Tuesday, September 30, 2008

On Cloud Nine

Yesterday, we left the state of Maine. Before we could blink and miss New Hampshire, we decided we really did want to stop at the liquor store there (for those of you who don't know, liquor in New Hampshire is very cheap. They don't have taxes. Everyone who lives in New England buys liquor there whenever possible) to buy more rum to feed our dark and stormy addiction. You have to understand that to buy liquor in PA, you have to catch the Hogwarts Express, know how to identify the door of ye olde spirits shoppe, be able to recite the password in five languages, and fork over a week's pay to the man behind the curtain. Thus, I stop at the New Hampshire State Liquor store all the time when I drive to and from office headquarters. They should know me by name in that place, but they don't. Quite obviously.

Yesterday, we split our duties at this pit stop this way: Bob would fill our water bottles at the water fountain while I ran in to get the rum, since I know my way around the store better than he does. It took me no time at all to locate the bottle I wanted from one of the back shelves and bring it to the counter. So there I was. The woman is busy ringing up my rum, and I've just run my credit card through the machine, when she suddenly says,

"Do you have i.d.?"

"You're kidding, right?" I said.

"No," she says, not cracking a smile.

"Just wait till you see how old I am," I say, happily whisking out my driver's licence, unable to believe my good fortune (it's one thing to have half-blind, little old church ladies constantly teasing me about looking like a teenager. It's quite another to have a middle-aged store clerk thinking I might not yet be 21). "You just made my day." Meanwhile, I turned about a hundred shades of red. She probably thought my PA driver's licence was a fake i.d. But she went ahead and sold it to me.

"Glad to make your day," she said, looking about as glad as if she'd just lost her job (this is New England remember).

I lied. She didn't make my day. She made my year! Now, leave me alone. I've got an important date with Seventeen magazine, after which I plan to paint my fingernails day-glo orange and call all my friends to see if anyone wants to hide out in my parents' basement drinking dark and stormies.

12 comments:

Eva said...

Ohhh: I'll come hang out in your parents' basement! And I'll bring my dark blue and silver glitter nail polishes. ;) And we can eat way too many chips and giggle over boys and all that fun stuff!!

(Speaking of being carded, I'm always concerned that people aren't going to accept my license, lol. In Texas, if you're under 21 you're issued a vertical license w/ "Not 12 until DATE" in big red letters. Even though it's valid until 2011, I always see people look at it askance-especially since I'm rarely actually in Texas when I'm buying liquor. So far, no one's rejected it though!)

Charlotte said...

I'd like to join the basement party too. I'll bring cookie dough and card games.

Anonymous said...

Love it. I can just see you guys doing some serious under-age drinking and laughing (almost said snorting there - but that's completely the wrong association, I meant with laughter). Are guys allowed at this rum-convention?

ZoesMom said...

I'd love to join you for the basement party. I'll bring Pictionary.

Anonymous said...

Too funny! I thought for a second there she wasn't going to sell it to you and you were going to have to go get Bob to close the deal :)

Emily Barton said...

Eva, oh, please bring the chips and your dark blue and silver glitter nail polish.

Charlotte, the more the merrier. And cookie dough and card games are a great idea, too.

Pete, of course guys are allowed. But first, you have to make a few prank phone calls to my parents' house and then show up really, really late (and bring a six pack of beer with you, of course). So far, you're the only boy at the party.

ZM, Pictionary! Yet another super idea.

Stef, then I could have said, "Hold on a minute, let me go get my father." :-)!

Anonymous said...

Let's call boys, too. And watch Dirty Dancing, please.
I HATE the alcohal purchasing process here in PA...the liquor and wine itself is an huge annoyance (I need cooking sherry and have to make an extra freaking trip!) but the beer is the one that really baffles me. Are dark and stormies really a drink?

Anonymous said...

That's much better than my experience of being carded at the grocery store recently (in England! where they never card so the clerk must have thought I looked about 12) and when she saw my age said "Oh, I'm really sorry. I guess I didn't look at you very well." Gee, thanks! Only a blind person would mistake me for an under-18.

Emily Barton said...

Court, yes, we'll call some boys, too (and force any who come over to watch Dirty Dancing with us. They will, you know, because they'll be trying to impress us).

It's funny, having grown up in the Bible Belt South, where you'd expect to have to know the secret handshake to buy alcohol, that the two northeastern states in which I've lived have had far more archaic liquor laws than the two southern states in which I've lived.

NS, seems that woman could benefit from a few classes at The University of Tact.

Anonymous said...

I'm late arriving, but if the party where we call boys and watch Dirty Dancing is still going, then I'd like to come along, please! I figure Pete can manage to be the only boy at the party - he can give us the phone numbers of his cool friends.

Emily Barton said...

Litlove, the party is still going, so come on in. We're all hovering over Pete, trying to get him to call his cool friends.

Heather said...

LOL Excellent!!!