Mark Twain said “Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whiskey is barely enough.”

Yes, a lot of things have worked for people while sipping whisky: people have committed marriage, some great business deals have worked out, salesmen have had great sales across the table, and people have signed contracts …….. whisky is really charismatic.

The term ‘whisky’ derives originally from the Gaelic language (it is spoken mainly in the highlands and islands of western Scotland) ‘uisge beatha’, or ‘usquebaugh’, meaning ‘water of life’………and isn’t it apt?  Whisky has been distilled in Scotland for hundreds of years. Alcohol has always influenced the mankind and had a great effect on the development of the human civilization. It seems the wine was produced and used over 8 thousand years ago and has infused itself into many religions and customs over the world. Whisky managed to became synonym of a Scottish history and one of the most popular modern alcoholic beverages. Although the national drink of the Scots gained worldwide popularity after 15th century, the origin of whisky can be traced to much older periods of our history.

Whisky is made via distillation of fermented grain and first records of that process was found in the archeological digs of millennia BC Babylon and Mesopotamia. Initially used for creation of perfumes and aromas, the distillation slowly spread across the ancient civilizations where it received numerous adaptations and improvements, finally finding its home behind the walls of the European Christian monasteries.  Popularity of whisky continued to grew during the early years of 16th century, until 1541 when English King Henry VIII dissolved monasteries in Scotland. This event forced newly unemployed monks to start private production of whisky, and they soon spread their knowledge across entire Scotland.

Today, whisky is the topmost ranked alcohol in the world. Some like to gulp it while some sip it. It has numerous varieties of brands:  Crown Royal, Jim Beam, Canadian Club, Ballantine’s, Suntory, Chivas Regal, Johnnie Walker, Jack Daniel’s, McDowell, Officer’s Choice, Royal Stag, Bagpiper and Old Tavern. These are the top most brands, but there are many more brands…..about thousands of it. Some like it smooth while some like it hard, some like the blended while some like single malt. Life without Whisky is bristly. Well I am just trying to rhyme few lines in appreciation of whisky!!

No matter whatever your preference is: whether it is Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, Fireball, or Wild Turkey, there is no good or bad one…… yes that is the fact, believe. Each one has a favorite brand of his/her. The fact is that the demand for whiskey is overtaking the available supply over the past few years.   Whiskey used to be the drink of cowboys, construction workers, and labor class workers. But, recently it has become more and more common to see people from all walks of life enjoying a shot of whiskey after work. In fact, doctors advise consumption (of course in moderation) of whisky every day.

It reduce the risk of blood clots, it lowers stroke and heart attack risk as well. The antioxidants in whiskey stop cholesterol from clogging arteries, and it can even boost the good cholesterol in blood. It is therefore considered as one of the best antioxidants. Some of the health benefits of whiskey include its ability to aid in weight loss, slow down the onset of dementia, increase heart health, prevents and manages diabetes, boosts good cholesterol, fights against cancer,  strengthens the immune system. It fights stress, boosts memory, helps the digestion, lengthens life span, and is a great anti-diabetic. What more do you want?

There is a style of having whisky: pour little whiskey into a glass, glare at the color of it to gauge its age. Lift the glass to your nose for smelling its fragrance, pour in it little of clean water, taste the whiskey and compare it to its smell………add ice to a minimum. Finally, drink it however you like. Some people don’t like getting fussy about these things. Nor is getting scientific: anyone with a pipet adding water by the drop is kidding themselves.

Age of the whisky: If a bottle of Scotch whisky shows an age statement, e.g. “12 Years Old” means that the youngest whisky in the bottle is at least 12 years old. Scotch is bottled at a variety of ages, from 3 years to 50 years. Grain whisky is most often used between 3 and 5 years old in blended whisky brands. The drink is in demand at various other ages in blends: 5, 8, 12 years and older. Johnnie Walker Black Label and Chivas Regal 12 are both 12 year old blends whose combined case sales are over 10 million cases, or 10% of the total market. These two brands alone require high volumes of 12 year old grain whisky. For every batch of whisky, there are two major factors that determine how it would taste decades in future: what matters is the wooden barrel it’s aged in and the environment the barrel is stored in. Traditionally, whisky is aged in oak wood barrels that are either roasted or charred when they are built, creating a layer of charcoal that filters out the raw spirit’s unwanted flavors.

Malt whisky is typically would be between 5 and 10 years old as malt matures more slowly than grain. 10% of malt is bottled as ‘single malt’, which means the product of a single distillery bottled without the addition of any other malt or grain whisky. The Age statements of whisky are from 10 to 20 years that are popular with consumers. In the recent times, there has been an increase in bottling of single malts which do not declare an age statement. Don’t bother too much about the age of whisky or your age – there is not right and wrong age, or no good or bad brand of the scotch…..three cheers to all whisky lovers out there!!!!

Many must have noticed in some or the other parties some guys turning into quarrelsome jerks when they are drunk, while some other guys get all blubbery, saying things like “I love you, I missed you, you are such wonderful person man” to everyone. Such drunken guys and girls are sometimes pain; some burst out crying and sometimes there are guys who spill out secrets of others. Does the personality of people who get intoxicated reflect their true disposition? Does their real personality get unmasked because the alcohol makes it impossible to keep up the façade? Or does alcohol just do weird things to our brain, with mottled but not significant results?

Some people get very serious and philosophical when intoxicated. They sit in a corner looking at ceiling with a very serious face. Rarely people behave the same as their natural self when they get intoxicated. Does the behavior vary depending on the drink? Let’s say if they drink beer, wine or hard liquor? I have observed some of my friends become really happy when they have beer; some get into a lousy mood when they consume rum; and there are two friends of mine who start singing and dancing loud and glad to be alive when they mix drinks. I think generally, the person that comes out with the application of alcohol is that person’s “real” personality. It’s because alcohol lowers a person’s inhibitions, so whatever facades of their personality they would normally bottle up for fear of social unacceptability are just dropped due to intoxication. it’s usually the ugly opinions that people keep bottled up that tend to pop out when alcohol is consumed……everyone has a child hidden deep down, the child pops up and we get those expressions like “I love you, man” and those hugs and kisses.

Alcohol has been a part of the human diet for at least 10,000 years. In the U.S., over 65% of adults regularly have at least one alcoholic beverage a year. Typically, a low-to moderate amount of alcohol is defined as no more than one drinks a day for women and older adults, and two for men. One drink is usually one 1/2 ounce or 15 grams of alcohol, which equals approximately 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof liquor. However, these guidelines are tailored by each individual.

However, alcohol tends to make your inhibitions go away. It makes a normally quiet person feel quite gritty and talkative. And, sometimes makes a decently normal person angry and asshole. One evident fact is that inhibitions are part of our genes, part of our personality, and also part of our learned behavior. We have read and sometimes seen famous personalities get into brawls after consuming alcohol.  Shahrukh and Salman (both Khans) had a huge fight at Katrina Kaif’s birthday. Both Sallu and SRK have worked professionally together and even been friends off screen. Both had moderate drinks at the party; SRK apparently said a few things out of line that did not go too well with Salman. It turned out to be an ugly fight. Some famous industrialists have has ugly fights in public after drinks.

After certain amount of alcohol is consumed by a person, his/her brain starts to release dopamine, the more alcohol the more dopamine. Dopamine is the chemical your brain creates to make you feel good.  It makes the body want to do things that is healthy for it. When a person consumes little more than normal drinks it will release so much dopamine that your brain can’t tell the difference between a good decision and a bad decision.

It is said drunken man’s words are a sober man’s thoughts. Alcohol makes people do stuff they wouldn’t normally do. So you will see people driving at higher speed, picking up fights, singing, dancing, hugging others, passing unwanted remarks at others, doing all sorts of unusual things. Some purposely get drunk to do wrong things and say ‘sorry’ the next day with an excuse that they did all those ‘wrongs’ under the influence of alcohol.

Do you know corporate use drinking as trick? When a person gets drunk in a party, his/her boss observes the behavior. Many of his personality facets are observed by the boss, which were nicely under wrap till then. Few drinks make a person more confident, they gather more courage to express them better, and feel less accountability for their actions. Intoxicated communication is sometimes used in order to meet up certain targets or make plans in a group. A lot of confession is made under the influence of alcohol which is trickily used by the bosses.

According to Bruce Bartholow, author of “Alcohol Effects on Performance Monitoring and Adjustment: Affect Modulation and Impairment of Evaluative Cognitive Control”, alcohol doesn’t make you behave badly; it just makes you care less. For all of you trying to apologies or put right some unwanted words, the excuse, “I was drunk, I didn’t mean it” stop using this lame excuse at once. Bartholow, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Missouri College of Arts and Science, concludes that alcohol dulls the brain’s “alarm signal” that warns you when you are making a mistake. These dulled warnings are what lead to the loss of self-control we often regret after one too many.

So the next time when you are in a party, at a bar with friends, or at home taking drinks take a pause, when your brain signals that your body cannot take more drinks. Because that’s what drinking is all about: it is not a whirling, plummeting gamble of life. Don’t just throw away all your inhibitions and deliberately drown yourselves in a liquid.