7/31/14 Booze at Arts Fest

(0731 Arts Fest Boozers)

970 WBLF.  I’m Wes Richards with some thoughts on

Booze Fest.

We read in State College dot com that there were more alcohol related problems during Arts Fest than there were on State Patty’s Day.  The figures come from the police department and the hospitals.  So they have to be right, right?

Arts Fest is five days and State Patty’s is one day.  But no matter.  A drunk is a drunk.  A DUI is a DUI.

For those of you newer here than I, State Patty started when the School on the Hill had the audacity to be on break on and around St. Patrick’s day.  Students created a new holiday to allow them to get sloshed whatever the class schedule.

Fortunately, under pressure from everyone who is not a hard drinking student. State Day has been diminishing in both stature and in arrests. Most of the downtown bars close but business at the state stores booms in the two or three day runup.

Arts Fest, of course, is not an official five day drinking binge.  And the tactics that helped reduce State Patty to a shadow of its original drunken self in recent years cannot be applied to the might and grandeur of one of the region’s largest attractions.

Bars are not going to close for five days no matter the size of the bribes that encourage them to close for one day in March.

But the figures on alcohol- related illness and lawlessness is yet another reminder that this is a drinking town and until and unless that changes, anything and everything is an excuse for drinking to excess.

I’m no drinking prude.  I like my vodka.  So don’t get the idea that you’re hearing a prohibitionist.  

And I understand that drinking is cash flow in several stages from the bottle to the glass to the digestive tract to the courtroom or the hospital.

But I am disappointed.  So far all those great minds at PSU and all those distinguished alumni and all those dedicated public servants in this region, have yet to figure out an effective way to make us all a little more inhibited.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®