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[Set2Stun]

The provincial liquor stores (LCBO) and The Beer Store are closed on holidays, yeah.

That just reminded me of something, though. You can buy beer at some gas stations and convenience stores now. I forgot about that, cause it's a new thing, and for pretty much my whole life you could only get drinks at the two kinds of stores.

 

[Homer Potvin]

The provincial liquor stores (LCBO) and The Beer Store are closed on holidays, yeah.

That just reminded me of something, though. You can buy beer at some gas stations and convenience stores now. I forgot about that, cause it's a new thing, and for pretty much my whole life you could only get drinks at the two kinds of stores.

For Good Friday? That's stupid. Only Thanksgiving and Xmas Day here.

 

[CatrionaGrace]

When I moved to Wyoming, I was astonished to discover one couldn't buy a bottle of wine in a grocery store. When the nice clerk directed me to the liquor store next door, I didn't know quite how to deal with the stituation. I'd only been in a liquor store once in my life (I was 23 at the time) and it seemed kinda dodgy and drug deal-ish to walk through that door. Only alcoholics went into liquor stores. Everyone else decoriously purchased liquor two aisles over from the baked goods.

 

[Set2Stun]

Had a random flashback from this content. I remember when you could not buy alcohol on Sundays. Because Jesus I guess heh. And then I remembered that earlier than that, most stores in general were closed on Sundays. That's about as weird as smoking in McDonald's in retrospect.

 

[CatrionaGrace]

...most stores in general were closed on Sundays.

American Blue Laws

 

[Set2Stun]

Always enjoy the historical context. Amazing that it persevered for so long.

 

[Rath Darkblade]

Laws can be silly, strange or outdated, indeed. Just google "silly laws" and you'll find millions of results.

One of the more reliable results is probably this wikipedia article on strange laws, which at least tries to divide them into categories like "False", "True", "Never Passed" etc. and substantiate those results with outside links. Have fun.

 

[CatrionaGrace]

My home state is part of the Bible Belt and my home county is about as Bible-Belty as they come. Ask me why I've lived in Wyoming for almost fifty years. Home county is still dry, though organizations like VFW have licenses to sell liquor at their events.

 

[JLT]

When I moved to Wyoming, I was astonished to discover one couldn't buy a bottle of wine in a grocery store.

When I moved to New Mexico, I found that you could buy booze at the grocery store, but when the store was open on Sunday, the booze section was gated off.

And on my first visit to Utah, the grocery stores didn't have wine at all. I had to go to an ABC (alcoholic beverage control) stores like the ones in Virginia. You'd walk in and a guy at the counter would give you a looseleaf notebook with the labels of the booze on it, and you'd leaf through it and point to the one you wanted. The guy would fetch the bottle from the store-room behind him and give it to you after you paid him. I felt like I was buying a sex object from an "adult amusement store."

When my family lived in northern Virginia in the 1960s, my dad would make booze runs to Washington, DC, which had regular liquor stores. I don't know what the situation is in Virginia or New Mexico now.

Do I have to include a weather report? Well, here in central California, we've had an unusually warm winter, so the snow-pack we rely on for our summer water supply is melting fast. So it looks like it's going to be another drought this year.

 

[CatrionaGrace]

Well, here in central California, we've had an unusually warm winter, so the snow-pack we rely on for our summer water supply is melting fast. So it looks like it's going to be another drought this year.

We had the warmest, driest winter on record. Same problem with the snow-pack here. Can I ask where in central CA? I lived in Clovis when it still had a rodeo arena downtown. Population back then was not quite 15,000 people. It was a really nice small town.

 

[JLT]

We had the warmest, driest winter on record. Same problem with the snow-pack here. Can I ask where in central CA? I lived in Clovis when it still had a rodeo arena downtown. Population back then was not quite 15,000 people. It was a really nice small town.

I've been through that general area a few times, since it's on the way from Sacramento, where I live, to Bakersfield and points east. (Whenever I have to drive to Arizona, I always go over the Tehachapi Pass and through the Mojave Desert rather than go via Los Angeles.) I think I stopped in Clovis once on the way to Dunlap, which was (and may still be) a popular hang gliding site. And a group I belong to bought some land in Cathay Valley, which I think is not too far from Clovis.

I lived in Salinas for years. It's also a big rodeo town, as you know if you follow that sport. When I moved there, the population was about 50,000. Now it's triple that.

 

[CatrionaGrace]

Now it's triple that.

Clovis is close to 130,000 people now. If my old apartments still exist, I doubt they are surrounded by vineyards, pastures, and orchards anymore. We used to drive to Bakerspatch to Barstow to Kingman on our way back east. Barstow was a nothing little town back then, about the size of Clovis. I drove through there about 2013 and it had broken out in strip malls. Looked it up just now out of curiosity; population has only doubled. Seemed bigger than that to me. I drove to Stinson Beach about 2012 and stopped in Citrus Heights, Sonoma, Napa, and Novato on the way. All had changed drastically. Sonoma still had dirt roads around the plaza when I lived there. Population is still small, but now it's all diagonal parking, bistros, and day visitors with good teeth and expensive cars. Traffic in Napa was so terrible that I turned around and got out before seeing what I wanted to revisit. Novato had also grown considerably, but the mountains and screening vegetation made it seem less crazy than some other places. The area on the outskirts of town where I lived hadn't changed so very much. The dairy was still there, though access to the creek had been restricted.

 

[JLT]

Clovis is close to 130,000 people now. If my old apartments still exist, I doubt they are surrounded by vineyards, pastures, and orchards anymore. We used to drive to Bakerspatch to Barstow to Kingman on our way back east. Barstow was a nothing little town back then, about the size of Clovis. I drove through there about 2013 and it had broken out in strip malls. Looked it up just now out of curiosity; population has only doubled. Seemed bigger than that to me. I drove to Stinson Beach about 2012 and stopped in Citrus Heights, Sonoma, Napa, and Novato on the way. All had changed drastically. Sonoma still had dirt roads around the plaza when I lived there. Population is still small, but now it's all diagonal parking, bistros, and day visitors with good teeth and expensive cars. Traffic in Napa was so terrible that I turned around and got out before seeing what I wanted to revisit. Novato had also grown considerably, but the mountains and screening vegetation made it seem less crazy than some other places. The area on the outskirts of town where I lived hadn't changed so very much. The dairy was still there, though access to the creek had been restricted.

I agree. Napa, my wife's home town, is no longer an agricultural town. All the pickup trucks have been replaced by luxury SUVs. (Sonoma, where my brother lives, is still quasi-rural when you get away from the center of town.) My sister-in-law is thinking of moving away from Benicia to escape the now incessant traffic there. And when I visited Albuquerque after being away for fifteen years, I found that it had turned into Los Angeles.

About ten years ago, I wrote a piece about my own trip down Memory Lane:

Oh, Baltimore