Good Morning Digital Neighbors & Friends! Merry Christmas & Happy New Year's Eve! Our final installment for the year from the Little Book of Lost Words! May it carry you into the New Year with feelings of merriment and not misery.

Quafftide Noun / kwahf-tyde / Sixteenth Century English
The time for drinking alcohol

BONUS WORD!!!!! 🍾🍷🍸🍹🍻🥂🥃🎉🎊

Tope Verb / tohp / Seventeenth Century English Slang
To drink alcohol to the excess

The sweet joys of topeing was at hand, New Year's Eve had arrived and Grand Quafftide was about to uncork itself for the masses. bow and lifts a glass

Alcohol is a strange thing - able to build bonds & open doors or destroy individuals & relationships. It is a more readily a friend or foe than the mythical fire was that Prometheus stole from the gods. Some might argue that it was one the things that brought humanity together in the ancient world or is currently the greatest bane to destroying it in the current world.

Whatever you experience with alcohol, treating it with respect is probably the wisest choice one can make. It's mellowing state can become an escape from the problems and doldrums of the world, but alas, one must return to the real world, and occasionally with a painful hangover. Some mistakenly think that the euphoria associated with the early effects of alcohol make them wiser, funnier or more insightful than their previous state of sobriety. I have noticed that quality is some pot smokers as well. While they might provide free entertainment it is usually not for the better.

I have often heard that alcohol is a depressant. Perhaps chemically it is, but behaviorally it seems to be a mood enhancer. If someone cruises into euphoria happier, the early stages of incoherence seem to magnify that happiness. If someone starts draining the cup of bitterness while angry, watch out, fist will probably be flying for the night is done. And if one is already heart-heavy, alcohol will often plunge them deeper into their grief. Of course all that comes to an end in the puking and passing out, the body's way of saying enough is enough, and usually an act of mercy for the friends suffering such behavior from their dearest of drunks. 🤪

Whatever the evening holds for you, if it includes alcohol, I hope you can handle it responsibly, I know that sucks, but you will be better for it in the long run. If it is among your first times cruising the Happy Hangover Expressway, or you have reoccurring membership, I hope you have good friends that will watch out for you without taking embarrassing videos or photos. Know of my hopes for an enjoyable and safe evening for each of you, I will be enjoying mine at home sipping a little of the spirits while resting well before the changing of the year. Peace and Happy New Year's!

Baby New Year from a century ago salting the wings of peace so it doesn't fly away.