Milk and cookies. Wine and cheese. Beer and wings. Just as different foods go with different beverages, different writing calls for different drinks. As a college student, I know a thing or two about writing, and drinking as well. In fact, I'm an expert in the matching of writing and drinking -- a self-appointed somellier, if you will.

Fiction writers, laboring over a short story or a novel, drink wine. Fictional text must flow naturally, which wine precipitates. In fact, wine improves fiction by eradicating inhibitions. Just make sure to sober up before workshoping any illicit, wine-induced pieces with your creative writing class.

Poets drink chai at Stella's, inhaling both smoke and inspiration with the bohemians. Writing a limerick? That's a different story. I recommend a Guinness, for authenticity's sake.

Research paper writers, producing text that is too mechanical for booze, guzzle Snapples from the Uris soda machine. If you're writing a research paper you're probably a broke student, in which case the 75 cent price can't be beat. "The Best Stuff On Earth" comes in cans that impose a tinge of unsavory aluminum in the brew, but the caffeine keeps the students upright. That is, if the broke student has the money to drink anything at all.

Those writing law school applications wish they were drinking formaldehyde. In reality, they're drinking filtered Brita water. Not because of dehydration, but because it's practical. As they write law school essays, they dream of their cocktail-replete lives as partners, sipping dry martinis while scrutinizing legal briefs, a la Ally McBeal. In reality, black coffee is in their future.

Love letter scribes drink chocolate malts at the counters of diners. If you are writing a love letter, you may be from the 40s. They drank chocolate malts in diners back then.

Those writing their name on the Cornell Catering Registry at the front door of a frat party are about to knock back multiple watered-down Rum & Cokes. But, due to the tequila shots they just downed in their dorm rooms, they won't notice.

Epistolary spring breakers writing postcards on the beach sip fru-fru tropical blends, such as Sex on the Beach or Mai Tais. Meanwhile, fellow students writing phrases such as "Harvard Sucks" or "Big Red" on their chests for the upcoming ECAC hockey showdown are drinking Bud Ice from a can. They will then smash the Bud can against their printed chests.

According to bartender.com, drinks named, "Ho Ho and a Bottle of Rum" and "Fuzzless Screwdriver" do exist. What type of writing calls for a quenching "Ho Ho and a Bottle of Rum?" Jovial Santa responding to Christmas cards? Or Captain Hook writing a check in a brothel? Not likely. On the other hand, only a pre-pubescent carpenter could imbibe a Fuzzless Screwdriver while jotting down measurements. And no reputable carpenter could be pre-pubescent. Clearly that's why neither drink has permeated our culture's cocktail canon.

Humans are 70 percent water, according to one of my friends. So technically, we are what we drink. So that would make writers what they write.

And what does a college opinion columnist drink while writing her column? Contrary to popular opinion, it's not liquid methanol. Just bottled Mystic water and an occasional Diet Coke.

Archived article by Andrea Forker