I HAVE A problem with stimulants: I can’t afford good ones. I compensate by hitting cafés with the same regularity that an addict frequents an opium den. I’m what you might call a “caf-fiend.” I don’t drink coffee. I smoke it.

Caffeinism runs in my blood. My mother drank around 18 cups of black tea daily. Of course, she cut down while pregnant with me — to two pots a day. Crack babies are born less nervous. I also had a Spanish nanny who used to give me a “cafecito,” which means “little coffee.” Given that I wasn’t allowed to have sugar doughnuts, let alone soda, I can’t imagine what possessed my caretaker to hand me a cup of joe, however wee. Maybe I was easier to handle doing loop-de-loops in a holding pattern on the ceiling. Is it okay to feed kids powerful stimulants so long as we add a cute suffix to the drug (crystal methecito?). I’m gonna sue both those nitwits for abuse as soon as I stop vibrating long enough to clutch a pen.

Like my interest in girls, my attraction to caffeine grew stronger in my teens. I discovered instant coffee in eighth grade, after I had procrastinated on my English reading, Gone with the Wind, until the weekend before the test. Caught in a crappy-paperback bind, I found a solution for my problem in Folgers crystals. These granules from heaven can be dissolved in a high Folgers-to-water ratio, then cut with as much milk as you need to make a cup downable. I used two scoops per cup — two huge scoops. Thus fueled, I rocketed through 1000-plus pages in two euphoric days, coming to the joyous realizations that the Klan was noble, Yankees were devils, and y’know, slavery wasn’t that bad! Luckily, the most mind-bending effects wore off before the test.

My addiction hit late stage in my early 20s, when I started slinging coffee in cafés for a living. The ready availability of free caffeine fostered a why not? attitude that saw my coffee ingestion reach a heart-racing 14 cups a day. My favorite form of intake was espresso shots, which you can drink almost without meaning to. I hit an all-time low/high the morning I poured a double espresso into a large Coke and big-gulped it. The stroke I suffered was a rush, but the drink left my teeth smoking nubbins and my mouth a fiery hole. I dubbed the mix “Bike Chain” (which is what it tasted like) and made it my own personalized version of Carnation Instant Breakfast.

AFTER QUITTING the café biz, I started to reform myself; the two were unrelated, if complementary. I didn’t try to break off my love affair with caffeine because it was getting on my nerves. No, no — nothing healthful. I just started drinking more beer, and alcohol and caffeine don’t mix nearly as well as caffeine and caffeine. Chasing a downer with an upper makes for some exciting heart confusion! Instructing your heart to speed up and slow down at the same time causes the messages to cancel out, and can even result in a form of cardiac inertia physicians call “death.” Yes, stimulants and depressants flow together like the River Phoenix. Also, beer and coffee are highly acidic, and my diet is mostly Mexican. I wouldn’t say I suffered heartburn; rather, fireballs blasted from my nose and my eyes shot lasers. Something had to give.

I first tried to cut back by quitting coffee cold turkey. Stop smirking — I succeeded. Sure, I started drinking a case of Pepsi a day, but no coffee. My inner junkie was so devious, in fact, that I didn’t make the connection between my method of “getting clean” and the mountain of soda cans on my desk. A colleague had to clue me in after he actually heard me say, “Damn, this is good Pepsi!” Pepsi is Pepsi, as battery acid is battery acid, and if you think one can has it over the other, it’s because of your pathetic addiction.

I cut back on cutting back and started making my coffee half decaf. That lasted — for about a pot. This rhythm method of caffeine prevention is like having sex with half your penis. It’s woefully inadequate for two reasons. First, addicts end up brewing and drinking twice as much half-caf coffee, or using twice as much half-caf coffee to brew a normally caffeinated pot of sludge; that they can stomach either testifies to the strength of their addiction. Second, decaf is a placebo ... I shouldn’t know it’s a placebo! You can’t trick your brain into thinking it’s getting a regular caffeine fix if it says “decaffeinated” right on the can; your brain can read, you know. If decaf is to be at all effective, one can on every supermarket shelf should contain caffeine — like loading one firing-squad marksman’s rifle with blanks to introduce to the executioners an element of guilt-alleviating doubt.

I’VE RECENTLY hit on a good coffee substitute: Mountain Dew. Before you deride my return to soda, let me inform you of some surprising facts. I did a lot of research online, and the rumor that Mountain Dew contains more caffeine than coffee is an urban myth. In fact, I was astounded to learn that Mountain Dew is actually caffeine-free! However, it is rife with a radioactive amphetamine called cocanium that makes it glow and excites your heartbeat to a high purr. Hmmm ... I think I finally found a good stimulant I can afford.

Sam Walters is a stand-up comic living in Somerville. He enjoys beer and beef jerky, and is not enamored of shaving. Berate him at sampwalters@hotmail.com.

Issue Date: June 14-21, 2001