Cureth post-Thanksgiving!

One of the time-honored traditions of Thanksgiving is the "food coma." People eat enough to get sleepy and then doze away the afternoon watching football or placeholder soap opera episodes. Or, of late, they prepare to talk with their family members who think differently about how wrong those members are, knowing that the ties of blood will prevent their being sat outside on the porch with the smallest possible slice of pumpkin pie.

Nicholas Culpeper offers a solution for the former; the solution for the latter is better candidates so we can discuss them instead of howling about them. Ask the Past brings us his Culpeper's Last Legacy from1655, where he writes that there are various cures for this "lethargie." Among them are burning brimstone under the nose, frequent provocations to sneeze with "white Helleborne," shaving the head and pouring "Vinegar of Roses" upon it, preferably letting it "drop down from some high place upon the crown of his Head." Ladies either never suffered from lethargie, or had different cures such as shaving their husbands' heads while they slept and pouring rose vinegar on it from the balcony.

For my money, the most likely method to work is "burning assa foetida to wake him." The name alone awakens my inner middle schooler to tell me a thousand jokes and explain the origin of the phrase, "that smells like ass." Given that it's nicknamed "devil's dung," I can't imagine anyone could sleep through the stench.