More and more, Denver bars, clubs and restaurants are enforcing the 21- and-over rule. Big-time. You not only have to be 21 to imbibe, you must have an ID on you to prove it. Everyone. Period. Even if you’re 80 years old. No ID, no drink.
The newly opened Linger wouldn’t give me or my age-appropriate date a drink without seeing an ID. Explains owner Justin Cucci: “Fifty is the new 21, so you can never be too careful.”
A friend of mine, Frank Kelly, clearly no teenager, was denied entry to Milwaukee Tavern last week because he didn’t have his ID.
Paulina Szafranski, promoter at Suite 200 and the upcoming Chloe, says they card everybody, always. “It’s a good policy,” she says. “One mistake can get the bar (in trouble). And some women get insulted if they are not carded. There are bigger service issues to worry about than carding people.”
But I agree with Rocky Hill, a reader who doesn’t cotton to the the card rules: “A policy that treats both me and their employees as fools does not get my business,” he writes me. “I have well-earned gray hair, lines on my face and some of those dark spots on my hands, and I expect to be treated as such, which does not include showing my ID as a precursor to getting a beer. I expect some semblance of visual acuity would win the day, but evidently not.”
Pingpongpalooza.
You might remember pingpong diplomacy when the game brought the U.S. and China together in 1971. Anyway, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of China and the paddle, Denver is going pingpong-crazy in September.
It begins at Neiman Marcus at the Sept. 8 International Fashion’s Night Out — with a table-tennis theme. Not the clothes, unfortunately, just a hot, blowout fashion show and celebrity pingpong matches.
The pingpong continues Sept. 13 at Civic Center during the Eats program that brings Denver’s squadron of food trucks to the park to feed lunch to more than 1,000 downtowners. Pingpong games featuring community leaders will take place.
The pingpong party winds up Sept. 24 at Infinity Park in Glendale with a tourney open to all. Pingpong, anyone?
She’s a star.
Denverite Gemma Star is a performance artist, an accordion player and a fire-eater — and now she’s a TV star. Watch for Star on Thursday’s episode of MTV’s doc series “True Life: My Life in the Marijuana Business.” Her infused Buddha Bars are sold at more than 100 local medical-marijuana centers.
Star says an MTV crew came out for a few days each month for five months. They recorded how hard- core and cutthroat the business is. You can meet Star at a viewing party at 8 p.m. Thursday at Chances Grill.
City spirit.
Check out for some video of Denver’s favorite son Duane “Dog the Bounty Hunter” Chapman and his team in a dogfight at La Montana Linda Restaurant y Cantina in Breck . . . Sez who: “When I was in China on the all-American pingpong team, I just loved playing pingpong with my Flexolite pingpong paddle.” Forrest Gump
Bill Husted’s column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Friday. You can reach him at 303-954-1486 or at bhusted@denverpost.com. Take a peek at Husted’s next column at .
