We're not trying to rush through the holidays like the retail sector, we promise. But since our Thanksgiving pint glasses weren't available for purchase until the week of Thanksgiving, we thought maybe we should prepare a little sooner for Valentine's Day.
Our friend Susan gave us some fantastic designs for both Thanksgiving and Christmas glasses, and they were very popular. The last Valentine's glass I remember had two cartoon fish kissing each other.
So, if you've got a great idea for a Valentine's Day glass, we'd love to hear it. You can send us an actual drawing or design, or if you're not artistically inclined, just leave a comment or send us an email and describe your idea. Dave's pretty handy, as you may know, and he actually has a degree in graphic design, so he can create almost anything.
Our goal is to have the glasses in stock by early February, in plenty of time for Valentine's Day gifts for your favorite Sandbar friend. They'd be cute filled with Hershey's kisses and some Bahama Mama toys!
Twitter is not only a goldmine of information for us, it's also a great way for our friends and customers to quickly send us questions, comments and pictures.
We got this picture over the weekend:
This photo is on display at the Lawrence Arts Center. We haven't been to see it in person yet, so we don't know who the artist is, or if it's for sale or not, but we love it!
I have several different online notifications set up to send me an e-mail whenever there's a mention of the Sandbar online- Google alerts and SocialMention.com are two of my favorites. Often, the alerts I get have nothing to do with our Sandbar, but every once in awhile I get something good.
Recently, I hit the jackpot with one of the strangest and funniest Sandbar mentions ever.
It appears that some teenagers in Austin who are interested in various internet and computer activites stumbled upon our webcam. They were so fascinated with this "magical digital portal" into the strange world of Kansas that they dedicated an entire page on their website to us.
Here's what they had to say:
Once upon a time, three friends stumbled upon a magical digital portal into the unknown world of Kansas. Through this portal, the friends witnessed a strange religious ritual centering around an artifact of pure crystal and shaped like a soccer ball. Fascinated by these practices, the friends captured a link to this portal and began using it every week as a cheesy segment in their semi-comedic podcast. And now the link has been placed here for all to see. Gaze in upon the Sandbar and its bizzare events if you dare…But don't expect much, it's not really that interesting.
Obviously, the strange religious ritual they are witnessing is the hurricane show and dance, and the soccer ball-shaped crystal artifact is the white Christmas light hanging in the center of the bar.
I looked around their site for the podcast that supposedly features us as a cheesy segment- I could only find one link to a podcast (click here to listen to it), and it's really long. I haven't listened to all of it yet so I don't know if they actually talk about the Sandbar or not.
We're happy that we could humor some kids in Austin with the crazy things we do in Kansas. When you turn 21, take a road trip and visit us- we think you'll find our bar a lot of fun.
Awhile back we found ourselves without a mermaid costume for the first time in eight years. We quickly got a new one, but it got us thinking about how many costumes have disappeared over the years. Probably at least 20.
One of the funnier stories about missing costumes involves the ones we actually got back.
Several years ago, some ladies stole several costumes from the Sandbar in Ottawa. A Sandbar family member- I think it was Peach's brother Patrick, if I'm wrong, sorry to whoever's not getting credit here- found out who it was, and heard through the grapevine that these ladies would be at a wedding reception with the costumes.
Patrick played detective (not hard in a small town) and found out when and where the reception was. And he showed up. He walked in to the reception, saw the women all dressed up in the mermaid costumes and promptly demanded them back.
They refused.
That's right, they refused to give back costumes they had stolen from us. Patrick then suggested that he call the local police to settle the matter. The women finally gave in and gave up the costumes.
And that's how we got back at least a couple of our stolen treasures.
(This story is as accurate as I can remember it. Please don't steal our stuff.)
The link to the mini-fridge beer cannon video floated across our Twitter stream the other day, courtesy of @rikkikite.
It appears that some guy used his old college mini-fridge to create a beer delivery service for his apartment. Combined with an app on his iPhone, he's able to select which beer he wants and launch it from the fridge to a point in his apartment.
Every lazy person needs one of these. Check it out for yourself:
