Part I - The Great British Coke Habit

Brain: packet. Packet. Packet. Packet. Packet.

Most smellers of coke are in a love/hate relationship with the ol’ Watfordian punching powder. Something like: love the idea of coke, hate the doing of coke. 

Some look down past their unweathered septums at this dilemma – and ask “If you hate doing coke. Why do it?” The thing is, what you lot really just don’t get about La Cosa Nozza is: every single doer affectionately hates coke.  

This very British pastime consists of: 1 part chore, 1 part obligation, 2 parts off-brand laxative and (optional) one part fun.

Practically orders itself, doesn’t it, ‘ey?

It’s true, those spur-of-the-moment nights out are often the best. There’s something enlivening about getting swept away by the momentum of an evening.

When staunchly partial to The p-p-Packet, the moment’s not spurring shit – your physiological peckishness for coke, however, probably, is. There’s a dreary inevitability about the whole process that leaves a bad taste in the mouth, long before a baggy is ever tongued.

Planned coke is all well and good; if, still, obviously, fully badly bad. But, by all means, plan your coke and jam it through your twin keyholes. It’s that unpreventable, impromptu coke where things begin to get a little feeble and unfun. That pretty much premeditated, spontaneous coke. Whenever the last dregs of a friendship circle without their shit together are ‘round a pub table, the outcome is done.

It’s damn-near alchemy, how a half-mention transforms into a half-gram. An avid sniffer can be Derren Brown mind-fucked by the order of a “Whiskey & ..”, with the right emphasis. Can you joke about ‘it that shall not be named’ without super-ironically ordering some? Or is any passing reference to c_k_ effectively a verbally binding contract between you, your feckless mates and your dealer?

Okay, few. We’ve established the gear is getting got. Now frantic admin sucks all fun out of the situation. Cue: everybody temporarily forgetting their friends are their friends, until the delivery is definitely, definitely, definitely on the way. I wonder if the dealer recognizes the four and a half pints of resignation in the buyer’s voice.

Yeyo or Nay-o. Whether or not to give in punctually. Or hugely inconvenience yourself and end up hovering not-quite on a corner, trying to stand how people not-waiting-for-drugs stand. The only 2 viable options.

Yummy, Vile, Yummy Cravings

Full disclosure: this article is brought to you, in part, by The Humourless BMW Owner’s Association.

Coke. If, like me, the amount that last paragraph contained the dreaded C word, coincidentally got your brain warming to the idea of some – then there must be some sort of keenness going on at a chemical level, here. (If not, feel free to pity-read on and duck my over-inclusive use of the second person.)

It’s funny how innocently the brain presents the idea. Nothing like a surging itch, a daytime hankering for some Charles N’Zogbia is more insidious. All fondness and whimsy, the craving just happens to pop into mind. Less: ‘Arggghh I NEED Coke!’ More: ‘Do you know what might be really quite nice? Some coke, actually, yeah, some coke, now that I mention it.’

Somehow, it comes from the same pleasure department as a naughty choccy hobnob. Oooh, don’t mind if I do. The cravings of a cokeamoholic feels closer to a guilty chocoholic’s, than an alcoholic’s. Ummm yummy, vile, yummy coke.

Coke: The Breakfast of Wankers

Oh jesus, well, if you’re going to do coke, I’m going to have to do coke, because I’m not not being on coke, while you’re on fucking coke.

Compared to the reality, the stereotype of a coke user as an insufferable brash wanker is pretty flattering. Up close, the real magnitude of the high-octane shithousery is an awful spectacle.

It’s a behavioural car crash in fast motion (see: a pile-up of Cokeheads). While you’re the person behind the wheel, it’s pretty fun, exhilarating, even. When you’re pinned under the bumper, getting dragged along for a night and a day, it’s not.

Nothing else prolapses our inner-arsehole in quite the same way. Coke can accelerate the worst aspects of a personality and maintain them at maximal douche velocity. The brain taps into one unbearable, collective personality trait. Why is being a boorish prick at a rate of knots so appealing?

Everyone is focused on waiting for their chance to speak or, more often than not, not. Each bugger careens along their own runaway train of thought. Only really taking a breath to suck in a line. Bollocks! Someone swiped the mic mid-snort, best clock in for a shift of intense agreement. The sniffed-up agree as if their livelihood is on the line. Mmm-mm Mmm-Mmmmm. Excellent point.

Convos become competitions, where butting in is the only way to enter. The cokeheaded can interrupt even their own paradigm-shifting take on the next booze run. It’s a wonder to observe, five people having five independent conversations at each other. It can be like an am-dram run-through, where all the characters are delivering their own clunky, spot-lit soliloquy to a bored wall.

Nothing quite assures a self, like a light dusting of that booger sugar. All healthy, human self-doubt is flushed away with the first pretend doody. But, any attempt to launch this turbocharged charisma doesn’t really fly. Unless it’s a druggy venue, any charm onslaught is met with a flinch. 

Even if you’ve never heard of the concept of coke, you could tell – that guy’s clearly on coke. To inflict yourself on others, or not? If you resist, you feel like a young Arnold motherfuckin’ Schwarzenegger, trapped in a downstairs loo.

TBC next week in the Great British Coke Habit - Part II.