Monkey on my back.......

Everybody has some kind of ‘monkey’ on their back....
Sex, drugs, ‘n rock ‘n roll.....dope, alcohol, whatever.....or maybe something as mundane as chocolate covered peanuts or soda pop...
Actually, quite a lot of people are addicted to Coca-Cola or Pepsi-Cola...or the sugar ‘n caffeine they contain.... American soft drinks used t’be made with cane sugar but that’s been replaced with the ubiquitous high fructose corn syrup which is a fancy way of saying ‘corn sugar’ as opposed to sugar from cane or beets.....corn sugar is, or has been, so cheap that companies added it to almost everything, not only soft drinks but cereals, candies, cookies, breads....pretty much you name it....and it tends to be addictive, y’know, and what manufacturer wouldn’t want his product to be addictive....I don’t care what all those tobacco companies testified to Congress, cigarettes were made more ‘n more addictive as the companies used more ‘n more additives.....I mean, if you grind up a little tobacco ‘n wrap it in a piece of paper, why would you add more expense by putting other stuff in.......ah well, I used to be a smoker so I know a little about addiction, cigarettes were hard to give up....I always said that I’d quit when the doctors told me to quit....’n after they told me, it took me five years.....remember that classic line, “I c’n quit anytime I want, I just don’t want to.”.....or one of my long-ago buddies that told me, “Marijuana ain’t addictive. I’ve been smoking it for twenty years ‘n I ought’a know.”
Y’know, I went for a long time without drinking soda pop, patted m’self on the back for having kicked an expensive ‘n (bad) tooth-decaying habit.....To tell the truth, I was feeling a little superior (maybe)...ah well, pride goeth before a fall ‘n I’m back on the juice.....not quite sure how it happened but it did.....I’ve been drinking diet Coke with Splenda....a couple almost ev’ry day...on the plus side, my coffee consumption is only averaging about six cups a day (most days).....
Y’all know, of course, that the way to kick an addiction is to replace it with another addiction....of course, you knew that......
I like old movies....’course, you knew that too...and in old movies, people smoke.....I also like Brit shows ‘n I’ve been watching one called ‘Gavin and Stacey’....and Brits smoke....a lot....I haven’t smoked in a long time, ten or fifteen years at least but in a dream t’other night... guess what?.....I was smoking....
Now, smoking in a dream has a lot of advantages over smoking in real life...it doesn’t hurt your lungs....’n you don’t have the odor...you don’t have to clean out the ashtrays....’n you don’t have to go stand outside ‘n have passerby’s sneer at you.......
And when you’re doing something that is as politically incorrect as smoking is t’day, you just know that everyone that passes you by is sneering at you....you just know that behind their bland appearances, their feigned indifference, they’re all looking down their noses at you...
And deservedly so ‘cuz you’re a wimp that can’t quit smoking.......
“She says, hey babe, take a walk on the wild side...”