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[Thad]

Tonight I went to a bar.

A trendy fucking campus-adjacent bar.

I hate places like that, but it's where my friends were going, and it got me out of the house.

Now, I picked up my ID back in '02 or so.  I was under 21, and the ID says "UNDER 21 UNTIL 10/01/2003" right on it.  (It's also vertical, while over-21 ID's are horizontal.)

The guy checking ID's told me he'd let me in this time but that I need to replace it with an over-21 ID.

That shouldn't be a big deal, but it frankly irritates the shit out of me.

I have a legal ID.  It has my date of birth on it.  It says what day I turned 21, which was over 4 years ago.  It has a hologram, a barcode, the whole nine yards.  It is clearly a legal piece of identification.

Moreover, I have lived here, in this city, for twenty-five years.  I was born here.  I've sure as SHIT been here longer than your goddamn piece of shit eyesore trendy bar, or any of its employees.  Fuck you people for telling me where I am and am not allowed to go in MY town.

And it's not as if I LOOK like I'm 20.  I have a receding hairline so obvious you can see it on my fucking avatar.  No rational, sighted human being would mistake me for a 20-year-old.  Getting carded is cute sometimes, and makes me feel a little better about the tumbleweeds of hair I leave in the shower every morning, but when somebody actually threatens not to let me into a bar it gets a little insulting.

America's drinking age, and enforcement of same, is asinine.  Yeah, all right, this landmass was settled by Puritans; I get it.  Having a beer is immoral.  Certainly the Mormon population of Mesa would agree.

But seriously, you fuckers can piss off.  I was born here.  I live here.  I support the local economy, and right now I'm trying to support it by buying a goddamn beer.  I'm NOT drinking and driving; I pulled up on a bike.  I DON'T look like I'm under 21, I have a legal, state-issued ID explicitly STATING that I'm not, and for crying out loud, what would be the harm if I WERE?

Just let me have a beer in peace.  I wasn't expecting the Spanish Inquisition.

I've ordered my replacement ID, but I can't say I'm in a huge hurry to go back to that place.  There are plenty of other bars with better beer and better atmosphere that don't treat me like a fucking criminal when I walk in the door.

[sei]

Not that it sounds like you care much to return to the bar, but did you get his name and contact information for the manager (ideally not from him) or will attempting to revise policy bad policy (or nail someone for breach of not-so-bad policy) not be gratifying enough to justify the effort?

Kind of a terrible sentence, but legible.  I guess.

[Kazz]

I think that bouncer might even totally agree with you, Thad, but it's his job to enforce stupid rules.  God knows I've enforced stupid rules and had fights with customers over things I knew were ridiculous and made myself look like a retard, but I didn't get paid to employ reason, I got paid to enforce stupid rules.  And enforce them I did.

Bars are pretty awful, anyway.  Buy your beer at the store.

Funny anecdote: Once, LD (who is young-looking) and I were shopping at Wal-Mart.  When we brought our shit up to the register, the cashier glared at us sternly, as though we'd already done something wrong, and demanded two IDs from each of us.  I was completely confused until I realized that I'd picked up a six-pack of glass-bottled IBC Root Beer.

[Niku]

I think that bouncer might even totally agree with you, Thad, but it's his job to enforce stupid rules.  God knows I've enforced stupid rules and had fights with customers over things I knew were ridiculous and made myself look like a retard, but I didn't get paid to employ reason, I got paid to enforce stupid rules.  And enforce them I did.

Yeah, I work like ten feet away from the end of the universe but I constantly have to turn away people with Starbucks drinks because of the whole NO OUTSIDE FOOD OR DRINK policy.  Neverminding that we don't sell coffee, and that people who are told to throw their drink away or chug it are not exactly inclined to go and buy a whole new drink.

I don't get carded because I don't drink.  But this reminds me that I need to get my drivers license updated.

[Royal☭]

How lenient are you on the whole outside food policy?  I've been to theaters where I've snuck in whole pizzas and hamburgers.

And as for checking IDs, let me tell you real quick it's a shit job.  When I worked for a convenience store, we checked everybody who looked under the age of 30, just to cover our own ass.  It's a nervous job, really.  You're constantly under pressure by to make sure you don't fuck up by management as well as law enforcement.  Around here, a simple mistake could result in jail time, a $4000 fine, and the loss of the job.  Then you mix in college kids who don't think they should have ID even though they're only 22/23, and the job is pretty demeaning.

  That said, giving you grief over having one that wasn't updated - but not expired, right?  Lots of places don't except expired licenses - is kind of a dick policy.  But then again, it might not have been his choice.

[Kazz]

this will be the ten billionth time i mention the job where i had to check everybody's ID no matter what, for cigarettes and beer.

 

[Detonator]

I'm so glad I worked at a store where there were no alcohol or cigarettes to sell.  The only thing we could card for was violent video games, and I only did when the kid was obviously 12 trying to buy the 50 Cent game.

[Niku]

How lenient are you on the whole outside food policy?  I've been to theaters where I've snuck in whole pizzas and hamburgers.

If they manage to get it into the theater without my seeing it, I don't care after that.

I really want to know how people sneak in entire popped bags of Orville Redenbacher popcorn though.  And why.

"COLD STALE POPCORN SURE IS MAGNITUDES MORE DELICIOUS WHEN I DIDN'T HAVE TO PAY FOR IT."

[Burrito Al Pastor]

An entire candy store (and very well-stocked, too) opened about four doors down from the theater a few months after the theater opened. Needless to say, the theater's concession stand has taken a hit.

[Fredward]

Up here, the drinking age is 19. Where I'm moving, come autumn (East), it's 18.

Of course, I assume it's a given that anyone of high school age can drink, if they have even the slightest initiative to do so. I can't say I've taken advantage of my older friends nearly enough, so I shall probably be doing so next week.

[Thad]

I think that bouncer might even totally agree with you, Thad, but it's his job to enforce stupid rules.  God knows I've enforced stupid rules and had fights with customers over things I knew were ridiculous and made myself look like a retard, but I didn't get paid to employ reason, I got paid to enforce stupid rules.  And enforce them I did.

Oh, I have no beef with the bouncer.  Hell, he let me in with a warning.  My beef is with the establishment for having an asinine rule like that.  And I KNOW it's the establishment, because nobody else in town has ever pulled that crap on me, but I also know it's probably the result of pressure from city and county law enforcement.  And that all of THAT stems from a very unhealthy national attitude toward alcohol -- hell, we BANNED the shit less than a century ago.

It also bears noting that Sheriff Joe has been cracking down, hard, on all sorts of alcohol consumption lately, to remind everyone that he is America's Toughest Sheriff^TM.

Bars are pretty awful, anyway.  Buy your beer at the store.

I went because my friends were going and it beat sitting on my ass at home playing Final Fantasy 12 like I'd just done for several hours already.

I would amend your statement that bars are awful to say that TRENDY bars are awful.  THIS was an awful, trendy bar.  However, I am very comfortable at the local breweries.

  That said, giving you grief over having one that wasn't updated - but not expired, right?  Lots of places don't except expired licenses - is kind of a dick policy.

An Arizona driver's license doesn't expire until your sixty-fifth birthday.

[Lady Duke]

That's pretty damn lucky your license doesn't expire so damn fast.  I got mine on my 19th birthday and then had to replace it within (I think) a month of my 21st birthday.  That's a rip and I didn't WANT to pay the $50.

On the bar note, I go to only one bar in the area, and I only ever go there with one friend.  I've been there prolly a dozen times, and I know at least one of the bartenders and she recognizes us every time we come in.  What really sort of annoys me is she always checks my ID even though I'm STILL 21 and it's STILL the same license. 

I know it's a precaution, but it's always embarrassing when I get carded, because I always get looks from the person for about 2 minutes.  They don't WANT to believe that I'm 21.  Like, flip it over and back, it's still the same card, it's blatantly a real ID, deal with it and give it back to me.  Jesus.

[Kayma]

I would amend your statement that bars are awful to say that TRENDY bars are awful.  THIS was an awful, trendy bar.  However, I am very comfortable at the local breweries.

That's a fact. Trendy bars and local bars/breweries are like night and day. It's the difference between being able to have fun, drunken conversations with friends or having to wade through an overcrowded joint with shitty music to buy a drink for $10.

[Brentai]

Colorado had your ID expire something like a week after your 21st birthday, so yeah that sort of thing got taken care of pretty quickly.  Or should be.  In practice you end up carrying around a paper ID as long as your arm for several months.

Whatever.

All you guys complaining about having to check IDs should work at a bank sometime.  You have to pretty much beat a driver's license, ATM card, birthdate and last three withdrawal amounts out of every damn person you see, with great resistance, while trying to explain that you need to do this so that other people can't take their damn money.  Inevitably 1 out of every 10 rich bitch will say something like "Bank of America doesn't ID me or anything!" and you have to resist the urge to tell them to take their account to BoA, which would suit you perfectly because it would 1) make them go away and 2) end with them being ripped completely the fuck off.

In retrospect it's pretty understandable that I can't hold down any job dealing with customers after going through that one.

[Thad]

Banks may ask for multiple forms of ID, but they have never told me I can't use my legal, state-issued ID.

The goddamn airport makes me take off my shoes, put all my liquid in a baggy, and throw out my jelly, but my ID's good enough for THEM.

[Fortinbras]

There's a very great episode of Tony Bourdain's food network show A Cook's Tour titled The Elements of a Great Bar that basically covers my position on bars, except for one thing: dives.  I like a completely shitty bar.  The kind of bar where you're afraid your foot is going to break through the floor.  Where beer tastes like nothing and the vodka tastes like gasoline and meat.  Where, if you're under 28 and you're playing pool, an old man will ALWAYS get up and tell you what you're doing wrong.

[Malenkaya]

Surprisingly, given Oregon's incredibly stringent liquor law enforcement, I've never had problems when I hand a bouncer/bartender my driver's license that still has the big, loud, red UNDER 21 square around my picture. They sometimes look confused for a moment, but then just check the birth and expiration dates and that's that.

Most of the trouble and annoyance I've run into was during the months where ALL of my friends were 21, but I wasn't. There is absolutely nothing to do in Portland after 10pm if you're under 21 - no all ages music venues, and any bar, as well as any place serving hard alcohol has to be completely closed to the under 21s. I've been turned away from brewpubs when going to dinner with friends because they were getting their liquor license. A grocery store cashier once practically interrogated my boyfriend and his roommate when we'd all gone grocery shopping together, because she'd seen me walk in with the two of them and they were buying a six pack. Incredibly frustrating. I mean, I realize they have to check everyone's ID when a group comes to the register, but this was Tuesday afternoon, they were clearly buying enough groceries for a week, and we'd split up immediately after entering the store.

One particularly moronic 7-11 cashier once argued with the roommate over whether his (fairly recent, unexpired) passport was an acceptable form of ID. Because someone is going to fake a fucking federal document so they can buy beer.

There's also a rule, which may or may not be common in other places, that you have to give a phone number and address any time you buy a keg. The OLCC (Portland's alcohol Gestapo) has been known to crash parties and arrest massive numbers of people when someone was foolish enough to buy multiple kegs in the same place, and to give the address at which they were throwing the party.

Double karmic bonus, though: the head of the OLCC was arrested for drunk driving a couple of years ago.

[sei]

That explains the pot.

[Thad]

Surprisingly, given Oregon's incredibly stringent liquor law enforcement, I've never had problems when I hand a bouncer/bartender my driver's license that still has the big, loud, red UNDER 21 square around my picture. They sometimes look confused for a moment, but then just check the birth and expiration dates and that's that.

See, me neither, UNTIL LAST NIGHT.

[Sharkey]

There's a very great episode of Tony Bourdain's food network show A Cook's Tour titled The Elements of a Great Bar that basically covers my position on bars, except for one thing: dives.  I like a completely shitty bar.  The kind of bar where you're afraid your foot is going to break through the floor.  Where beer tastes like nothing and the vodka tastes like gasoline and meat.  Where, if you're under 28 and you're playing pool, an old man will ALWAYS get up and tell you what you're doing wrong.

Fucking preach it. I'd rather be somewhere dark, smokey, comparatively quiet, and full of people who pretty much live there. Kind of place I learned to drink in, and it'll always be more comfortable for me.

As opposed to most of the bars close to work, with my all time least favorite being Fluid. Which is all brushed steel and glass and transparent floors with rippling blue lights and, jesus wept, it's like trying to get drunk in the Jetsons bathroom. Wouldn't you know it that's where every other asshole holds their press parties.