Quotulatiousness

October 9, 2009

Australian livers: industrial strength

Filed under: Australia, Randomness — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 00:05

I’m probably admitting that I’m a lightweight here, but a “limit” of 24 cans of beer per day seems, well, not actually a limit:

Australian motorsport fans are ruing militant alcohol consumption guidelines at one of the country’s most popular races – after being limited to a mere 24 cans of beer a day.

Police in charge of the Bathurst 1,000 car race in Bathurst, New South Wales, issued the restrictions before the start of the four-day event this Thursday.

Spectators are limited to one 24-can case each of full-strength beer, although if revellers are willing to consume lower-strength alcohol (3.5% abv or less) they will be entitled to a more satisfactory 36 cans.

Wine lovers have not escaped the heavy hand of the law either, being restricted to a punitive four litres a day.

<sarcasm>A mere four litres? How do they survive?</sarcasm>

H/T to “Fishplate” for the link.

September 12, 2009

QotD: The Muse of Booze

Filed under: Humour, Quotations, Wine — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 18:06

It’s reasonably well known that the arts of brewing and fermenting arose in nice time for the dawn of human civilization (there are ancient poems and mosaics and that sort of thing, dedicated to the celebration of the fact), but it’s at least as notorious that an open flask of alcohol is a mouth that can lead to hell as well as heaven. This being the case — and one day we shall work out the etymology that leads us to use the simple Italian word for a bottle, fiasco, in the way that we do — then it is as well to have a true Virgil to be our guide through the regions infernal as well as paradisiac.

The late Sir Kingsley Amis (who wrote these slender but thoughtful volumes before receiving his knighthood and who was also the expert to consult on things like the derivation of fiasco) was what the Irish call “your man” when it came to the subject of drink.

Christopher Hitchens, “The Muse of Booze”, Everyday Drinking: The Distilled Kingsley Amis, 2008

August 24, 2009

The odd economics of post-Prohibition Pennsylvania liquor laws

Filed under: Economics, Law — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 19:44

I’d just finished dinner at a restaurant within a short walk of my hotel, and I thought it’d be nice to have another beer when I got back to the hotel (in Pennsylvania, you buy less-than-case amounts of beer from licensed bars). I went up to the bar, and ordered six Sam Adams. The server looked at me a bit oddly, then went back to pick up my order.

When she came back, she said, “You know this is going to be very expensive, don’t you?”
“Uh, just how expensive are we talking here?
“Well, six bottles at $4 per bottle expensive. You could probably buy a case for that at [name of nearby beer warehouse].”

Two gents at the bar chime in that I’m crazy to pay that kind of money for just six beers, but they’d happily take any extras from the case I should buy at [nearby beer warehouse].

The three of them then gave me carefully simple instructions on how to find my way to [nearby beer warehouse], where I picked up this:

HopDevil

One of the most hoppy IPA brews I’ve ever tasted . . . for slightly more than what I would have had to pay for six at the bar.

July 23, 2009

Cointreau . . . suddenly I want a Cointreau

Filed under: Media — Tags: — Nicholas @ 22:07

« Newer Posts

Powered by WordPress