Addicted to...

One of the part time regulars at my local drinking establishment is a friend called Frosty. Frosty gave up smoking some months ago or perhaps just over a year. Well done to him for going for it. I think his technique and there are a few notably popular methods. The cold turkey, patches, lozenges, mints, chewing gum, hypnotherapy, eating, solitary confinement etc. So he chose the Allen Carr method which for those who don't know involves reading his book from beginning to end and magically you give up smoking. I have read it twice and am still in the process of stopping. I actually did quite well recently. I managed two weeks and a half weeks without using a combination of the cold turkey, eating and solitary confinement method. I took two weeks off work and stayed at home and rarely ventured out except to buy loadsa junk food. So Thursday night we spoke about addiction and the general opinion was that addiction anything is bad. How can being addicted to sex (as an example) be bad? 99% of blokes would agree that its no bad thing unless it becomes a devient thing to do and they end up commiting a terrible crime to fulfill the addiction. Or is addiction exactly that. Is it a definition of something pleasurable that has turned itself into self harm, harm to others or both? Or does it describe something that is repeated with little or no thought to it? Or perhaps something that once a person would recognise as being pleasurable to an extent so much so that he/she has become desensitised to it and needs a great or more intense sensation to fulfill the need. So Frosty likes cheese. He said that he is addicted to cheese. Weird fetish if you ask me. But could I apply what I've said earlier to his particular addiction? At which point does the life of this man become consumed by his desire for a cheese fix? At what point will he stop washing and shaving himself in the mornings. Not put out the rubbish or clean his teeth for a cheese fix? Will he steal to fund his habit? Sell his body to men and women for a nibble of stilton? Every one has an addiction. No one person lives a moderate life. For some its cigarettes or booze, for others its sex and drugs or a combination of all four. Other people are addicted to keeping fit which ironically can kill if my theory of addiction is correct. Perhaps it is everyone addiction to something that in the end kills us. But death by cheese?