Welcome to Weekenders Behappy1, ghostgirl and RedBerryJuniper!
Red, you are absolutely right, there is no compulsion to have a reason not to drink. I minimise the amount of time I spend where alcohol is being consumed and because I have not drank for two and a half years I rarely get asked the why aren't you drinking question but when I do I still only say I stopped because I was scaring myself which is true but is not the whole truth. There are two reasons for this coyness, the first being that I still don't want it to be widely known that I am a recovering alcoholic, principally for work and secondly if you tell the truth and say I don't want to be drunk and hungover it is taken as a reproach by the people you say it to. A little white lie to avoid hurting peoples feelings is not so bad.