Ham on Wry

THINK THE DRINK THROUGH: If you have any thoughts about drinking again, have your spouse open up a saloon in your basement. If he or she buys a gallon of the rotgut you fancy and pays $25 for it, it can be sold back to you for $1 a shot, or about $128 a jug. Assuming the "bar" buys you an occasional drink "on the house," your spouse will make a net profit of $100 on each gallon. At two of these per week, assuming it takes you ten years to drink yourself to death, your spouse should have on deposit in the bank (with interest compounded daily) more than $175,000--money with which he or she can pay off the mortgage, start the kids in college, and have enough left over to attract a new young husband or wife in whose arms he or she can forget you ever existed.