The College Fix

Raise a glass — or a be-nogged hand– and enjoy: A few delightfully intoxicating links have been piling up next to our jug of moonshine:

1. You may think that jungle juice theme parties are a modern disease, but as this month’s Bookforum elucidates, it’s merely the latest twist of orange peel on the punch tradition from the 18th century and earlier:

Armed with all the relevant information about punch’s beginnings as a seventeenth-century British nautical necessity—the citrus warded off scurvy, and distilled liquor took up far less space on board than wine or beer, which often spoiled anyway—he moves through the decades at a steady clip, focusing on the extreme circumstances that brought about his beloved beverage. It was, among other things, the fuel behind the great discoveries of the East India Company and its kin, and Wondrich takes us out on the high seas and to the strange outposts where adventurers found themselves much in need of a taste of oblivion.

The age of discovery – fueled by hard liquor and proto-Crystal-Lite. Read the whole thing, which calls to mind that classic scene from Hemingway:

Bill came over from the piano and we drank the hot punch and listened to the wind.

“There isn’t too much rum in that.”

I went over the cupboard and brought the rum bottle and poured a half-tumblerful into the pitcher. “Direct action,” said Bill. “It beats legislation.”

2. Speaking of legislation and alcohol, the Commentator has been gleefully shotgunning the spirits of the season with their recent spate of drinking games/theme parties. First, their holiday issue features a simulation of the “Ted Kennedy Memorial United States Senate Beer Pong Tournament” — akin to war games for the alcoholic set. Sadly, our Arizona representatives fell at the three hands of the Hawaiian team, which is a pretty disappointing way to go out. They’ve also broken out the most intense Christmas film drinking game ever (actual quote: “take a shot…if it snows”), which poses more hand-eye coordination issues than drinking ones.

Speaking of hand-eye coordination, we don’t have to reminder that ’tis the season for a good game of Eggward Noggyhands.

3. Via American Drink: Writing in the Independent, Suzy Dean has some keen (and poetically wrought) considerations about prohibitionist efforts and limiting alcohol consumption for young people. “We should be encouraging young adults to drink sensibly, but to do this we need to be honest,” Dean writes, saying adults “need to integrate young people into our drinking culture earlier, making sure that they learn how to drink rather than forcing them to first encounter alcohol in hiding on a park bench.” She concludes her piece in a lovely sepia-toned scene with all the warmth and romance of that fourth glass of something stiff and steaming:

“We also shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that young adults won’t eventually discover this and want to do it themselves. There is a reason why a taste for alcohol is not specific to a single demographic in society; why it is not something we ‘grow out of’ and why…we won’t stop drinking the stuff. That’s because chatting with friends over a pint or a bottle of wine is an enjoyable cultural tradition: the fuel of conversation, intimacy and the exchange of ideas.”

We’ll drink to that. And so, apparently, will scientists: according to a paper on “the social properties are of the most highly cited scientists in the fields of environmental science and ecology,” these oft-referenced professionals are liberal with their libations. “[T]he researchers looked at how much these high-impact scientists drink,”  concluding that these scientists imbibe “an average of seven alcoholic drinks a week, which is 2.5 more than the average American.” Just what we wanted from Santa Krampus: more evidence to the intellectuals-as-drunkards/drunkards-as-intellectuals thesis. Cheers!

Anna Swenson blogs at the Desert Lamp.

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