Because some years ago, some younger colleagues used me as the subject of an experiment. They wanted to see if I was any different under the influence than I was in the office, so at the office Christmas party, they made sure I was supplied with fresh drinks all evening. They were quite disappointed, I think, to find I was pretty much the same after several scotches as I was before.

But now we have scientific evidence, so we can be even surer. Reminds me of the big news a few years ago that a scientific study had determined that babies in utero could hear. The guys from Harvard announced this. A lady wrote a letter to the editor which said, essentially, "Of course they can. My son always jumped when I slammed the refrigerator door."

First of all, what do they think they are accomplishing by enlisting the aid of observers who were in no way qualified to make psychological observations? If you are doing a scientific study, you don't go out on the street and hire a bunch of random strangers to make the observations for you.

Secondly, the subjects of the study were apparently random, and the effect of alcohol on them utterly unknown. That is, they were not studying the effect of alcohol on alcoholics. The whole issue of alcoholism is that alcohol does things to, and for, an alcoholic that it does not do to, and for, a non-alcoholic. It is well known, actually, that alcohol has relatively little effect on people who are not alcoholic, so what were they attempting to prove?

I was well known to have a Jekyll/Hyde personality in my drinking days. My subordinates learned not to ask me for anything before I went out and drank my lunch. The defining quality, in fact, of alcoholism, is the change in personality that occurs when we drink. When I was sober (Well, hell, I was never sober. When I was not drinking) I was angry and liked no one. When I'd had a few drinks I was a cheerful and liked everyone.

Some years after I got sober, I came to realize that the real me is the person that likes people. I was fearful that people would not like me, and it was only under the influence of alcohol that the fear diminished enough to allow me to act on that liking. And years of learning to deal with that fear by means other than alcohol, of course.

So the headline of the article, I think, did get it right sort of by accident. For an alcoholic, the behavior under the influence tends to be the natural behavior of the person. But their study as described in the article is nonsensical and proves nothing.

Dancing was the first thing I thought of.

I can't/don't dance when I'm sober.

And I sure as heck can't when drinking,
although I may.