Steve-O’s – Crystal , MN

We went to watch some roller derby with Karen192 and Charlesworth a few weeks back and Charlesworth mentioned a bar in Crystal that has an 8am happy hour for third shirt workers (and drunks). It’s called Steve-O’s. From what he heard, 8-9am they serve three-for-ones and from 9-10am, they serve two-for-ones. We tried to do the math on how much drinking we thought we could do, but we were already into our current cups so the math wasn’t coming out very smoothly at that point.

Being unemployed, I convinced TheDoctor to go to Steve-O’s with me the very next Friday. And no, it didn’t take THAT much convincing. He DID go to Arizona State, after all. We drove out there and were the first ones in the parking lot. While waiting and enjoying a PB&J sammich (thanks, Doctor), we saw a random guy walk through the door. Guess they were open! We headed in to watch the last of the night shift cleaning crew finishing up with the mopping and cleaning (at least we know they clean this place, right?). It’s a dark bar, but not a scary dark bar. It’s got all kinds of pool tables and games (no darts that we saw) and actually is a pretty welcoming place – even if you don’t like country music on your juke box.

The barkeep, Linda (she’s awesome) welcomed us graciously and took our orders. Canned beer and rail drinks were three-for-ones. I ordered rum and cokes and TheDoctor ordered Premiums. She whipped up three of each and handed them over. It was 8:05am and we were on our way.


People started rolling in to Steve-O’s at this point. Like lots of people. People getting off work, a bunch of old guys, and some regular guys that were just there to drink. Interesting mix of people. There were, of course, some stereotypical bar drunks there. A guy with an oxygen tank sitting next to me. A guy without vocal chords using one of those voice box thingys. And a random uber-talkative baseball fan who kept trying to talk to TheDoctor. There was another guy talking about strip clubs while showing photos of his kids to his neighbor. And of course the guy that comes in every Friday and pounds two shots of J ägermeister and drinks a beer. Like I said, this place was hopping at 8:30am.

We polished off the first round and ordered a second. I think it was about 8:20am.


We listened to some people arguing and I heard one of the best lines ever come out of an old guy’s mouth. “I’d kick you in the ass but I don’t want to hurt your gerbil.” Who the hell says that?!?!?! Obviously an angry old guy says that. It was brilliant.

I polished off another round of drinks and ordered a third set. It was about this time that TheDoctor realized someone was going to have to drive us home. So he quit drinking after two rounds. He also confiscated my phone when he realized I was drunk txting people at 8:45am. Apparently, people don’t believe you when you drunk txt them that early, since I got responses back like, “You’re so silly” and “WTF are you talking about?”


And then, because TheDoctor is nothing if not generous, he ordered me a set of two more drinks when 9:00am rolled around – that’s when they switch to two-for-ones. (I would have taken a photo of these two, but my phone was missing, along with my digit functionality.) I tried with all my might to get through both of those drinks because I hate to waste alcohol... I mean diet coke. But it wasn’t going to happen. I made it through one full one and half of the other.


This brings the total number of drinks to 10.5 in the space of 1.5 hours. Not my smartest move ever, but I can cross 8am happy hour off my list. Additionally, I can cross a multitude of other things off my list that I didn’t even know were ON the list. Some of those things being: puking straight rum in TheDoctor’s driveway at 10am, passing out in TheDoctor’s chair with his dog at 10:30am, and having a fresh hangover at 2 in the afternoon. Who would have known my list of stupid things to never do again was so extensive?!?!


And while I would highly recommend hanging at Steve-O’s to anyone, especially since they do karaoke there, I probably won’t be attending 8am happy hour again. It was fun while it lasted (which was about an hour and a half), but I don’t need to prove myself to an ASU grad ever again.