We’re  not trying to glorify drunkenness here, but it’s New Year’s, which means, for a lot of people, it’s a time for drink. So after a little reminiscing about New Year’s Eves of the past, we look at the history and nomenclature of cocktails.

• Some favorite cocktails of mine and Holly’s, including bloody Marys, bees’ knees and Holly’s love of vodka
• Caloric waste in the world of cocktails
• A brief chronology of cocktails
• Recipe variations in things like Mai Tais
• A drink ordering scene in “Home Movies”
• All the things you can read into a person ordering a Sex on the Beach
• Bitters as Ny-quil for liquor
• A “Will & Grace” with hot buttered rum
• Alcohol as “for medicinal use” in the past
• Where “signature drinks” came from
• Prohibition-themed bars
• Fizzy drinks on New Year’s
• Happy New Year!
• Listener mail! It’s a Facebook note from Jokey, who wrote some more about men in early childhood education (Jokey also inspired our occupational segregation podcast).

My research:

• Gatti, Susan Irvin. Fuzzy Navels and Slippery Nipples: A Sociolinguistic Reading of the Cocktail Menu. The Journal of American Culture. Volume 26, Number 1. March 2003
• Rooney, John F. “Beer, Bourbon and Boone’s Farm: A Geographical Examination of Alcoholic Drink in the United States.” Volume 11, Issue 4.

Holly’s research:

• Cocktails from Prohibition
• Cocktail Renaissance: The Re-emergence and Re-invention of the Cocktail Way of Life

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