities.
• Drink quickly.
• Do foolish, potentially deadly things like driving drunk, starting fights, being sexually promiscuous and taking unnecessary risks.
• Are more likely to: damage property, have trouble with authorities, miss classes, have hangovers, experience sexual assault or unwanted sexual activity and experience injuries than those who do not.

Blackouts are not normal

Blackouts

LINKS

BLACKOUTS

What is a ‘blackout’?

• A blackout is an “alcohol-induced brain dysfunction”
• A blackout occurs when a person consumes enough alcohol that it interferes with brain function and memory formation.  “Alcohol in sufficient quantities prevents the NMDA receptors in the hippocampus from reacting to the glutamate neurotransmitter, thus blocking formation of memory.” (Sweeney, 2004, p. 67)

   

In other words…

• When blacked out, a person’s working or short-term memory is broken.  The person cannot form any short-term or working memory, or any other kind of memory for that matter.  
• Because one cannot form memory, they are living in the “precise present”.  What one sees, hears or feels a moment, a minute or five minutes ago is unknown to them. 
• One cannot remember what is immediately happening, nor make use of past knowledge to alter his or her conduct. 
• One is out of control, wholly impulsive.  Without knowledge of recent events, there is no capacity for rational thought.  Such people are a menace to themselves and others.  (Sweeney, 2004)

A Blacked-Out Person: A Scary Reality

People in a blackout do not forget what happened, as widely believed.  The truth is, they will never remember, because alcohol blocked their ability to form memory.  People who are blacked out can remember things from their distant past, but because they cannot form short-term memory, they can’t remember anything that happened a minute ago.  Without short-term memory formation, they CANNOT:

• learn
• think
• plan
• form intent
• consider consequences
• make a decision
   

The reality is:                                    

• They have blacked out.
• They are unconscious.
• They do not know where they are, what they are doing, even what time it is. 
• They are at risk to “act out of character” and do something regrettable.
• They could have had sex with the stranger lying in bed next to them, run up huge bills on their credit cards, gambled away life savings, said unforgivable things to people they care about, gotten into fights, driven drunk or killed innocent people.
• They will never remember any of it.
• Yet… their pre-blackout memory remains intact, enabling them to walk, talk, drive, travel, quarrel, get into fights, wield a knife or hammer—and never know it.  They are “walking, talking, unconscious and lethal”.

Who Can Experience a Blackout?

• Anyone who drinks alcohol—both non-alcoholics and alcoholics.
• A person who gets drunk once in his or her lifetime may experience a blackout.
• Healthy drinkers (who use occasionally, socially, and/or moderately) are extremely frightened by the occurrence of a blackout and will reevaluate his or her alcohol use patterns.
• Problem drinkers who continue unhealthy drinking behavior will increase their tolerance and likely experience more blackouts—which is a sign of Early Stage Alcoholism.
• Frequent blackouts are experienced by individuals who have developed higher tolerance, drink until drunk and often lose control, pass out, and/or crave alcohol.  These individuals are most likely early to middle stage alcoholics.

Tired...

Tired of watching you drink yourself to death. You are not doing ok.

Wonder why?

Conservatives can be so simple minded.

Who wants to die for art?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQwPES50N0s&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Bird

Hi

I wish MPLS had this

2 sides

Boom

Hmmmmm?

Ted has been irrelevant for decades

On the outside looking in.

The tragic killing of a cyclist by a drunk driver is not a declaration of war between cars and bikes. It is a knock at the cyclists door to notify them they are as susceptible to these tragedies as pedestrians, bystanders, drivers and other victims of drunk driving. It is not proof of the infallibility of the cyclist or the demonetization of the driver. You can not let your outrage blind you into a protest that makes you more vulnerable than safe. Every tragedy has lessons to learn on both sides.

Eyes wide open

There are facts and there is a truth that goes along with them. They might not be what you want to know, or what you want to hear but that has nothing to do with what they are.
It is going to sting, but you can not allow yourself to be blinded by outrage.

I have been trying get people to really read, now it is catching on.

Now beat it.

Beat it

The only way to fix all that's been done.

yep

"Introducing the new Bike Library Mechanic--- Brian Rose!
B Rose will be the new Bike Library mechanic--- we are happy to welcome him! His contact information is as follows: brose@cyclesforchange.org and his Bike Library phone number is: 651.317.9474 " .

Do you have any idea how important this is?

• Mindlessly taking the first small step
• Dehumanization of others
• De-individuation of self (anonymity)
• Diffusion of personal responsibility
• Blind Obedience to Authority
• Uncritical conformity to group norms
• Passive tolerance of evil through inaction or indifference

7 Social Processes That Grease the Slippery Slope of Evil

Haters be hatin'

My new player card has gotten me some hate mail.

a few thoughts...

The Blue Scare ~vs~ Supply and Demand

  I have been noticing a few trends that are really interesting. Lets for a minute forget the the word "gun" has anything behind it. It is just a category of "widget", specifically we will be looking at gun parts, the kind that you do not need a license to buy. I am gonna put this in a bulleted list :)

• 7 years of gun part sales happened in 4 weeks around the end of the year.
• Companies that were literally about to go out of business were saved and restarted their production lines again.
• There had been a trend of sites like Ebay and Gunbroker getting a premium price for parts over what companies like Midway USA and Cabellas were able to get. Probably because like capitalist circus seals the cheap gun public has been trained to look to Ebay first. Much like the use of Walmart.
• In the last few weeks demand has gone way up. Guns shops and online retailers have nothing on their shelves. Tumble weeds and blank space is all you will find.
• Prices have gone up in ways that defy logic. $17 magazines are going for $40 plus. Lower and upper receivers (cheap ones) that were under a $100 a piece are now selling for $500 a piece on Ebay and Gunbroker (when laws permit). And the Online businesses like Midway have nothing available for weeks.
• The gun community will eat itself in spite of its self. It is a very suspicious and greedy group , why isn't important. But it will gouge until the market has bled dry. Companies like Midway and  Cabellas can not, they have to look more to the future and customer satisfaction surveys :)
• In 4 weeks, there will be a lot of orders fulfilled on the whole sale level. And this is what I am leading up too. A few things are gonna happen very quickly and might not get noticed.

1. An online retailer will like be selling product more than %100 cheaper that Eaby and gunbroker style sites. Imagine if your bike shop was cheaper than the internet.
2. Online stores will likely be bought out by ebayers and the like who will still have a few weeks to make profitability reselling parts purchased at retail. Imagine if someone came into your bike shop and purchased all your parts at retail to sell online.
3. Then as things equalize , there will likely be a massive sell off because MSRP will become the norm and the ebay types will be back to selling in that price range. How do you adjust for a bubble that only you can see.

  It will be interesting to see this happen because there is a perfect storm brewing that be like nothing else I have seen as an industry dances up close with its online spoilers.

Go easy Lou

East Liberty Shooting Leaves 1 Dead

January 14, 2013 4:15 PM

 

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – Police are investigating an overnight shooting in East Liberty that left one person dead.
It happened just before midnight Sunday at the intersection of North Negley Avenue and Rippey Street, outside of an apartment complex.
Police stayed on the scene until after 3 a.m., but have yet to release much information.
The victim was 37-year-old Lou Auer of East Liberty. He was found with a gunshot wound to the torso and pronounced dead at the scene.

One neighbor who did not want to be identified said she heard three gunshots.“It’s not [abnormal] to hear the gunshots, but to see a body outside your building, that’s (abnormal),” she said.So far there have been no arrests and police have yet to determine a motive, but say that two black males were seen running after shots were fired.

“With the body laying there, and then for the kids to get up this morning and still see the sheet still left there,” the neighbor said. “It’s just mind boggling. And my daughter asked, ‘why’s that out there?’”
A maintenance worker at the apartment building said he had to chase the victim out of the building twice, but did not elaborate on why.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Pittsburgh Homicide Squad at 412-323-7161.

Save this damn date!!!

All you need to know!