On Jul 8, 12:32?pm, Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jul 2007 08:47:28 -0700, Chuck Gould

wrote:
There's a difference between having a beer on a summer afternoon and
being a "drunk".

It's a little more complicated than that.

The combination of alcohol and sun can lead to dehydration - even one
can cause the effect if one hasn't taken precautions by drinking
non-caffinated beverages like water or a sports drink. Even one 12
ounce can of beer can do the trick - in particular if somebody hasn't
eaten or had some water along the way.

If you are just sitting on your house deck, drinking a beer and eating
a burger, that's not going to create a problem as such.

On a boat, that's a whole different story. Movement, wind, the
accelerated dual effect of direct sun and reflected sun can dehydrate
you in short order. Add 12 ounces of beer, it's possible that you can
have or be a problem in short order.

The sad thing is you won't even know it until it happens. All of a
sudden, exhaustion sets in. A cold beer sounds gppd and the effect in
compounded.

When I was active with the local Vollies, I've seen it happen a number
of times on local lakes - I only had one beer.

Never doubted it for a second. :)

I thought Carrie Nation and Temperance Unions were ancient history.
Good thing they didn't catch one of the canoeists or kayakers smokin a
doobie.....if beer warrants a ticket those uptight puritans would
probably lynch somebody found with a joint.

Not the issue and I'm surprised that you would make such a statement.

An open container law bans an open container of alcohol in the
passenger compartment of a vehicle and/or boat. The goal is to stop
people from drinking and driving, it almost goes without saying that
an open container law should stop people from drinking WHILE driving.

And that's really the issue - drinking while driving and boating.

No wonder the entire world seems to be moving to the west coast! :-)

You ought to check our own state's Open Container law then because
it's one of the more drastic ones in terms of fines and effects.

I agree that it's questionable to allow people to drink on board, but
there's a sliding scale of risk that effectively decreases as the size
of the boat increases. Those large charter and sightseeing boats run
non-stop bars. Booze was easily available on our recent cruise ship
vacation 24 hours a day. 2400 passengers, most of them drinking at
least a little bit every day for a week straight and some almost non-
stop, and not a single incident where the safety of the vessel was
compromised or the risk of going overboard was dramatically increased.

I offer again my example from earlier in this thread. Joe Doaks has a
party of guests out for an afternoon cruise. Joe isn't drinking, and
in fact he's piloting the boat from the flybridge. Down below in the
salon, Mrs. Doaks is serving Margaritas to a couple guests of legal
drinking age. Is Joe Doaks a criminal? Should he be hauled into court
and made to answer for his behavior? In many states, certain boating
offenses cross reference to your vehicular driving license, so should
stone sober Joe's car insurance be cancelled or his premiums be
doubled because somebody else on his boat (well out of reach of the
skipper) had an alcoholic beverage?

Last year at our Seafair hydroplane races the Seattle cops did one of
these mass arrest deals. They had to rent portable jails to lock up
everybody they were processing. The difference was, the Seattle cops
where targeting people exhibiting drunken behavior (not merely people
who might be having a beer while watching the hydroplane races). The
Seattle cops also focused on underage drinkers.

I've always like the European approach to alcohol. In many societies
it's common to serve beer to school kids, and entire families often
enjoy a drink together. The difference is that becoming publicly
intoxicated is a very serious screw up, and getting caught DWI will
typically result in very serious punishment even for "first
offenders".