December 25, 2007
With the intent of making a casual trip into the neighborhood 7-Eleven to pick up a 12-pack of Miller Lite, Ethan Geddings decided on a whim to “take it up a notch” and spend an extra 80 cents on Yuengling.
The $11.79 beverage procurement – paid for by SunTrust debit card – marked the first step toward adulthood for the 23-year-old, the former Randolph-Macon College student said on his way to a Christmas party.
“I’ve done ‘the college thing’ and am ready to start acting my age, and that means a grown-up beer,” said Geddings, unaware that his most ambitious and hardest drinking days lay ahead of him. “Besides, I’m only going to have a few tonight, and I want to enjoy them.”
Geddings, who last month moved out of his parent’s house, said Yuengling has gathered a rather cult-like following among twenty-something partiers in recent years. The Pottsville, Penn.-based brewery is more than 170 years old and claims to be the oldest family-owned beer maker in the U.S., or, as Geddings describes the lager, “is cheap and somehow manages to still taste awesome. We call them Yuengies.”
A temp at a local mortgage broker who bartends during the week, Geddings said he enjoyed Yuengling a few times in college but couldn’t really afford to drink it every weekend until he landed a steady job.
Also, he is unaware that beer brands such as Blue Moon, Anchor Steam and Magic Hat #9 exist and believes Hefeweizen has something to do with World War II.
“I also debated buying some strawberry daiquiri Boone’s Farm, because chicks love that stuff,” said Geddings, who does not remember making out with two University of Richmond students at different times – and telling each he was an FBI agent on his way to Paris that night – on an acquaintance’s back porch during a triple keg party last weekend.
“Then I remembered – no, no, you’re an adult now. Can’t be doing that stuff,” said Geddings, who on that next morning woke up on a friend’s sofa with an ink mustache and “SINEP” written in permanent marker across his forehead.
At the point-of-sale, the 7-Eleven cashier requested Geddings reaffirm that he was, indeed, an adult. While the official Virginia driver’s license listed Geddings’ birthday as Nov. 21, 1984 – therefore eligible for the Yuengling buy – the cashier had no idea that the history major still talks to his former college girlfriend via Facebook and has impractical hopes of one day getting back together with the 21-year-old.
Geddings, who has been able to legally see movies such as “Die Hard” or buy video games with an “M” rating for only five years, said the Yuengling purchase will be the first of many to come.
“Love the taste,” said Geddings as he shut the door to his car, which was obviously his own because he still cannot rent one by law for another two years.
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