Day 64: faking it.

According to fast company magazine, right now in England, scientists are working on a synthetic alcohol substitute. Why would we need an alcohol substitute when we have perfectly good alcohol to do the job you may ask? The substitute claims to give you all the pep that getting a bit tipsy does, but with none of the messiness that accompanies it. And it comes with an antidote pill that switches off the alcohol effect when you're ready to drive yourself home. Woa-a. Everything just went bananas. First up though, is it just me or is the "pep" factor of alcohol kind of intrinsically linked to the messiness bit? Like, it's the loosening up that makes alcohol fun but also means things get messy. Whoops! There goes my glass etc. If things aren't getting messy, it sounds like they're creating not a substitute for alcohol, but a new kind of drug that can be sold over the bar by the glassful. In fact, this new elixir is made from "Valium-like benzodiazepines". Uh-huh. Apparently too, it's easily cleared from the body so won't give you a hangover, and it isn't addictive. That last point probably explains why big alcohol brands haven't so far shown much interest in it. But wait a minute, a fun pissy high with no hangover, no glass breakage or word slurring, that you can turn off whenever you like? Sounds pretty addictive to me.