People Are Bidding Adieu to 'Long Boozy Nights'

Say goodbye to those "long boozy nights" of yesteryear. That's according to Katie Roiphe, a college professor who observes for the Wall Street Journal that, as we head into the holiday season, she's noticed more "sober-ish" people around of late—meaning folks who haven't gone full teetotaler but instead substantially cut down to just a glass or two of booze on occasion, usually when socializing. Roiphe notes that this phenomenon of rising pseudo-abstention could be tied to the fact that more and more research is finding there's no truly safe amount of alcohol, or because as more people start dealing with aging parents and staring down their own mortality, they've decided the fun of a liquor-fueled night out doesn't outweigh the risks. So how does Roiphe feel about this? She's got feelings more mixed than an elaborate spiced winter cocktail.

On the one hand, expect parties to not last as long, and that you may not see people "who like to be festive in an old-school way" (those who like to throw a few back) as much. There are also "peculiar new etiquette frontiers": Roiphe said a pal mentioned, "When you go out to dinner with someone now and the waiter comes to take the drink order and they say, 'just water for me,' you know that person is saving their glass of wine for a better dinner. ... You're not worth a drink." Still, Roiphe notes it's nice to walk around on a weekend morning with a clear, non-hungover head, and she noticed at a party she threw for current and former students, at which she drank just a half-glass of wine, that it was a literally more memorable night for her, with better conversations and more interactions. "I realized that I probably had more fun than I would have had on a tipsier night," she writes. Full essay here. (More drinking stories.)