...painters have to be high. I'd love to say that the cliche' slash general consensus that painters are drinkers is untrue. Wait, that's the former cliche'/consensus; now it's that we're all stoners or some variation on people who overindulge in mind-altering substances.

This cartoon, part of my latest batch to not be selected by "The New Yorker," actually refers to odorless paint and, possibly, odorous painters.

Now, I have (now) been a painter of one stripe or another (sign painter apprentice; painter of public works projects like Navy housing, buildings, metal towers; shipyard painter of bilges and tanks and submarines and aircraft carriers; nuclear-qualified sign painter; painting contractor; oh, and a few watercolors) for 48 years, and have worked with or run into a large number of painters (not physically, though I have stories of painters who had too much at lunch and did run into other vehicles, including a government worker crashing into a government vehicle IN a government vehicle); so, I'm in a possibly unique position to say that, yes, some painters indulge. 

Some overindulge. Actually, and I'm not bragging (a little, maybe; it surprised me when, just recently, I figured out it's been almost thirty years), I haven't had a drink of alcohol since 1989 or so. There is a story here, and, maybe, if you're intoxicated enough (and I'm, of course, not), I'll gladly tell you. 

No, I'll tell you anyway, but not here and now. As far as now-legal pot; nope; never smoked enough to impress a high school senior (probably not even a freshman). Now, smoking cigarettes; took me a while to give that up (somewhere in the early 2,000s).

Oh, I do take a lot of vitamins, and will pop two acetiminophen (sp?) pills late on a long day if my knees hurt enough; AND I do swear. A lot. Too much.

Still, probably not enough to impress a high school freshman.