Waiting for Liquor
So an interesting thing happened this morning. As Liz and I were running some errands, we stopped off at the nearby Strack and Van Til (our local grocery store). While we were picking up supplies for the coming week, Liz also grabbed a few extra ingredients as she’s planning on making several fruitcakes.
Part of the recipe calls for a lot of booze (Liz typically uses an entire bottle of whiskey for one fruitcake). To see a few images from holidays past, check out our trips to Kansas and Georgia.
While we were in line and the cashier began checking all our stuff, she turned to me and said “You can’t buy that,” pointing to our liquor. “It’s not 11AM yet.”
Turns out, you can’t buy any beer, wine or liquor before 11AM on a Sunday. Once upon a time, when I was an undergrad and grad student, I used to know the liquor laws in Indiana and Ohio by heart. But ever since I moved to Chicago, I guess this is the first time I’ve tried to buy any hooch before noon on the Lord’s day.
As a result, I ended up having to kill about 15 minutes at the grocery store. Liz went off to run another errand, and I sat around waiting the for the time to pass.
When I returned to the line, someone had already put away the booze… so I had to go and get more bottles. Along with the whiskey, I also decided to pick up a bottle of wine.
As I joined the express lane checkout, I set down three bottles: two fifths of Wild Turkey, and a bottle of red wine. The guy in front of me glanced at my bottles, then at me. I can only imagine what kind of Leaving Las Vegas references must have been going through his head.
I imagine him saying “Really? You need all that booze at 11 o’clock?”
And had he asked, I would have said “Only on Sundays, my friend. Only on Sundays.”
Is this true of all stores in IL? Or just Strack & Van Til? I’ve never heard of this before. How do people tailgate? I suppose they must buy their booze beforehand, huh?PS. He was probably looking at your booze and thinking that he would be buying the same thing at 11am if he wasn’t working. : O )
Marty J. (November 22, 2010 at 4:53 pm)Nice. I’m that person behind you when you’re only buying a 24 back of beer and a tooth brush going “Wth is that guy going to do?”Thank goodness I don’t live in liquor law areas, they sound sort of pointless and easy to get around with a little effort or pre-planning. It’s not like you’re buying a weapon or something and the waiting period actually makes sense.
FrauTech (November 23, 2010 at 7:42 pm)Texas is even worse with this kind of stuff (surprise, surprise). What I recall is that Sundays the sale of any liquor is not allowed (maybe beer and wine is now, but I don’t think so), and then I think the cutoff on weeknights is 11pm. And then the dry counties (which includes half of freaking DALLAS county) are extra ridiculous. Not only is there no beer/wine/liquor to be purchased at retail, but at dining establishments – from your standard chain Chili’s type joint to the fancy French place – they have to be set up as a private club and then you have to show either ID or this weird membership card I remember my Dad having.Really goofy stuff. I think they are referred to as “blue laws”. I’m sure a Google would come up with all kinds of odd/archaic ones, especially in the South!
Allison (November 25, 2010 at 11:43 am)