Karl Klockars

Say goodbye, Wrigleyville. For 60 minutes.

And simultaneously, Science: 0. The biggest goose egg of ‘em all. More on that a little later.

First, allow me to tell you a little story.  Anecdotal evidence of the highest order.  This is a tale of people who drank beer.  And oh, did they drink beer voraciously.  They drank it like it was going out of style.  They drank it like they were running out.  They swilled those long-neck bottles and hoarded them like squirrels fearing a long winter hiding their acorns.

These people were not Cubs fans.  They were not Wrigleyville patrons.  They were attending an art gallery opening.  And these people were me. 

Flashback: It was somewhere around 2000 or so.  It was a nice, cool fall night.  The moon was shining bright, my friends and I were all sorts of dressed up, and we were going to look at art.  Do you know why me and my pot-smoking metalhead friends were going to go look at art?  Two words:  Free drinks.

The friend of a girlfriend had a couple pieces showing in some dance club/art gallery in beautiful downtown Elgin, Illinois.  Did we care about art?  Not a lick.  Did we like the idea of getting boozed to the gills for nothing and then shaking our asses with some unwitting club girl from Barrington?  Yes.  But there was one problem – the happy hour was only from the hours of X to Y.

This car is awesome. Scientific fact.

We got a late start, so we had to haul ass up there in my beautiful 1971 Cadillac Coupe deVille.  We poured out, took a cursory glance at the art on display (which was packed in what I think was a janitor’s closet two hours previous) and headed directly for the bar.

We had all of about 45 minutes to drink and make the long trek worth it.  Google Maps says:  Naperville to Elgin is 24 miles on a drive straight up a state road with untimed street lights.  An hours drive for 45 minutes of beer followed by a drive back home – unless we got sidetracked by the Grand Victoria, that was.

So:  Drink we did.  The poor untipped bartender was surely disgusted by us and what we thought was a clever ruse to get as much booze as possible before the cutoff time.  It was a game called:  “I’m going to go get 3 beers, then you go get 3 beers, then you go get 3 beers.”  It was a game we played well.

After a few rounds of this game, our table of ne’er-do-wells was just about covered with Budweiser bottles in various states of drunkenness.  And we too were in various states of drunkenness.  Actually, that’s not true – we were mostly wasted.  We had to pack extra drinking into an artificially created timespan.  Would we have gotten as wasted if we had 2 hours to drink for free?  If we could stay until last call?  No.

"You there. Put that beer down."

So the City seems to think that taking a couple innings off will make a difference.  It will.  It will make everyone pack their guts and livers with enough booze to carry themselves through that drastic hour without alcohol – and in the process, get so pickled that they won’t know what a baseball is.

Is it nice that the City wants us to take a short break – to clear our head, as it were?  Of course.  How thoughtful of them.  Here’s what’s going to happen:

City: “Hey, Chicagoans!  You have to stop drinking for like, 60 minutes or so.  But!  Before that, we don’t care how much you drink.  Then!  After that, you can start drinking again.  Got it?”

Drunks: “Yes!  Bartender!  83 shots of your cheapest whiskey for me and my closest friends!  Wait, City of Chicago – what are we supposed to do for that span of time when we can’t drink?”

City: “Well, just….sit around or something.  Bring a board game, maybe?  Or watch the game?  But – be very, very controlled.  Don’t do anything silly.”

Drunks: “We can do that – but we’re all going to be outside.  All X-thousand of us.”

City: “Wait – what?”

Drunks: “First off, half of us will be smoking.  The other half of us won’t give a shit about the game at that point, and will take to the streets in great cheer.  We’ll all be wasted as well – your arbitrary drinking rules will see to that.  But we promise – we’ll be perfectly orderly.  No climbing on street signs at all.  Promise.”

Also, Science! How much beer or booze can one person’s liver metabolize during that one hour of non-drinking?  One.  Drink.  Anyone who’s ever taken a high school health class knows this.  One single beer.  One shot of vodka.  One glass of wine (and if you can find someone drinking wine on Clark street during the playoffs, please let me know).  And the city thinks that that will be the dramatic difference between chaos and control.

One single solitary Miller Lite is what you’ll be shoving through your liver during those two final innings.  That is the Thin Yellow Line that we hope will contain the insanity and irrepressed Cubdom that beats in the heart of every drunken fan.  One little beer.  Thanks for the help, City of Chicago.