The Bar Towel

A couple things, and sorry for the long post...

Got one at Eg and Laird today (not proud of how early I was there but yet there I was at 6:00am) - my sister showed up an hour before opening but she was about number 80 with only 56 packs.

Had I known about Avenue and Lawrence (not far away) I would have sent my sister there.

I almost don't want to say what time the first people in line got there, because I don't want it to cause panic for people tonight, but let's just say that it stretched the concept of "morning".

I'm sure the beer is good, but even more interesting were the people in the line

Only one person I met today had heard of the beer before this week. I heard more than one person ask if it was a dark beer. One person talked about the beer being from a monestery in Amsterdam. All very innocent, and the people were quite nice. A couple people there buying gifts for their husbands because they're"beer geeks" - so if you didn't know where your wife was this morning, who knows?

One of them a fellow teacher from a nearby school who had someone cover part of her class until 9:30. Kinda ballsy, I thought, given the current climate in schools.

The shadiest of people though were a father and son duo behind me. They had already gotten "several" packs yesterday from "guys they had" at various stores. And they were getting some today, and talking about tomorrow too.

I made some comment to no one in particular about hoarding and re-selling which they pretended not to hear.

Probably the best part of the morning is when the son (who you'll remember has already purchased several packs) learned from me that the bottles were only 330ml and not, in fact, pint sized!!!

That, in itself, may have summed up the frenzy for me.

Whatever. Even though someone will pay an insane price for those gift packs, I hope THEY get more enjoyment out of the beer, than those poachers will get out of the money they got from them.

And I also hope that people who aren't that into beer who got these packs will appreciate it for the rare and special treat it is.

Lastly, I'm really sorry to hear about some of you not getting it. I'd put some of mine up for a "cheap trade", but am splitting it with my BiL. Actually I'm going to brag about it for a couple weeks, and then his gift will be that he gets to share one in the glasses. He'll actually love that. Then I'll give him a couple more bottles and a glass.

Cheers, good luck for the rest of you, and let's be thankful when this is finally over.

it's a fun game to keep searching kijiji + cl and flagging every one that pops up... let the hoarding resellers burn.

JeffPorter wrote:A couple things, and sorry for the long post...

Got one at Eg and Laird today (not proud of how early I was there but yet there I was at 6:00am) - my sister showed up an hour before opening but she was about number 80 with only 56 packs.

Had I known about Avenue and Lawrence (not far away) I would have sent my sister there.

I almost don't want to say what time the first people in line got there, because I don't want it to cause panic for people tonight, but let's just say that it stretched the concept of "morning".

I'm sure the beer is good, but even more interesting were the people in the line

Only one person I met today had heard of the beer before this week. I heard more than one person ask if it was a dark beer. One person talked about the beer being from a monestery in Amsterdam. All very innocent, and the people were quite nice. A couple people there buying gifts for their husbands because they're"beer geeks" - so if you didn't know where your wife was this morning, who knows?

One of them a fellow teacher from a nearby school who had someone cover part of her class until 9:30. Kinda ballsy, I thought, given the current climate in schools.

The shadiest of people though were a father and son duo behind me. They had already gotten "several" packs yesterday from "guys they had" at various stores. And they were getting some today, and talking about tomorrow too.

I made some comment to no one in particular about hoarding and re-selling which they pretended not to hear.

Probably the best part of the morning is when the son (who you'll remember has already purchased several packs) learned from me that the bottles were only 330ml and not, in fact, pint sized!!!

That, in itself, may have summed up the frenzy for me.

Whatever. Even though someone will pay an insane price for those gift packs, I hope THEY get more enjoyment out of the beer, than those poachers will get out of the money they got from them.

And I also hope that people who aren't that into beer who got these packs will appreciate it for the rare and special treat it is.

Lastly, I'm really sorry to hear about some of you not getting it. I'd put some of mine up for a reasonable trade, but am splitting it.

Cheers, good luck for the rest of , and let's be thankful when this is finally over.

I'm glad it worked out for a fellow Brampton resident.

At Weston Road and 401 anyone I spoke with knew what they were there for. As mentioned earlier, someone did commandeer at least one road/construction worker to get around the one case limit but as best I could tell, the vast majority were "genuine".

In the parking lot I was offered an extra $10 for my case but that didn't represent a very good hourly rate so I declined.

My friend and I got the last 2 packs at the Carleton and Church so that is one more store that is out.

BigBob wrote:
At Weston Road and 401 anyone I spoke with knew what they were there for. As mentioned earlier, someone did commandeer at least one road/construction worker to get around the one case limit but as best I could tell, the vast majority were "genuine".

I wonder if there was a bit of a demographic difference between today's rush and yesterday's. I wonder if word spread via the star article. I would say almost half the people in the line up at Leaside got turned away with still almost an hour to go before opening.

JeffPorter wrote:

BigBob wrote:
At Weston Road and 401 anyone I spoke with knew what they were there for. As mentioned earlier, someone did commandeer at least one road/construction worker to get around the one case limit but as best I could tell, the vast majority were "genuine".

I wonder if there was a bit of a demographic difference between today's rush and yesterdays.

An interesting thought - I attributed it to the location. It's not handy to public transit or to downtown Toronto. It was mostly people from my demographic but there were at least a couple of (unescorted) women.

Ottawa is out...

Went to the Crossroads location and there were like 75 - 100 people in line. I left empty handed. There were people there who had struck out at Rideau earlier (including a guy who drove in from Montreal...). There were people, including the guy in front of me, who had no idea what the beer even was but decided to come anyway.

No big deal, I'll just drink a St. Bernardus Abt 12 instead. ;)

I wonder if any of this will end up at some of the local bars with an insane price per bottle? If I find out that bars around the GTA sent folks out in line to buy up as much as they can so that they can gauge us at their establishments that will be the last time I give any of my hard earned $'s to them!

Just like yesterday, my girlfriend missed out by just a couple. That was our last hope so I'll probably just buy a bottle at a bar one day. Maybe this will help push us to visit Belgium!

admviolin wrote:Just like yesterday, my girlfriend missed out by just a couple. That was our last hope so I'll probably just buy a bottle at a bar one day. Maybe this will help push us to visit Belgium!

Or take a cheaper trip out to Alberta?

Soods wrote:Royal York and Bloor had 33-6packs.

Ha ha....had been told yesterday by someone working the floor that there would only be 10 bricks, and so didn't hang around early this morning when I dropped by to find 10 ppl ahead of me.

I'd be pissed off if I weren't so sleep deprived.

vandutchy wrote:I wonder if any of this will end up at some of the local bars with an insane price per bottle? If I find out that bars around the GTA sent folks out in line to buy up as much as they can so that they can gauge us at their establishments that will be the last time I give any of my hard earned $'s to them!

Of course it will. The local bars will be well stocked, and it won't be selling for cost.

This thread just hit 41 THOUSAND views. 15-20 a minute right now.

OK, a dozen views are mine these past 2 days. This is 'Worsevleteren' than I imagined.

Belgian wrote:This thread just hit 41 THOUSAND views. 15-20 a minute right now.

it's fun to watch/read, especially knowing that I'll never see it up here.

spinrsx wrote:I was in the line, they had more than enough for everyone. (130 packs total)

people walking in at store opening still got some

cfrancis wrote:Drove by King Edward and Rideau in Ottawa at about 9am. Lineup was about 60-70 people long. I continued to work.

Friend got there at 9:50 and they were all out. Couldn't justify waiting in line for it but wouldn't have objected to a bottle or two...guess other tasty beer will just have to be drunk...sure something can be found