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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pbartender" data-source="post: 4468413" data-attributes="member: 7533">No problem...  I've lived with a great many non-Americans in past.  Since most of them were less than perfectly fluent and always eager to improve their English, I've since picked up this habit of taking notice and offering help with such slips of the tongue.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />Hrm.   That's rather interesting.  I'd never really thought of it before.I come from a very German ancestry, and one that's mostly from the south of Germany...  The Reinharts were Hessians, the Küsters were Bavarian, the Domayers were Austrian, and the Piotters were from that part of Saxony in eastern Germany that's too close to Poland for its own good.In my extended family, especially on my Dad's side, they tend to follow the same sort of pattern you suggest for the south Germans...  they don't drink often, usually only during celebrations, but when they do they drink a lot for a long time and tend to get very, very drunk as a whole.On my Dad's side, that meant a long, illustrious line of drunkards.  Every single one of my Dad's brothers and sisters was an alcoholic at one point or another (they've all since "recovered"). You see, while they would only (over)indulge during celebrations, they would continually hunt for excuses to celebrate.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" />On top of that, I'd seen too many friends who were sons and daughters of alcoholics try their best to be teetotalers, only to lose it all when they finally give in and have a taste...  With no drinking experience, they had no self-control, and ended up becoming what they desperately worked to avoid, because they had to defense against it.Which is much of the reason why long ago I taught myself what I now find out to be very north German mannerisms in my drinking habits...  I tend to drink more often than my relations (maybe once or twice a week, when I can afford it), but I have far less to drink when I do (just a glass of beer or wine with dinner, for example).  The best thing about it, I find, is that I have a better awareness of where I am on the sober-drunk spectrum, and far more control over pacing myself or stopping when I want to.To me, coming from a family of alcoholics, that's a comforting thing.  I know that I won't get drunk unless I choose to, and I know that I have the willpower to not drink when I want to.</blockquote>

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