What the heck is lupulin, and what's it doin' in my beer?

Lupulin - What is it? How did it get in my beer?!!

Did you ever hear someone being described as being loopy (like whacko, nuts, loco, or acting stupid)? Well, the term comes from olden days of yore (pre-pharmaceutical days).

In the good ole ' days before aspirin and vicodin, the doctor would sedate you with compressed tablets of lupulin before they yanked your teeth out , operated, or set upon you with leeches. The lupulin was the yellow pollen stuff found in Hop plant cones! Patients under the influence of luplin ingestion were described as "loopy".  

Turned out that lupulin wasn't much of an actual pain-killer unless you combined it with a stiff shot of alcohol. (Reminds me of those old western movies where John Wayne would take a shot of whiskey and then dig a bullet out of his own gut with a dull knife.) Thank God they found better pain-killers!

Lupulin is found in Hops cones.(And did I mention Hops are closely related to marijuana?)  The hop cones are used in brewing beer. Heavy beer drinking leads to being "loopy".  But hey, it's not the beer drinkers fault- it's the lupulin!

Which raises the question- What is the hard liquor drinker's excuse?

  And now you know . . .