Sunday Drankin

I'm bumpin Bob Marley,
sippin hops and barley...

Y'all know my steez...I represent Colorado to the fullest. Yet today, I did something that I have never done here in The Box State. We're not talking climbing a 14er, seeing some old school ruins, partaking a cold one in some far off saloon. No, today I had the opp to walk into a liquor store on a Sunday and buy myself some full strength libations.

For the unaware, CO has been held down by The Man's blue laws for the last 7o years, not allowing liquor stores to sell full strength beer, wine, or spirits. For us beer drinkers who were unprepared, it has meant 3.2 beer for as long as we can remember on Sundays.

Not anymore, as the State repealed the law and now allows the sale of the real ish on Sundays.

On ceremony, I had to go buy today. I set off, but just couldn't go to your standard strip mall LQ, I had to rep the gullyness. That meant a trip over to Go Go Liquors on Highway 287. Old school, to say the least, with their Googie neon sign, neighbors from a head shop to a laundromat, racks of Nickel Traders and Rocky Mountain Oysters, and just as many signs as Spanish as in English.

As I pulled in the side lot, adjacent to a rail line, I noticed the new 'Hours' sign: Sunday- OPEN: 8am, CLOSE: 5pm. Never mind that the opening time the other six days a week is 9:30; hey, Grandma might need a shooter before Church.

I walked in to the standard CHIRP CHIRP indicator, as an attractive Asian lady offered me a hearty greeting. "I had to come in today, this is history," I said. She was unimpressed.

I walked to the rows of wall coolers. Normally it is a 24er of smooooooooooth CL, maybe a sixer of a crisp Summer brew. But today is different, I had to represent. Represent the years of Sundays at 7-11, Diamond Shamrock, hell, even the grocery store buying the soon to be forgotten 3.2 beer.

On vacation on Sunday in the mountains, stopping in a local gas station and coming out with two tall cans for me and my beautiful wife; pushing a shopping cart full of 12 packs (a bit of a discount with your loyalty card!); a car load of homeboys dropping $50 plus on 24ers of 3.2 at 10am on the way to Mile High Stadium; using a fake ID bought from the back of Vibe Magazine claiming my new name was Frenchman Michelle DeGalle, trying to buy a 12er of the 3.2 stuff at 7-11 (because c-store clerks were "easier" to fool than the others.)

I settle on the perfect ceremonial brew: Keystone Light. A six pack. Four bucks. How perfect? A Colorado beer on a historic Colorado day. One that gives a nod to the past, what self respecting Coloradoan hasn't slammed a Keystone in their formative years? Yet, we can look to to the future, one of Sundays in at the LQ, one of 3.2 as just a number.

Glory, glory Colorado my people...