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Caffeine Experiment
The holiday allowed me to do something I've been wanted to do for some time now: cut down on my daily caffeine intake. I went from drinking a pot or more of coffee and numerous diet cokes every day to drinking 1-2 cups of coffee in the morning and then nothing else with caffeine. The great surprise? It wasn't very hard to do this. I had no headaches or other noticeable withdrawal symptoms. Even better, I've recently felt much less tired in the late afternoon and evening, which used to be the time of day I would crash. Is it possible that drinking so much caffeine actually made me more tired, rather than less? I'm sure. Of course, it's also possible I've simply been getting plenty of sleep on vacation, leaving me no reason to be tired. At any rate, I hope to continue limiting myself to 1-2 relatively small cups of coffee (or less) per day and I'm sure I'll learn in the coming weeks whether that seems to have any effect on energy levels. Maybe I'll send all the money I save on coffee and cokes to the guy in the U.S. selling bumper stickers that complain about the guy in China selling idiotic magnets. (Thanks to Dave! for the link.)
Posted January 7, 2005 08:32 AM | life generally
Ya know, when I drink enough coffee it actually puts me to sleep so that it makes you tired doesn't surprise me. As does the fact that you didn't suffer withdrawal symptoms. The real problems start when you cut it out completely, as I have learned from hard and bitter experience.
Say, I know you're just catching up with all yer e-mail and such. BUt I wanted to ask if you got my e-mail with attached zip file? I sent some pictures of Exene to you I thought you might find of interest and I zipped them to save space (a whopping 4K! I gotta change the default settings on gzip). But then it occurred to me, after I sent them, that it might look to a spam filter like one of them pesky windoze viruses. D'Oh! Let me know if it got through or not and I will respond accordingly, if you want that is. Also, have you heard from Jeff S. lately? He and C. will probably be heading your way with family in tow as he got a job at the Naval Academy. Peace to you and L.
Now get back to work!
Posted by: Famous P. at January 7, 2005 01:50 PM
yeah, it's the undertow that gets you. and the crash. i think coffee, although yummy, is often more trouble than it's worth.
if you want to get off completely, switch to 1/2 caf/1/2 decaf for a week, and then to decaf, and then quit. i did that in wisconsin, and it was great.
Posted by: monica at January 8, 2005 11:11 AM
