Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher - Ep. 45 | Loose Animals and Drinking With St. Nick | Guests: Kara Cooney & Michael P. Foley

Episode Date: November 24, 2018

Loose Animals and Drinking With St. Nick | Guests: Kara Cooney & Michael P. Foley In When Women Ruled the World (published by National Geographic), celebrated Egyptologist and UCLA professor Kara Cooney takes readers on a riveting journey through the lives of six remarkable female pharaohs — Merneith, Neferusobek, Hatshepsut, Nefertiti, Tawosret and Cleopatra — rulers who wielded the most significant power, despite their gender.   “Ancient Egypt is an anomaly as the only land that consistently demanded the rule of women to keep its regime in working order, safe from discord, and on the surest possible footing — particularly when a crisis was underway,” explains Cooney in the book’s introduction. While this does not mean that ancient Egypt treated women more fairly than other complex societies, it did utilize female power to avoid war and to maintain order. As Cooney explains, women “rule pragmatically; they don’t hog all the credit. Society won’t let them … In Egypt such women were the salvation for people again and again.” Washington, D.C.—How in the name of Christmas are you going to surprise and delight your friends and family with a fun and festive holiday celebration they’ll remember forever? Raise a glass to Christmas as it should be celebrated with the help of Drinking with Saint Nick: Christmas Cocktails for Sinners and Saints(Regnery History; October 16, 2018; $19.99) by bestselling author of Drinking with the Saints: A Sinner’s Guide to a Holy Happy Hour and expert mixologist, Michael P. Foley. One-part bartender’s guide, one-part spiritual manual, a dash of lightheartedness, and mixed with Christmas spirit, this book brings holiday cheer to sinners and saints alike.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to Chewing the Fat on demand. So you're tired. You're sitting in your car. And you're thinking, I'm just going to listen to chewing the fat and relax a little bit before I go back out and shop. Or you just got home. You're tired. You've had it with people. You just wanted to sit down and listen to chewing the fat.

But you didn't get all the gifts that you wanted. You're not sure what to get, everybody. Shop. Dot the blaze.com. shop.theblaze.com take care of the people you love with a chewing the fat with Jeff Fisher coffee mug. There's nothing more in life

than the thank you and the hug and the kiss that you'll receive from the person you give the chewing the fat with Jeff Fisher coffee mug to. Shop.com. Happy black Friday. Since it is Black Friday, I thought I would.

I'm kind of liking, I'm not going to do this forever, I'm just teasing, but I'm kind of liking the theme shows. So, you know, this is going to be Black Friday Animal Day. Just we're going to cover you with the animal stories. You know, what started me thinking about this was Donald Trump, yes, the president, Donald Trump, getting in trouble for slapping the back of a horse's butt. And I said slapping. It was really patting the back of the horse's butt when they were dropping off the Christmas tree. And I got the big Clydesdale, the giant horses there pulling the Christmas tree. It's a cute, it's a whole big to-do.

And so our president comes up when he taps the, and I say pat. At first I said slap, then I would tap. Now I'm saying just pat's the horse on the butt. You know, there's a big old horse there. Yeah, yeah. And he gets in trouble for that. can we give the guy a little bit of a break? Please.

Just a little. No one walks up to a horse and doesn't just pat it. It's not anything other than just loving the animal. Can we just give the guy a break? And then we saw reports of a camel in Pennsylvania. It was storming and snowing and people were posting on social media. Some of them I can't air for you. on my podcast, but people are driving by going,

is that an effing, Campbell? You know, that's one of the things that disappoints me with a lot of social media today that some of the live shots that we get of stuff going on on the interstate, everybody's got to use just their, just using naughty language, and I don't like it.

Can we clean it up just a little bit? But then I read an article that said, if you swear you have a higher IQ, did you know that? So go ahead and swear. I don't care. I don't. Do I care?

Of course, you're going to beep that. So there is a camel from some petting zoo that got stuck in the back. They were moving in the snowy. You see this camel along the highway, you would be a little, is that a camel? Holy cow. And you know my experience with camels when I was in Israel. And we stopped along the side of the road because these better ones were giving camel rides. but the camel was not happy about me coming up to him.

You're going to put, he wants to ride me? No. And the better one was having none of it. His owner was having none of it. You want to talk about being mad at somebody for slapping an animal. Talk to the guy that owned the camel in Israel. Because that camel, it didn't matter what that camel wanted to do. I was going to, the fat man was going to get out of him and ride him.

And that's exactly what happened. Then we have animal control officers helping. helping people catch a loose chicken in Maine. You ever seen a loose chicken in the city? This is in Maine. And there was a chicken running around and people were, you know, people were, I don't know why people get so scared. It's a chicken.

It's just a chicken. Live them alone. But so they, nearby citizens were all freaked out and trying to wrangle the bird. And so finally an animal control officer came and, you know, caught the chicken. When I was living in New Jersey for a summer, I lived in Weehawking, New Jersey for the summer, and I lived

right across from, right there at the beginning of the Lincoln Tunnel on the New Jersey side. Right? So we worked in Manhattan, and so I took a bus into the city every day, and the bus stop was right close to where my apartment was. And

it was the last stop in Jersey and then the first stop was at the at the bus terminal in Manhattan so it was just a quick ride but I want to walk to the bus stop from where I was living there's there was you know a wall and a hill it was New York in New Jersey you built in a little giant mound of dirt and there was a chicken used to be up in that up in this brush, and he would be up in the brush, and he would come out and he would look at you like, you're going to feed me, you're going to feed me?

No, I'm back in the brush. You're going to feed me? You're going to feed me? No, I'm back in the brush. And he would hop down and try to get food from people's trash, and he would hop down and people would feed him. Then he'd be back up in the trash. That's a chicken.

Don't worry about chickens roaming around your neighborhood. They're just a chicken. But I've been thinking about, you ever think about raising chickens in the city? I don't know. That's, That's a little question. Well, people get a little wound up when you start raising chickens and stuff.

They're noisy and dirty, nasty. In North Carolina, an animal shelter says they're always looking for people to come and adopt animals that they have. That's what animal shelters do. But there's a special bond between a donkey and an emu that they're saying, look, it's going to make adoption difficult. difficult. Because these two animals, the donkey and the female emu, do not want to be apart. And they don't want to be, they want to be together.

When you start taking them apart, they freak out. So either you can take the donkey and the emu. Or, I mean, it doesn't say this in the story, but what happens at adoption centers when animals aren't adopted? Goodbye. So it's going to be a sad day with the emu and the donkey. You have to bite it on the same day. But I've got animal stories here.

It's full of animal stories. Bird rescue seeks owner. Oh, yeah, you've seen. I saw the pigeon this weekend that's got the bling on it hanging. You ever been? I got no pigeon stories too. You know, when I was a little kid, I worked for a guy, Mr. Washington.

He was such a good guy. And he was, at the time, he was a really old man. And I know sometimes when your kids, people seem older than they were, but he was fought in World War I. He was a railroad guy. He had show ponies. But what he did in World War I was he was the pigeon guy. He sent messages with pigeons.

So he had all these trained pigeons. And he still had him up above his garage. He had this huge garage, like this huge. four-car garage, but upstairs is where he kept all his pigeons. So, I mean, we always had to take care of those stupid pigeons. What I call him, Mr. Washington, his name is Wallace. Mr. Wallace. Not Washington, Mr. Wallace.

I love that old guy. He was one of my first jobs, actually, going to the fairgrounds to clean out the stalls. He had rented the stalls for his show horses. And I remember him saying to me, and we used to play football in the yard next to his house and stuff. So, you know, I used to talk to him. He used to watch us. In today's world, would you let your son, you know, I was, I don't know how old I was, but would you let your son go to the fairgrounds with this old guy all by himself?

Probably not. Today's world, you wouldn't. Although it'd probably be fine, really. But just what we know in the news, no way, right? So I go home and I ask my dad, hey, Mr. Wallace wants me to, you know, go to the fairgrounds and clean the horse stalls out. going to pay me and my dad's like and why aren't you there now i mean so every saturday man bright and early those shoveling out horse stalls and hosing down horses cleaning up horse crap all

saturday wheelborrowing it in and out new straw cleaning those horses from mr wallace but it was a job man he paid me i loved it now back to the bedazzled vest-clad pigeon that nobody knows who belongs to So it's all blinged out and they don't know who it belongs to. I'm guessing that it belonged to a female who possibly, I don't know, maybe once ruled the world. We had an opportunity to talk to Caracone, who wrote a book called When Women Ruled the World, six queens of Egypt. She's an Egyptologist.

This is for National Geographic. And I thought, you know what? Women still rule the world. These stories of the six queens of Egypt are kind of lost stories, but it's fascinating to hear about it and see what it was like for them as rulers. Caracone, author of When Women Rulers, the world. That's kind of misleading because there are many of us in the world. And unfortunately,

I am in that list that believe that women still do rule the world. I don't know if you, you know, I've been married and the woman in my life rules the world. Although I know what you're talking about. Yes, but does she, so essentially it's when women rule as formal leadership state. So I'm looking for when women can lead the whole show. So your idea is the six queens of Egypt, which is fascinating to me. Egypt provided access and power to these women, unlike other places in the world for years, didn't they? Yeah, it's a strange thing that in ancient Greece or Rome, where you have more even distribution of power and more competition. If one man falls, another man takes its place.

But in Egypt, where you have this authority. regime of dynastic families, very, very inbred form of power, the female in that family can step in a crisis and really make sure that the patriarchal system continues. And really, that's the tragedy of the whole book. Yes, women did rule the world regularly and systematically in ancient Egypt, but they did so only because there was an authoritarian regime that made it possible. So the more unequal to society, the more possible it is in the ancient world for a woman to gain this kind of power. You know, we hear so many stories of women, you know, ruling different parts or different

businesses. And it seems like today it's such a surprise that women are, you know, it's like a, oh, my gosh, women are actually smart enough to do this. Yeah, duh. What can we learn from that as an example? I mean, in today's world where we can maybe realize that, you know, women can actually do this, duh. It's pretty crazy, right? If feminism is nothing more than 50% of the population should have 50% of the power.

Why do we have 6% female CEOs of Fortune 500 type companies? You know, it's pretty crazy. When I speak on this in public, you know, I have to establish that women do not rule the world. show military slides, I show economy, I show political discussions. These are the numbers and break it down for those who think that we're making such great strides. Not that the elections, the recent elections, don't improve things for women, but we're still not at 25% in the United States Congress yet. And there's a long way to go. And I'm also cognizant as a historian, having written this book, Each time a woman rose to power, she got a pushback after her death or the sisterhood, I should say, got a pushback.

There was a response, and we have to expect a response here in this case as well. When women make great strides, there will be somebody to push back in some way. We have to expect it. Well, I mean, we also have an idea that, you know, there are times when women decide that they want to be mothers and they want to be mothers. and they want to be homemakers. And we, you know, shouldn't make them feel bad about that. You know, that's their decision, right? No, and I couldn't have written this book without having given a birth, given birth myself.

You know, I breastfed for two years. That's crazy. Who does that? And I saw all the ups and downs of my own hormones, and I was postpartum, everything, depressed, anxious, all the things. And I think that a feminism absent of biology is ridiculous. I think a feminism absent of the idea that women can think differently than men, obviously on a gradient. You know, they're masculinized women and they're feminized men.

But I think that I couldn't have understood how vulnerable my body is in comparison to a man's had I not gone through that process and how much my hormones tether me to the world in a way that a man's hormones don't necessarily do. Even if a man decides that he wants to call himself a woman in today's world, it doesn't make it so. Well, this is really interesting because it's culture that gives us the binary between male and female. And if you look at the biology, it's a mess. You know, there are masculinized men and there are feminized women biologically. And there's intersex and there's all kinds of crazy chromosomal number counts. and it's a much more complicated situation when you're actually looking at the biology. It's our cultural understanding that says, no, you have to pick.

You're a man or you're a woman. And so the whole transgender argument that we're having right now is very interesting. But it's in some ways in nature versus nurture discussion. And if you talk to hunter-gatherer communities, people who live the way human beings have lived for hundreds of thousands of years, they wouldn't have the same problems with it. They know that some people are born, some men are born. born in a more feminized way and vice versa. And this is an expected part of nature and they are familiar with mammals and know that

there's many different ways to express a biological sexuality. So, yeah, it's a little more unclear. But for these Egyptian women, they're dealing with binary. They're dealing with you're either a woman or you're a man. And they're dealing with a man's world. And in ancient Egypt, when you're trying to create power for one dynasty, you've got to give it to a man, just in terms of basic biological economy. A woman can only produce one baby a year, a man 365. If I'm risk-averse and I want my dynasty to continue, I'm going to give the man the power and surround him with females, with a harem of females, so that he can make sure that there's going to be an heir to the throne.

That's unequal from the get-go. So in your book, Kara Cooney we're talking to in her new novel, When Women Ruled, and there's six stories in here of queens or when women rulers. And tell me a quick little bit about the Queen of Blood. Oh, Mernay, Dynasty I. It's so interesting that female rule makes its appearance at the very moment that Divine Kingship makes its appearance in Egypt in Dynasty One. So in Dynasty 1, the kings are trying to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are God kings that cannot be questioned.

And throughout this dynasty, when the king dies, they took members of their family in court and sacrificed them and then laid them to rest around the king and his burial. The method of death is not known because the skeletons have all been found, though buried at the same time, in a fetal. position without any sorts of marks of death. So maybe poison of some kind, or maybe they were strangled. We don't know. But hundreds and hundreds of people lost their lives when the king died. And Mernays, this woman who stepped in when her husband died unexpectedly, leaving her with a young son on whose behalf she had to rule, she would have been the one who decided

who lived and who died, who accompanied her dead husband into the ground and into the afterlife and her young son would have witnessed all of this. His first moment as king, as king, would have been a Jones town-like affair of sadness and grief and keening. And it's an extraordinary way to start out Egyptian divine kingship. Boy, no kidding. And it also leaves a twisted. You talk about the sadness and so forth with that, but it also leads the little one to believe that he can do anything because it doesn't matter. Right. I mean, he's the king. It doesn't matter. Yeah. And he, he, he He ruled, he had the longest reign of any king in Dynasty one. But the Egyptian king, the divine king, is meant to believe that he can do anything.

He is a God king. And we see the latitude people with absolute power take. It does corrupt. We do know this. That's an amazing thing. All right. So as you went through these dynasties, what did they all, you know, aside from being, women. What did they have in common? There was a crisis of some kind. There was some reason to invite

the woman in. And they took it. So Mernate, she's in Dynasty I. She's dealing with a son who's too young to rule. You can't make the decisions on his own. We don't know his age, but he was too young. Nefru Sobeck of Dynasty 12, there was no one left to rule, maybe because of a very inbred dynasty riddled by incest, but she was the last one left. And they allowed her to take the throne. In Dynasty 18, Hatschepsid is dealing with a situation very similar to Murnates. She's got a two-year-old on the throne, and she's serving as his Queen Regent, and when the kid is nine years old, she decides to have herself crowned alongside him. The reasons for that are shrouded from our view.

It's very interesting to see her ambition push itself forward there. In Dynasty 18, Nefertiti, she's ruling alongside a husband who is a religious fanatic. And she is a co-king alongside him. And when he dies, it's arguably Nefertiti, who has to put all the pieces of the shattered rain back together. Tawhastard of Dynasty 19 is there in another crisis dealing with civil war, ruling alongside a child king, taking the throne eventually herself after that child's death. And then there's Cleopatra. And the crisis can't get much bigger than Rome's ultimate invasion of Egypt and the taking of Egypt into its. empire. And she fights to the end, but she does lose as so many other women lost fighting the

voracious Roman Empire. But it's a crisis that allows these women to come in. Something's gone wrong. And each of these women acts to protect the patriarchy in the larger dynastic line. And they, and on the same token as taking over from the crisis, they, actually, it appears, you know, once you take the bull by the horns, you love it. that power does end up corrupting all, as you said earlier. The women, actually, there's less evidence of that happening. And partly because those women who were so successful are erased from our memory, Hatshepsu, little 22 years altogether, did everything right, left Egypt better than she found it,

and we can't even pronounce her name. So the successful female leaders, I don't think they were removed from our historical view, because their power corrupted, at least there's no evidence of it. They were removed because they didn't fit the patriarchal succession and because their success could be claimed by others who ruled after. And so her names and images were erased, and those feats that she had achieved were given to others and everyone wants to be successful so that was easily done.

But a cautionary tale like Cleopatra, you know, Shakespeare's written plays about her, and we can remember her as the reason that women don't rule, rule. That's really why her failure has been so aggrandized and why we can pronounce her name so easily in comparison to Hutschepsuits. Kara Cooney, when women ruled the world, six queens of Egypt, you know, I have an 11-year-old daughter, and I'm, you know, I really do tell her all the time that she can, you know, she needs to just do what she wants and there are no, there are no barriers. But as you're going

through this, what would be the most important thing I should tell my daughter? That there are barriers. She should be very clear-eyed about this. She needs to know that there are barriers, and she needs to know that her femininity will be a barrier. And we need as a society to talk about our mistrust of females in power, our outright hostility in some cases. And as soon as they know that that exists,

then it's something that can be transcended and can be discussed and talked about. As long as we don't discuss it and pretend that women are just equal to men in every way, shape, and form, then we don't have the conversation. Caracone, when women ruled the world, six queens of Egypt. Thank you very much. This is for, this was done through National Geographic. Do we have the, are we having the National Geographic specials of the six queens? No specials yet, but I have an exhibition happening at Nat Geo Central in D.C., and I'm doing a speaking tour now.

So I'm doing Nat Geo live talks all over the country. It's pretty exciting. That's fantastic. I'll argue for the specials for you if you'd like. We'll get those produced right now. Oh, thanks. Let's do that happen. Kara Cooney, thank you very much.

I appreciate it. Remember, you can follow me on Twitter at Jeff EMRA. Facebook and Instagram is Jeff Fisher Radio. And subscribe. If you're listening to this podcast and you haven't subscribed, please do so. And then rate, review it. And I'll make it easy for you. just rate it 20 stars and review it Best Podcast Ever.

You don't have to worry about it. You don't have to think about it. You can make it nice and easy. Just subscribe, rate it 20 stars, review it Best Podcast Ever. You're done. And know that I thank you very much for that. And then if you're still in the mood, share it with someone and say, hey, you should listen to this.

Thank you. Share it with whoever you want. Whatever first name drops down in your email list, share it with them. So since it's Black Friday, animal-themed Friday, two stories that are a little frightening. We had a story of a monkey who snatched a baby from its mother's arms. It was in India, of course, but it didn't happen here in America, but it could. in a village north of Agra in the Indian state of

utter Pradesh which is south of New Delhi you knew that though I don't want to tell you something you didn't already know so the main door of the house was open and the man's wife was this lady

was breastfeeding the son and the father was quoted as saying the monkey came in grabbed the baby and took off I mean what is going on When monkeys are just coming into homes and ripping kids out of their mother's arms, something has gone wrong. And sadly, they could never, they caught the monkey and got the baby, but it was too late.

Very sad. We've got to stop this horrific madness that's going on with monkeys stealing babies. There's also another horrible story. Another horrible story. It was written years ago called The Jungle Book, Animal Stealing Babies. It's horrible, horrible. It's been going on for years and something has to be done. Also, another story.

It's a little frightening. Just a little. A goat gives birth to furless half-pig, half-human creature. Now, that's the way. That's the headline. All right, that's the headline. But look, it was just a half-pig, half-human creature is what it's being called. But what the strange creature had shiny skin, no fur, a navel like a human.

And of course, all the neighbors flocked to the farm. And then once they got there, they were scared out of their minds to see the mutant devil. I don't blame them. I would be very, very scared as well. Now, the good thing about this story, it didn't happen in India, but it did happen in the Philippines. So we in America are safe for a little while. I know it's Black Friday. You're over Thanksgiving.

You're now thinking about, oh, I've had to shop. It's Christmas time. I've just heard horrific animals. stories, what I need is a drink. Well, you're not alone, but I have a way for you to enjoy a drink, cocktails, and drink from now until Christmas and celebrate because I had the opportunity to talk to Michael P. Foley, drinking with St. Nick. Now, he's also, you'll hear in the interview, the author of of Christmas cocktails for sinners and saints.

So he has a great mixology of how you can enjoy the holidays with booze. Michael Foley, author of Drinking with St. Nick. Michael, I noticed on the cover, before we get into the actual coverage of drinking with the saints throughout history, Drinking with St. Nick is the title and cover of your latest book. And I noticed that you didn't pick Santa Claus. You actually picked St. Nick. So that's the kind hint of we're not getting drunk with Santa Claus. We're actually drinking with saints, correct?

That's exactly it. Yes. And it says drinking with St. Nick, not drinking with Santa Claus. So we wanted something that sort of was. Santa Claus-ish, which still was kind of firmly, recognizably St. Nicholas. So you got this. I know that you, you know, you're the author of, you know,

drinking with saints, you know, the sinner's guide to a holy happy hour and the politically incorrect guide to Christianity. And you're down in Baylor at Baylor University, spreading your information to the youngans. I get it. But what gave you the idea for this one? Well, drinking with the Saints did very well. Sales were strong and consistent, and there were calls for a second round.

There you go. We came up with a holiday sequel. See, that's kind of the problem with drinking is there's always a call for a second round. You just don't go in for one drink. Once the appetite is wedded. Boy, you aren't kidding. I find it fascinating. So your idea, as an example, you talk about Mother Cabrini's influence and felt around the world in New York,

but then you say to celebrate her, you know, you want to drink a Manhattan. Yes. And so you're tying in, what's your favorite drink, your favorite cocktail to tie in with what's saying? Well, you mentioned Mother Cabrini, and one of our family favorites is the Manhattan, and that ties in very well with her because she did a lot of great work in that city. Yes, she did. But one of the things I'm really excited about with this new book is we have at least a dozen cocktails that have never before been in print.

Wow. Some of them are original, some were out there, but never written down or committed a publication. And a couple of them I'm really happy with. We had Balconi's distillery, the famous whiskey makers here in Waco, make us three cocktails for the book. and they're all outstanding. And then there's another one called a white lady, which I'm also very pleased with. So I got a couple favorites.

So what's in the white lady? The white lady is actually a very old recipe, and I included it, I included a version of it in drinking with the saints, but a priest friend actually contacted me and said, you know, I tried your version, and it was okay, but I know a better one. And so I thought, all right, I'll give this a shot.

It's kind of labor intensive. It requires beating egg white for about five minutes before you actually put it in the drink. But once you do, it's fantastic. It's egg white, gin, vodka, quontro, powdered sugar, and fresh lemon juice. Wow. And it is phenomenal. It's worth the effort. I mean, what if we just, what if we just, you know, lose the powdered sugar and the egg?

Yeah, well, actually, that's what I did in the first version. Because I thought, who wants to beat an egg for five minutes and want to drink? So I didn't, there are at least four different versions, and I included the simplest one because I didn't want too much hassle. But like I say, my friend convinced me otherwise. Well, he was a priest. I mean, if a priest calls and says, you know, you ought to try this, it's usually a good bet. Maybe you try it. So let me ask you a question.

Are you, one of the things as you go through drinking with saints for the holidays and to drink with St. Nick, like a lot of people have, you know, the idea of moving, you know, moving the animals closer to the baby Jesus at Christmas Day. And they have, you know, the stupid elf on the shelf. And whatever they do, you know, transformers in the trees, all that kind of stuff. to celebrate Christmas. So are you saying that starting about, I don't know, now, we should just drink ourselves silly through the holidays? You might be tempted to do that, given holiday pressure. I am.

Yes, I am. I don't recommend it. No, and I felt slightly conflicted because the book has drinking suggestions for every day of the Advent and Christmas seasons. So I felt slightly conflicted having Advent drinks. I thought, well, maybe Advent should be the time to sort of scale it back. And I do believe that. But I don't think that just having one drink a night is necessarily Mardi Gras.

So I think it is possible to be somewhat ascetical during Advent, but still enjoy an evening beverage. So that's why I did include it in good conscience. See that sounds good, like, and that's sticking with the, well, you can just have one. That's right. You can just have one. As about day 10 rolls around on that 12 days of Christmas, you're just hammered all day. Well, one of the things I do recommend is is sort of restraining yourself during Advent. And then to have a truly old-fashioned Christmas, have the 12 days of Christmas,

which go from December 25th to January 5th, the feast of the vigil of the epiphany. Right. In the old days, people took off work, courts were closed. stores are closed, it was 12 days of merrymaking. Not necessarily Bacchanalia, but people just spent time with family. They had gotten all their chores out of the way in late December. And so it was time just to relax. And I think that was a pretty good model.

That's not a bad model at all. I think, you know, we might actually have families a little bit closer together if that were tried again. That's a good point. So what's your favorite? You know, we talked a little bit about Manhattan, and I like the egg white. I like the sound of that with the powdered sugar. I'm a fan of sugar and eggs.

So what the heck? Let's put some alcohol on and give it a shot. But what's your favorite, Michael? After all this, I mean, you've got, you're drinking with St. Nick, right? You're drinking with the saints and the sinners. Out of all that, would you go home and drink a light beer? Actually, my go-to is just a simple gin. martini.

Yeah. Yeah. That's probably... A bold, potent, delicious. I like a martini. My dad was just... I just need some vodka. Oh, yeah.

I just need a vodka. That's all. Mix it with whatever you want. I don't care. It's a vodka. So, the book is for sale now. Absolutely. And I can get it at...

If I want more information, can I get the books at Michael Foley. or do I need to go to wherever books are generally sold? Wherever books are generally sold. I have a Drinking with the Saints.com website. You can also like and follow our Drinking with the Saints Facebook page. And oftentimes we'll post new items, new ideas, new cocktails. But obviously the book is sold on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, so forth. When you said that the book, you have many new drinks in it, are you posting some of those up

your Facebook page during the holidays, or you just saying buy the book, Smarty Pants and figure it out yourself? A little of both. There will be a couple surprises. What do you, you know, in today's world, we have so much talk about drinking and driving and there's such a spur on people driving under the influence. But really, if you think ahead and are drinking responsibly and even with moderation or without moderation. You should be able to

transport yourself without harming others. Very easy. Absolutely. And it's gotten so much easier with Uber. Yes. That has made a huge difference, I think, in the culture. It really has. And it doesn't make any sense that

someone, I mean, I get the thought of, well, I can do it. It doesn't matter, I guess. But there really is no call for it in today's world, no question. So, I know we have your favorite is go-to. gin. I'm just looking to see

how much, do you have any, do you have any beer in here? Or is it just booze? No, no, it's wine and beer as well. I counted up all the suggestions, and it's 445 beer wine and cocktail suggestions in the book. Oh, and I just flipped to page

109, by the way, and it's Christmas punch for children. And so we've covered some of that as well. I like it. Very much. A couple of non-alcoholic beverages for the little ones during the holidays. Though most of it does focus on the strong stuff. Right.

Well, I know, but it's good to have, you know, give the kids something to drink and pretend. Exactly. I mean, you've got to create alcohol drinking sometime, Michael. That's right. Michael Foley, thank you very much for joining us. I hope everybody gets a copy of the book and has some fun over Christmas and over the holidays and drinking with St. Nick.

And I also hope that they can maybe celebrate with the family and, you know, maybe come a little bit closer. and if it takes a new drink from Michael Foley, then so be it. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. I appreciate it. All right. Enjoy yourselves.

Have a good time this weekend. I know we're coming back to work on Monday. Everybody's back thinking, oh, we've got to go back. We've got to get all this stuff done. You know, not that it means anything to me, but the wife will be wanting to get all the Christmas stuff up, and we've already started getting all the Christmas stuff up. So if you fought that battle to not get the Christmas

stuff up pre- Thanksgiving. It's post- Thanksgiving, so I hope you have fun putting up your Christmas stuff this weekend. Bless your heart.