As a now city resident I’ve been observing a trend: to carry a cup of drink about as you walk the streets. In the mornings it’s usually coffee, in the evenings, typically lager: large plastic beakers of it.

Takeaway food and drink is nothing new and eating your fish and chips whilst walking along the prom of your local seaside resort is a traditional holiday treat. But food on the go and drink-in-hand has become ubiquitous on the streets of the UK in only the last few years.

Why?

You could come up with all manner of explanations on, for example, greater availability of street-drink, but I’m more interested in the deeper ‘why’ question.

Why is there a perceived need to carry a cup of our preferred beverage around with us everywhere we go?

And then, as I reflected on the manner of this carrying, almost clinging nature of human with drink-in-hand I noticed a parallel. Watch a young child as it toddles around its home, nervously exploring this huge, often scary and unpredictable world.

The drink-in-hand is nothing more nor less than a comfort blanket.