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I can't be sure but I think the first beer I ever had was a Miller that I borrowed out of my brothers fridge when I was in the 7th grade.
After that I had industrial beers to numerous to count until I tasted a Samuel Adams on vacation. Returning home I called twenty or thirty liquor stores trying to find it. It was new, and I was in Iowa.
Then I found Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, life has not been the same since.
Me. Like. Beer.
How can I *possibly* remember the first beer I ever had?
I was a very bad little girl. I know it had to be in Newport, RI. I know it was before 7th grade, because... well, never mind why.
It was almost certainly a Ballantine Ale, because that is what my Mom drank when she mowed the lawn, and my Dad was in Vietnam. And I used to love the little rebus thingies inside the bottle caps (yes, I was a strange child).
Oh, that Hamm's can looks so familiar......
I grew up in the NW and got my father many of those cans out of the fridge. They usually arrived opened....'course, that was when my folks were hillbillies. Now, though, they say they're "Mountain Williams".
If you liked the rebus things, then surely you remember Lucky Lager in the little brown bottles......
I am trying to remember what my parents drank.
My Mom was partial to Ballantine's Ale, as I said before, so that is what my Dad would bring home. I can recall a time when they went through a Tuborg and Grolsch period, because we still have those funny bottles with the cork-type thingies in the top and the metal doohickey. My Dad was with NATO for a while so we were always trying odd beers - we had Dutch and Norweigian friends and he was always shuttling back and forth from the US to Europe. That was one of the many times we were stationed in Norfolk.
He would also come home from sea with odd kinds of new beer that we had to try (not with the actual beer, but he would go to the store b/c he'd had it somewhere on his travels). I think that's why I don't recall a particular kind of beer - it was always changing.
Probably Red White & Blue.
Yes, that was a beer. My step-father of the time drank it.
My first beer was a Rheingold swiped from Grandpa's fridge. Rheingold was a very dry beer the kind of which isn't made any more in the U.S. The Japanese beer Asahi Super Dry comes the closest. Lately, I've become enamored of Modelo Especial. But that too shall pass.
Oh without a doubt it was Hamm's. My dad was stationed in the Pacific NW at the time. My mom has the pix of me in my father's cowboy boots, cowboy hat and diaper (mine, not my father's.....sheesh) holding a can of Hamm's.
Somewhere I have a great picture of our beagle sleeping on our first sofa with a can of beer between her legs. It is still my favorite photo of her.
I don't know how it became a family tradition to torture beloved pets by submitting them to various indignities involving beer and random bits of popcorn, but sadly that seems to be the case.
We are not the Brady's.
What about nicknames for beer?
In high school we used to call PBR 'headache beer'.
And then there is the whole topic of college beer, which is downright frightening...
[thud]
Nicknames for beer?
I will ponder that, but I do remember calling Old Milwaukee mud ducks.
Colorado Kool-aid.
The other thing is cheap beer you had to drink when you had no money :p
Lone Star
Pearl Beer: I remember this from when we were first married in Williamsburg and were poor as church mice, purchased up at the local Bi-Lo (a southern institution which I taught my little boys never to pass without mooing like a cow, "Bi Looooooow'...., then yelling "Sell High!" - fortunately small children are easily amused). I used to literally save up loose change until I had enough to buy a 6 pack of Pearl Beer - $1.39. Add a bag of Ruffles potato chips and some dip, a blanket, a transistor radio, and an Indian summer afternoon and you had a recipe for all the happiness our little world had to offer.
We called Meisterbrau its probably proper interpretation - Brew Meister.
We had Old Mil-dog.
Little Kings - Green Head (not sure why)
When I was a senior the sophs in my house liked "Schits" (but when we were low on cash we seniors stuck with our original rancid cheap beer, the Brew Meister)
Others will come to me.
My first was a Schmidt's, as a child, at a family function; I thought it tasted awful.
(Prob'ly 'cause it did)
Meisterbrau and Pearl I've had...the latter when I lived in Texas. My palate became almost too refined after spending time in Germany.
Thank God for the "microbrew revolution"...
They make a pretty good local beer right around here. There are several varieties, most of them are highly drinkable.
I knew I smelled beer somewhere on the intertubes... It took a while to sniff out the locale.
First beer? That would be Bud courtesy of me mom's Irish brudder. The black sheep of the family and his wife would come over to my parents house every Friday (along with most of the rest their siblings) for my dad's (in)famous Friday fish fry and tall tale emporium.
Anywho, I was about 5, it was 1958, and mom had that new-fangled stuff called Mohawk wall to wall carpet (I recall that little Indian kid threatening me with his tomahawk), in beige of course, freshly installed, well... wall to wall.
Uncle Larry, being the mischievous former sailor and all around sport model that he was, pumped me full of 2 B'weisers on the sly.
Within moments, my young life became very interesting. After trying to convince the neighbor girl that I was really Josh Randall, hey baby, Wanted Dead or Alive =8^) , I felt real bad all of a sudden. Guilt? Nahhh, boiler distress. So I bolted for the porcelain room in mom and dad's house. Needless to say, in a foreshadowing of a typical noob-grasshopper who's quaffed too many/too fast while training in the Zen arts of the brewsky mystique I made it to the dining room when Ma Nature threw the ole esophagus into reverse despite my best efforts.
Oh the shame... not me, mom, who never could quite get the carpet... ahhh spotless, ever again. Well brudder or not, one should never ever spot the brand new wall to wall carpet of a red headed Irish lass, not even by proxy.
”Cassandra | Homepage | 10.21.07 - 8:12 am | #”Nice memory Cass. When the wife and I first married, we lived in the artsy craftsy section of old Atlanta and would scavenge spare money from el Banco de-Piggy to raid Starvin’ Marvin’s for a couple of those accursed oil cans of Fosters, and a pack of honey buns for a Saturday morning breakfast in the park.
Most of my beer escapades between those two times are a bit fuzzy, especially one in Athens Greece... for which I would need to rely on the testimony of dubious witnesses (US sailors) in order to recount that one accurately. I can share that the take-away lesson as I recall is not to enter into a boiler-maker drinking contest when the ingredients are warm Greek beer and Ouzo. Apparently the Greeks had not heard of Josh Randall in the early 70's...
Best regards, and cheers!
I will gladly accept that the first part of the preceding comment, attributable to Cassandra is, shall we say, an expression of "art," rather than fact, and by someone other than Cassandra (the Scot) herself.
Other wise I might be in a mood to dance a reel on someone's head.
Mr. Rdr,
The first part of the comment was not attributed to Milady Cassandra, it was a recounting of my first experience with beer as told to me by various members of my family and my mother. I have little more than a vague recollection of the actual event.
The attribute to Milady was of her recollection of the Willamsburg BiLo which reminded me of my history with the local Starvin' Marvin's and Foster's oil-can Saturdays with my dearest wife.
Not art by any means, and yes it may be a clumsy attempt at humor, but I was under the impression that attempts at humor were acceptable here as was the case back at the former VC site of Milady Cass... I will revise that apparently mistaken impression.
My apology to all if it came across in a bad light.
Anyone wanting to dance a reel on my head can email me for directions to my location. I will be happy to oblige.
Well now, if I am not mistaken that is a mistaken impression of a mistaken impression.
And I don't remember the last time I was mistaken.
Nicknames? Well, up in the PacNW we had Olympia, lovingly called Piss Water. Then there were the standards like $hits for Schlitz.
Nice to see you made it around for happy hour, bthun.
First microbrewery beer I ever had was in a little brewery/bar in Missoula, Montana called The Bayern Brewery. Snuck out of there with one of their mugs one night. I'd still have it, too, if that cop hadn't seen me drinking out of it while walking down to the next bar -- three bars later.
Pile,
IIRC, once on VC you might have mentioned you thought there had been the slight possibility of a definitive maybe that you were mistaken, but subsequent investigations revealed that you were wrong.
Hope that clears that up for ya!
0>;~}
Well....I think the point is I don't remember the last time I was mistaken.
Burgie...........Yeeeeech
Thanks for the memories, bthun :)
I think that is what I missed the most over at VC. It got so big we didn't often just sit around and talk. I am sorry I didn't think to look down this far until this morning - I was checking earlier.
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