-=( 13 days later )=-

Its been 13 days coke and fizzy drink free, infact it's been pretty much a couple of glasses of milk and nothing but tap water ( which raises a few interesting questions about our local water supply ).

To say that quitting coke is an experience is a bit of a understatement, it seems to be one of those easier said than done things as the temptation is quite interesting i think ultimately the key to quitting stuff like his is realizing where the temptations are and avoiding them eg like not walking up the soft drink isle in the supermarket or going to fast food places.

If anything positive is to come out of a decade of coke consumption then it would be the addition of a still to my long list of projects. not so much for alcohol but for clean drinkable or water that doesn't smell badly of the chlorine hat has been used in an attempt to "clean" the water.

-=( Substance Abuse - Quitting cola )=-

After a decade of consumption i have sat down and done the maths on what has turned into a scarey addiction, and that is the consumption of cola it's hardly a secret that one of the ingredients in these things is Sugar or what we think is sugar which has been used in increasing quantities over the years to sweeten foods , and while sugar by itself isn't necessarily bad for us it turns out to be the quantities of sugars you are consuming which does the most damage.

Symptoms others and I have observed from my own consumption:
- extreme tiredness after getting out of bed nearly 1 hr after the alarm wakes me up ,
- very little to no energy
- crankiness after short periods without my favorite drink
- limited paranoia
- slight weight gain (nick named the coke belly)

To date in the last decade i have consumed somewhere around 4.5 litres per day which in hindsight is scarey on it's own, however it gets worse:

According to the label on the bottle there is 11.5grams of suger(s) and 5mg of sodium for every 100ml

that is 256grams of sugar(s) in every bottle  and since i am consuming 2 of these bottles everyday that is 513 grams per day ..... I must admit i get those chills down my spine just recalculating the numbers several times and until someone else does the maths and confirms these numbers i'm living in denial

at this rate of consumption: (4.5 litres/day)
over a day 513 grams of sugar(s)
over a week  that is 3,591 grams of Sugar(s)  [3.591kg]
over 1 years that is 201.096 grams of Sugar(s)  [201.096kg]
over 10 years that is 2,010,960 grams of sugars(s) [2,010.9kg] (2.010 tons)

this is very scarey.... and not good...

I have tried over the years on occasions to give the stuff up which has usually resulted in consuming slightly more as soon as the headache/migraines set in.

most of my efforts to quit in the past have involved:
- Teas:

the results were migraines/some type of hangover experience the tea wasn't particularly attractive to taste either and crankiness came about after 1/2 a day

- Coffee:

tried more recently and not to insult coffee drinkers out there , seriously how can you honestly drink this stuff and even look like you are enjoying it. i remember my taste buds jumping for more joy in contact with Brussels sprouts before today still the result was the same as Teas , splitting headaches and crankiness

- Cordials

this had an interesting effect where the headaches we're as bad, however the Sugar intake isn't much better if not actually worse this is not really a viable option to reconsider

- Caffeine tablets

didn't do anything , other than keep me awake

- Cold turkey

tried a few times , gave in to the headaches,

in conclusion and after confirming the above numbers it looks like the reason is because i am on a massive sugar "high" and my body has become dependent on it so when i stop consuming it i experience a huge chemical change in my body , in hindsight none of the above in any quantity would have done anything for me, so it looks like the path forward is to go "cold turkey" and suffer the pain and drink plenty of water. apologies to everyone around me for what is about the ensue... again.....

-=( how to wire up a hotend )=-

-=( Github - learning to love it..... )=-

I have since worked out the working of git-hub , and now got my own variant of marlin with all my mods in it
https://github.com/jgrjgr/Marlin


Modifications included:

- Hardware/software pwm choice settable in configuration.h
- M42 is now buffered - this is usefull for when you need buffered triggering of leds ,cameras , lasers, solenoids... anything

Modifications todo:

- variable pulse width out for use with the tb6560 and similar stepper drivers