There will have been a first. There always is. The first man to melt iron ore. And for the Sámi, the first to er… take advantage of the Fly Agaric mushroom.

Let's call him Od. I need a name. It's not Sámi but Norwegian and, to the credulous, that's close enough.

Od must have noticed reindeer acting oddly (sorry). Wandering around, admiring trees perhaps. Od will have worked out that they were dining out on Santa-coloured mushrooms. He would have tried them and left the lining of his stomach in the autumn leaves.

But the next step. It's always the next step. How in God's name (sorry again) did he work out that if you drink their piss, you have the hallucinations without the vomiting?

Did he follow Rudolf's forebears around with a leather bucket? Why would they let him get close? And when he finally gathered his brew, from what depths of hell did he drag up the courage to take a sip?

Now let's be charitable. Perhaps he was thirsty and in extremis had sampled his own. It's reasonably sanitary, although not very appetising… but a reindeer's?

Od will have taken his discovery back to the village, in his leather bag. “No, honestly, my love, you must try this.”

And he passed the recipe to his son. “This'll put hair on your chest, boy.”

In any case. Here's to Od. A pioneer.

Drink up, Son.