Beer!

[NightAngel]

This guy wasn't too bad but it kind of made me laugh. Once again... I'm at the grocery store.

Heading up to get in line I hear the announcement over the loud speaker:
"Attention shoppers the time is now Midnight. We can no longer sell beer, wine or alcohol. Thank-you."

A speedy older man cuts me off and gets in line in front of me- I didn't really much care as I was in no hurry. From his cart he produces some steaks and a six pack of beer. The cashier tells him that she cannot sell him the beer as it's after midnight. He wasn't loud or mean sounding or anything but I had to laugh at what he said next:

"But I had the beer in my cart before midnight."
She smiled and, of course, still denied the sale. He protested a bit but didn't push it too hard.

After he walked off I said, "Huh, I guess he didn't hear that amazingly loud announcement that you guys couldn't sell any longer."

She chuckled and said something to the effect of, "They never hear the announcement."

[thegiraffe]

Nightangel - what county are you in? I know Hillsborough (unincorporated Hillsborough, not the cities) is dry on Sundays til....11am I think, but I dunno about any other areas. When I cashiered when I was here at school (didn't last long - HATED the management. I now go home to Orlando to work), I HATED working Sunday mornings and explaining to people that while the Bucs game started at noon, I'm sorry....I had to wait til 11 to sell them the alcohol. "Can't you make an exception?" Nope...sorry. The register won't let me. Just make a beer run just before the game....you'll survive - I'm sure!! Grr...I don't miss those days AT ALL!

[Seanette]

When I worked at 7-11, I worked 11pm to 7am. In Oregon, beer/wine sales cut off at 2:30am and did not resume until 7am. Much "joy" telling people "According to my clock, the one I *have* to use, you entered the store at 2:30. I cannot legally make this sale" or "I'm sorry, state law does not permit me to sell this before that clock [points] says 7". Much agitation among desperately alcohol-delayed customers. Uh, did it ever occur to you that if you can't stand to wait a few hours for booze that you might have a bit of a problem here?

What really bothered me was the hunters who'd come in wanting beer to take along on their hunting trips. I have no problem with hunting (put a lot on the table when I was a kid. My family had a policy of "don't shoot it if you're not going to eat it"), but I think any rational person would consider alcohol and firearms a BAD mix.

[flybye023]

Kind of off topic but your post, Seanette, reminded me of this song they play on the radio every fall:

http://lyrics.dct.sk/index.php/254345


Apparently beer is a regular part of deer hunting

[NightAngel]

Nightangel - what county are you in?

I'm in Pinellas County. Home of high taxes and crazy people.
Oh, and that was Friday night anyway.

[Spiffy McMoron]

She chuckled and said something to the effect of, "They never hear the announcement."

That would have been the perfect time to pimp out the site to others. Ya know, assuming that you were a pimp, of course.

[Seanette]

Kind of off topic but your post, Seanette, reminded me of this song they play on the radio every fall:

http://lyrics.dct.sk/index.php/254345


Apparently beer is a regular part of deer hunting

Not in my family it wasn't. My father and grandfather both had a strong desire to return from hunting still vertical and not strapped across the hood (or in the truck bed).

[Anakah]

Why is there a cut-off time for alcohol?

[Rapscallion]

Local laws, I would imagine.

The Uk for long enough has had a closing time of eleven pm for all bars and pubs, and anyone wishing to stay open past that time has had to apply for special licences. This came from the war years, when it was decided that late drinking times may result in people being less productive in the ammunition factories etc.

We've recently allowed all pubs etc to apply for a much easier licence to allow twenty-four hour drinking. About twenty thousand have done so, if I remember right, but not all have gone for that option after obtaining said licence. I'm not sure if people in general are drinking more, though some definitely are. They would have done so anyway.

However, the dedicated inebriate really ought to know that there's a cut-off point and store up their beer in front.

Rapscallion, despairing

[blas]

Ohhh I remember liquor selling times. Fortunately, it was at the same time that the gas station closed, so unless the whole neighborhood ambushed me at 8:59 pm and wouldn't disappear until 9:15 (which did happen and drove me nuts constantly, which is why I'd close 5 or sometimes 10 mins early). That was really the only time at night that I had to tell people "no beer!".

The other time was when I used to open and work early mornings. We can't legally sell beer until 8:00 am (but we don't have any Sunday laws or anything, just 8 am to 9 pm where I live, and midnight the next town over). Anyways, I'd remember opening the gas station at 6 or 7 and having people reef on the beer cooler doors and then come over and grunt to me, "Beer's locked." And I'd nod, and then they'd grunt, "Well, open it!" and I'd get so much pleasure out of saying, "Not until 8!". Too bad, alcoholics. You don't need to be drinking that early in the morning.

I only counted on two hands the number of times people actually came in, pulled and pulled on the door, and threw fits to me about the door being locked and NEEDING beer.

If my manager and I were working together, and it was, say, 7:30 am, and someone came in (of course, they'd never throw a fit to her, but they did grunt) and complained that the beer cooler was locked, she'd sigh and just give in to them and unlock it, saying, "Just this once". Yeah, well, just this once turned out to be nearly every day, I'll bet anything word got around if you whined that the door was locked between 7:30 and right before 8, she'd open it for you.

[alphaboi]

Why is there a cut-off time for alcohol?

Or why do so many places have an earlier cut-off time for off-sales than on-sales? Which is worse people going to a bar, getting drunk, and driving home or people going to a liquor store, going home, and then getting drunk? One good thing about PA's liquor is I don't have to enforce them. No wine or liquor except in a government-run store, no beer except from a bar, deli, or case distributor (where you must buy by case or keg). Of course this pisses out-of-staters off. Whenever we started selling fireworks we'd get people from NY come down and wander around the store looking for beer. Or they'd get pissed because we needed to card them for "non-alcoholic" beer/wine.