Question: why can't "Addictive"(tm) stuff addict me?

This has been a real confounder for me. You all know about how society regards certain products as dangerous, and gets them banned, in large part because they are addictive. You use them, you get hooked, you can't stop, they're destructive to your body, and then you have to go on public assistance. Woe is thee.

Yet I have never been able to get addicted (or near addicted -- I'm not going by the rigorous psychological definition here) to such products. For example, I have never once actually enjoyed the process of drinking an alcoholic beverage. That is, there has never been an instance where I drank beer/wine/liquor/whatever and actually got a positive response signal from my brain telling me to do it again because it's cool.

So I don't like any alcoholic beverage (the feeling of intoxication is another story) and can't even distinguish them much. They all taste like like sour/bitter stuff that stings/hurts as they go down. Yuck! I mean, I get that it's an "acquired" (i.e., imagined) taste, but I've been socially drinking for a while (i.e. in the presence of legal guardians and after turning 21), and ... nada. To drink anything alcoholic feels like a chore, not something I'd do for enjoyment. (In fairness, soda stings too as it goes down but is otherwise tasty.) When I pick a beer, I go for "least painful", not "tastes good".

I'm even at the point where I believe it's all faked. You're all familiar with the phenomenon of how double-blind tasting destroys the standard quality ranking for wines (link forthcoming). And then, for example, when I asked my female friend "K" what she likes about beer, I got answers like, "well, um, it tastes good when you're really thirsty and tired ..." (in contrast, of course, to all those drinks that taste BAD when you're desperate for one...).

My female (and Italian) friend "A", an avid wine lover, claims that my brain or genome must be so fundamentally different that I should submit myself for medical study so as to gain insight into curing alcoholics (a condition that completely perplexes me). Yet my female friend (wine lover but not Italian) "C" insists that not liking wine is common among her friends. Like with wanting to tank oil's price, I'd be very interested in contributing to the well-being of society by helping out with curing alcoholism ... if in fact I can. (I'm glad their names all begin with different letters!)

(Yes, I know there are some good points about how "alcoholism" is just a case of "I really like alcohol and will ditch my family to enjoy it" [link forthcoming] but the existence of a desire to drink so much is believable and worth understanding better.)

The same phenomenon repeats itself for smoking. While I have tried cigarettes before, and did smoke socially a couple times, and certainly beyond the threshold that makes people yearn for a cigarette, I feel no desire whatsoever to smoke. (Hi health insurer! I haven't ever smoked nearly enough to count as a "smoker".) Sure, the buzz is great, but I have never thought to myself "Hey, I want to do something enjoyable ... oh! Right! Lighting up!"

I can hear you guys yawning. Now, here's the kicker: I do get powerful, near-addiction urges to e.g. post on internet forums, eat ice cream/milkshakes (YUM!), play certain video games, and other things I can remember. But EVERY one of those things for which I *do* get urges ... is completely legal! (Go me!) That is, there has never been any kind of succesful mass movement to ban those things! Those closest we've see is "fat taxes" which are very unsuccessful.

For discussion: am I different enough to be useful to medicine? Is this condition a special case of my bad luck, as society will protect me from access to non-addictive stuff, and let me use addictive stuff to my own detriment? Is it just a matter of time before I start "getting a taste" for these things? Do people merely pretend to like certain beers and wines e.g. as a form of social signaling?

A pickup truck driver tried to ram me

Okay, first personal post.  As I was driving back to Austin from Waco for the 4th of July weekend, was stopped at a light behind a pickup truck driver.  I saw him smoking and figured he was just going to be like the standard, don't-care-about-everyone-else jerk that tends to drive a pickup.

And of course, I turned out to be right.  He tossed his cigarette out his window in contravention of the laws against this and general standards of decency.  So, I gently reminded him of his transgression by laying on my horn the moment it hit the ground.   This seem to anger him, as he started to yell things at me I couldn't quite make out, via his rear-view mirror.  I motioned to him something like "smoking cigarette, toss aside, what the hell?"  As is usual from this type of animal, he only got angrier.

In an attempt to retaliate, he drove very slowly through the light when it turned green.  No problem, he's trying to piss me off and it's not going to work.  I just casually followed behind him without attempting to go around him.  Finally, he pulled to the left to a turn lane and put on his signal like he was going to turn.  After I passed he came charging behind me. He got in the lane to the left of me and I suddenly notice he was changing lanes right into me.  I quickly braked in order to avoid him, and wasn't sure if he would have actually gone through with it.

Apparently, he thought this would scare me.  But still not wanting to break any law, I continued to drive along casually, no matter how slow he went.  Finally, he just turned off to a side road.  A driver behind me looked like he was getting out his cell phone so I pulled in to a driveway for a business, thinking the witness would pull over too.  But he didn't, so I continued to my destination, never seeing the truck again.

Too bad I didn't take the time to catch his plate numbers.

So, did I unnecessarily risk my life by antagonizing a jerk?  Discuss.