Comes a time every year, in the few days between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, where you have staggeringly little to do. It’s a blissful pause, often spent at home, with your family, hanging out and eating and drinking and hardly working (if at all)—a pleasant period of boredom before the hubbub of the New Year.  

But perhaps it’s something else, too, at least for those of us who are not fortunate enough to have booked a vacation or found a suitable mate: a ripe moment during which to hook up with someone new.

Bear with us here. Yes, it’s the holiday season. Yes, it feels weird to want to do it with someone you just met so soon after watching It’s a Wonderful Life with your extended family. Yes, you’re probably kind of exhausted and bloated from eating and lying around in bulky Christmas sweaters. And yet, this dead zone between two holidays—which we'll dare call Sexmas—might just be the most appropriate time to enjoy a casual hookup.   

Here’s why.

It’s cold.
This goes without saying, but coldness is conducive to hooking up—out of sheer necessity. You don’t want to go out; you require bodily warmth; you’re suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder, because of course you are. If late-fall/early-winter is cuffing season, Sexmas is the playoffs. And the World Series. And the Super Bowl. And we’ll cut it out with the sports metaphors now.

You need an excuse to get away from your family for a while.
And so does everyone else. There’s only so much time you can spend, as an adult, binge-watching Peaky Blinders with your dad before you realize you need to see someone your own age—and/or that you, two seasons in, don’t even like Peaky Blinders.

The holidays are a time to spend with those you love.
Which makes the holidays a particularly challenging time for those who are not currently in some kind of romantic love. And, consequently, a particularly amenable time for those not currently in some kind of romantic love to use each other’s bodies as a gratifying, if fleeting, substitute.

It’s likely you’re staying in your hometown, where you grew up.
And where you may or may not be able to rekindle an old flame with someone you hooked up with that one time in high school, and who just so happens to also be single, providing a level of comfort in familiarity, as well as a level of comfort in the fact that you don’t ever have to see them again afterwards (unless you want to) until next Christmas.

You’re in a celebratory mood.
Heck, it’s Christmas vacation. And you don’t have to work. And you’re likely drinking at a rate you wouldn’t dare to during any other time of the year. All of which puts you—and your potential lovers—in a good place to want to do something fun/naked.

You’re not doing anything else, anyway.
Not the best reason to have sex. But certainly a reason.

In sum: if you’re still single, get on Tinder, Bumble, Hinge or whatever app floats your boat, and start swiping. There’s still plenty of time to prepare.

Merry Sexmas to you and yours.

This article originally ran on December 19, 2017.