The first time that I stumbled upon this place, I was driving through Valpo on a Sunday afternoon. It was winter break, the college kids were home, and jack-shit was going on in town. I figured that this would be the best time to grab a beer at a brewery right off of campus--the place would have to be at its most authentic.
And it was. It was closed.
I went back about six weeks later, as I was in town to go to a basketball game. I parked in a football field lot that was about half way in between the gym and the brewery. This time, a Saturday evening when school was in session was the setting, and I anticipated a rowdy pre-game college crowd. I crossed the street and could tell from about 75 yards out that the joint was alive. There were few to any cars in the lot, so this had to be an on-campus rowdy crowd.
Again, I was disappointed.
This time they were open, but when I opened the door, it was either filled with professors or old folks having a pre-funk before going to some sort of January high school graduation party. Shoulder to shoulder and nobody was rowdy. The ladies all had dates, and the guys wore ties. The ol' girl pouring was very overwhelmed, but very nice. After things cleared out, I bull shat with her for awhile. She explained that the bar operated in spite of the college--the two basically had no knowledge of the existence of the other one. Local politics dictate that the town and the school will always be at odds over what ever the fuck they want to be at odds over.
This was the first college town that I had ever been to that disliked its college.
She assured me that they make enough money off of the locals and tourists, and that they do nicely and don't need the college kid market. It's really a shame because you can actually see the football stadium from their building. Tailgating should be their niche. All they would have to do is barbecue in a 21 and over area outside and get some corn hole set up. If they didn't want to fuck around with the food license, get a hotdog cart or a taco van to come up.
Fuck, or just corn hole. Drunk college kids love their corn hole.
The other problem that this place had was it's prices. They were on the high end of normal, but their token beer was a Russian Imperial called Black Friday. It was going for $20 per 22 ounce bottle. A $20, 22 ounce bottle had better be straight panda semen or something expensive, not some fucking nothing special home brew. If you are Sam Adams or Rogue, you can do a $20 bottle--not some little-ass local joint.
No comments:
Post a Comment