Thanksgiving night, driving home after seeing the excellent Johnny Cash bio "Walk The Line," my body turned on me. I'd been a bit dizzy after the movie, but chalked it up to jumping from my seat too swiftly.

The dizziness increased, turning to tunnel vision.

My lungs seemed to lose their ability to take in air and my heart began pounding hard enough to bruise the inside of my ribcage.

Ania quickly pulled the car to curb and I jumped from the seat to get flat on the wet sidewalk. It was so cold my skin was steaming, and all I could see was a small fuzzy circle of the dark sky and Ania's worried face as she dialed 911 and held my hand.

It wasn't the oft-described "elephant standing on your chest," but it felt so much as if my heart was going to explode I was certain it was a heart-attack.

Am I dying?

Is this really all the life I get?

An ambulance ride, many hours in a strangely quiet Sutter-Solano emergency room with ECGs, staggered blood tests, chest x-rays... and the verdict was I'll live. No damaging cardiac event took place, no heart attack, no sign of anything out of the ordinary.

Diagnosis: benign heart palpitations, confirmed by my regular physician today.

Culprit: excessive caffeine intake.

If that was benign, I certainly never want to experience malignant.

My one vice is green tea. No smoking, no drinking, no drugging, no meat-eating... hell, not even coffee. I quit that over a year ago.

Just green tea.

I have now learned the hard way all chemical dependencies will get you.

Now I am truly without vice.