I’ll preface this post by saying “Don’t judge me”. No seriously, don’t judge. I take my “me time” wherever and whenever I can get it, whether it’s a quick lunch at Barnes & Noble with the laptop, or a coffee at Panera with the tablet, or as in this case, a single beer at Chili’s while my son is doing a 45 minute karate class next door.

I sit down, knowing (a) I only have 40 minutes, and (b) I can only have one beer since I’m the epitome of the responsible driver, and order my usual (again don’t judge), a pint of Stella Artois, draft. The bartender smiles sadly and says, “sorry, the manager replaced the Stella tap with Yuengling a couple of weeks ago.”

Jaw. Drops. Seriously? And before I get a flood of “hey, I like Yuengling” comments, I’ll cut you off: I don’t. At all. And I’m a beer snob. A crisp, clear, cold pint of Stella is hard to match, and Yuengling falls well short, in my opinion.

What does a socially-responsible person do? Tweet, of course:

Hrm. Some back-office manager at my local Chili’s decided to replace Stella Artois draft with Yuengling. Now how am I supposed to write??

— Steve Umstead (@SteveUmstead) January 9, 2013

What happens next is the unusual part. I get an email the next day via my site from the New York-based marketing company that represents Stella Artois in the US, saying “Stella Artois saw your tweet about replacing it at Chili’s, and wanted to send you something to fuel your creativity.”

Wha? I immediately email back with a “Stop it, seriously?” only to get a “Yes, seriously” right back. So stalking aside, I send back my address, thinking I’d get a logo coaster or two…but no. Next day UPS:

Which turns out to be 12 bottles of Stella Artois:

Fueling creativity indeed. A big thanks to Stella Artois to being aware, the HL Group for saying hello, and Chili’s for screwing up in the first place.

I think these will get me through a few new chapters. Or one. Mostly.