Wassail

And then again, if you're talking about, like we did at the start, the groups, one of the things that this book is talking about being... identifying competing needs.

And that's the phrase that often I think we come across in mixed groups is competing needs, not needs that can happily sit adjacent to each other, but competing needs, i.e., everyone in this space would like to be away from screens and I'm hosting a screen free thing you want to get the screen out that is a competing need if you were to say we would like to run Wasail and somebody else was to say My need in this moment is to bring a portable amp, electric guitar and to blast my own guitar practice in this space.

You go like, oh, that's a competing need.

I'm not serving everybody that's come to this meeting, this wassail with an expectation of competition.

Um, I'll show it again just in case I didn't leave it up there long enough.

Booker's Wassail.

Yeah, and then you got the little...

Here's the cinnamon.

But, so that's kind of where the idea came from.

Yeah.

And this one's one of the first ones, but, uh, through his own R&D, he started to call it Booker's ABC Wassail, 'cause it was apple wine- Apple, yeah ... aged in a Booker's bourbon barrel with cinnamon sticks.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

Let's have a listen to the Wassailing song.

The only one of these songs not available on the Modern Life is Rubbish Deluxe Edition,

I

And hollow seems now thy twittering high up where the bittering Night-blown winds arise.

Throstle, the wassail thou drinkest daily of chalice buds, Wassail in which thou linkest thy notes of springtime moods, Should docile thy elfish fluttering where twilight is uttering Sorcery through the woods.

Plover, thou lover of moorlands drained by the surfing sea, Lover of marshy tourlands, what is the world to thee? Nay, rover, wing on unquerying o'er mallows ne'er wearying Over the pebbly sands.

But, sparrow, the care o' thy nesting pierces thy vesper song, Care o' the young thy breasting shall warm through the blue night long, Till an arrow seems thy dittying of pain to the pitying Heart that knows earth's wrong.

But how would you go about doing that traditionally, then? You've got to wassail it.

Now, wassailing means singing to your trees or your animals, whatever you raise on your farm, to encourage it to do better in the next year.

Wassailing an apple tree is the real wassailing, the basic wassailing.

Right.

First thing you do is you need a bow.

Gather around the punchbowl, everyone, and we'll have a drink or so before we give out the presents.

Wasail!

Oh, we should.

That's the ticket.

Think of me when you drink the grog.

We will.

Wasail.

Wasil.