In the HBO documentary Risky Drinking, which profiles, well, risky drinkers from all different walks of life, experts discuss the "shades of grey" that are now widely acknowledged to exist when it comes to addiction. At what point does grey become black and white? At what point does the amber warning light of addiction begin to flash red? "I like to say it’s when alcohol be- comes a friend, the thing that we turn to to relieve our stress, to numb our pain," says Deidra Roach, of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. "Because when alcohol becomes a friend, it’s firmly on the path to becoming a partner. And as a partner, it’s poison." One way to read this is that the more severe the stress, the more traumatic the pain, the more likely it is that "normal" drinking will slide stealthily into becoming risky drinking.