December 5 is Repeal Day: a day to commemorate and celebrate the anniversary of the day the Eighteenth Amendment was repealed and Americans gained the right to drink alcohol.
Repeal Day has its own website where you can find a history of Prohibition and text from the 18th and 21st amendments.
The Repeal Day celebration is the brainchild of Jeffrey Morgenthaler, who makes a great case for why December 5 should be a national drinking holiday. Other holidays such as St. Patrick's Day and Cinco de Mayo- which have no true connection to alcohol- are commonly considered "drinking holidays," so why not Repeal Day? Jeffrey provides a great list of reasons for celebrating on his blog. (Not that you need a reason.)
It's not as much fun to fall on a Sunday this year, but you can still celebrate Repeal Day.
Last year we wrote about an event that man on the street Pat brought to our attention: SantaCon.
In that post, we said: "We are totally doing this in downtown Lawrence next year."
Well guess what, kids? WE ARE!
SantaCon Lawrence makes its debut this year on Saturday, December 11. There are six bars participating in the inaugural event: Louise's Downtown, the Replay, Red Lyon, the Bottleneck, Barrel House and Sandbar.
SantaCon is free and open to anyone who is at least 21. The only requirement is that everyone must be dressed in Santa apparel! Creative interpretations of Santa are encouraged. Can you imagine a mass gathering of Santas parading around downtown from bar to bar?
In the spirit of the season, Santa is also adding charity to the event. Even though it's free to attend, Santa wants everyone to bring non-perishable food donations. A box will be located at each bar where you can leave donations, and Santa will pick them up later and deliver them to a local food bank.
SantaCon starts at 1:30 p.m. at The Sandbar. A full schedule will be posted on the official website, so Santas who are late can find the party. Though, it shouldn't be hard to find a bunch of rowdy Santas downtown.
If you aren't sure what SantaCon is, check out the video below:
This popular annual event in downtown Lawrence is in its 18th year. It showcases horses, carts and carriages from several states, and the organizers expect about 90 participants this year.
Our very own Friday bartender Phil serves as the parade's chairperson and helps organize the parade every year.
This is one parade we just watch- no ginormous Sandbar creations in this parade. Join us downtown on Saturday! The parade starts at 11 a.m.
November 30. The end of the month and the end of another successful National Blog Posting Month, or NaBloPoMo for short.
The goal here was to post a blog entry every single day during the month of November. I did this once before, back in 2007. It's hard to find things to entertain you for an entire month! Big thanks to all my contributors this month, whether it was a guest blog or just an idea for a post.
The most popular posts from November? Cupcakes. Both of the posts (here and here) about Brenna's Shark Attack cupcakes were the most-visited pages this month. Apparently, you all like food. And sharks.
So, what's coming up for December? Probably not a post every single day!
Last year, we featured "12 Days of Sandbar Christmas," with Sandbar-themed gift ideas. It was fun, so we'll do it again. Also, a big event is coming up in Lawrence next week: SantaCon! Watch for more info on that soon. What else do you want to read about this month?
Thanks also to my fellow local NaBloPoMo participants: SuperJenn, Eric, Bailey, Amerika (sort of!) and Rachel. It helped to have friends doing this challenge with me. Lawrence.com even wrote a story about it; check it out here.
A couple months ago, Dave put up a shot wheel of fortune behind the bar. If you know Dave, you know his wheels (pardon the pun) are always turning and he's always coming up with new ideas, so of course he's already modified the shot wheel.
Introducing, the carnival shot!
If you want to play this game, you get to throw darts behind the bar. Dave added a dart board to the mix. You throw two darts, and the two numbers they hit determine the two liquors in your shot. Then, the bartender spins the wheel to pick your mixer. Finally, they mix up your new, randomly created shot. It might be good; it might not.
The wheel still has the shot picker, for those of you who are too indecisive to pick your own. The bartender spins the wheel, and the outer ring of the wheel contains the names of our most popular shots. Whichever one the wheel lands on is the one you get.
