The Story of 200.

Honours year is not an easy year. I could say that again. Not an easy year. And again. Not an easy year. AND AGAIN. Not an easy year.

And it is especially so if you do honours in research science, whereby you come into contact with baby-killing, DNA-changing, and other sort of stuff that ordinary people THINK can kill a herd of stampeding elephants. Don’t get me wrong, it is easy to handle those things. Those are the very reason why lab coats exist; they were REALLY not made for kinky scenarios to begin with, there is no way one can still be turned on after undoing ALL those buttons.

What makes honours hard are the mutants and weirdos you come into contact with in your day to day life in the laboratory. All the professors used to work in a lab at some point in time making them potentially psychotic super-mutants with defective brain lobes.

And then there is this unsaid food chain where by the honours student (yours truly) is right at the very bottom, and the post-docs, PhDs, RAs, exchange PhDs and all the other-people-that-randomly-appear, being somewhere on that food chain chart. They all form some sort of a cannibalistic tango line with the (you guessed it) honours student right at the very end.

In essence: Honours is very hard.

This entire situation is made worst by the very fact that I have been craving a certain thing for what seems like ages. Although I see it frequently around social events, I am not allowed to consume any of it.

Yes. I am referring to the lack of –OH groups in my diet.

When people (meaning: humans who know the trials facing a Honours student) find out that I am living an alcohol-free life for this year, they tend to do this amazing acrobatic act where their eyes shiver with withdrawal, jaws drop like a dead weight onto their thighs and their ear lobes reach round their heads tying themselves in a knot.

Then they ask, always the inevitable question: WHY ON EARTH DID YOU DECIDE TO DO THAT?

Mad laughter will begin to play in my head on an endless loop, but outwardly, I remain always the cool person. This is after all a lab environment, flaying arms are very dangerous and not to mention; unbecoming for a lady of my status.

So I say: Bragging rights and 200 bucks.

And this, dear readers, is the part of the story where you will avert your gaze gracefully for I will now take a verbal and mental beating from every booze-loving Aussie on this planet.

But that beating will not be as bad as what is to come. Because dear friends, a bet to stay alcohol-free for a year will make you forget the taste of beer. It is now official that I have been alcohol-free for 200 days and well… I can no longer recall the feeling of the pee-coloured liquid trickling down my throat.

Was it sweet or bitter? Was it a kind of spreading warmth?

Who knew that Alcoholics Anonymous can be replaced by a bet of 200 dollars?