Ahhh, the good old days.
So, here's a cheap ass beer story for you:
The year is 1987. I was a young, 18 yr old private stationed at DLI on the Presidio of Monterey. Friday night, it's time for a beer run so we pooled our cash. Well, none of us had a car, but one of the guys had a motorcycle, so I hopped (har!) on back and we headed to Safeway. We have enough money for 5 suitcases of Bud, which we promptly bought. We got out to the parking lot and realized that 5 24pks of Bud may not have been the wisest choice. Being young, highly motivated soldiers, we were determined to overcome the minor obstacle of 2 people, a bike, and 5 cases of beer. We bungied one on the back fender, then my buddy stacked two on my lap, and I had one in each hand, and used my knees to balance the stack. After getting me situated, he carefully climbed on in front of and got the bike off the kick stand. At this point, we were starting to draw a crowd........many people were laughing and pointing. I should point out, this was not a dresser or big cruiser, and the bike struggled two-up, before adding 5 cases of beer.
I'm sure by now you can guess what happens..........just as we turn into the main gate of DLI, a catastrophic weight shift occured during the apex of the turn..........thus causing us to lay the bike down. I swear, all 5 of those cases burst........beer cans were everywhere. It looked like a brewery truck rolled over. We get the bike off to the side, but our beer is everywhere. Traffic is flowing at a typical california rate, and we're watching with dismay as many of our cans of beer are being ran over. My buddy runs into the intersection, and stands at parade rest with his right hand extended straight in front of him, like some kind of traffic cop. Traffic comes to a halt, so I'm in this intersection grabbin' beers as fast as I can.......like some kind of mad easter egg hunt. I'm stuffin' 'em in the remnants of the cases, my pockets, down my pants, in my shirt.......you name it. I think we recovered about 2 1/2 cases of that beer before we heard sirens, that being the signal to take what we had and get. You should have seen the looks on peoples faces when we got back to the barracks, and out came this pile of smashed, dented, leaking, and well shaken stash of bud.
We thouroughly enjoyed that brew.....especially looking out the 2nd floor dayroom windows and watching a bunch of MP cars cruising the bike parking lot and shining spot lights on all the bikes.......while my buddy's was safely stowed under a blanket in the stairwell.