Thanks jkath, it comes of endless nights sitting on your helmet with a pool of "rookies" looking up at the old dog...
On that note, you might look over the "Rummmm!" thread for the "Moose Milk" recipe for New Years Day Levy...
Thinking of SRD Rum, though, makes me recall my grandfather, a WWI veteran, and one of his stories of that war, where he went from civilian volunteer in the "Suicide Battalion" to CQMS Sgt, one of three unwounded survivours of his 150 man company at Vimy Ridge...(promotion gets easy with viscious attacks and sickly seasons...a toast in any military mess)
Anyways, it seems Granddad, known then as "Billy", was in an infantry unit deployed right up on the front line trenches, and was detailed to a party of men to bring up the company SRD rum ration for the day (150 men x 4 oz each = 600 ounces) which were issued in pottery "ankers" and it was desireable to have more bodies than the physical exertion would give, both for protection (lest some rear echelon party should fall upon you and steal the good stuff) or should you suffer casualties, or should you be basically dishonest and steal it yourself...
Anyways, the bearing party is headed back up to the line when it comes under artillery barrage and everyone is jumping into the nearest shell hole or swamp to get out of the fire, and the area is given a pretty good beating up...so the surviving party comes to a neat thought...send the youngest member up to the Sgt Major to report that they've caught a dose of fire and the stores are destroyed...while the rest of them salvage the rum and head to the foremost machine gun post at the edge of No-Man's Land and commence to divvy up the spoils and consume same amongst say 6-8 individuals; a good move of entrepreneurship, you'll agree, as rum there is in plenty, but good soldiers are hard to find...
It lacked one element in planning, in that the Germans were in fact serious about expending arty ammo, and produced an attack on that very point of the front...
As Granddad related "I've never got so sober so fast" as they had to use the machine guns etc to fight off the attack, more or less unsupported, and were "mentioned in dispatches" for bravery or "courage", even if it was plainly a "Dutch Courage", which the official records do not record...
He was a tough old bugger, my granddad!