Cape Breton kids likely given ‘beer’ treats by accident
Fruity beer drinks are great Halloween treats for Homer Simpson but not so much for kids.
But that’s what 12-year-old Morgan MacMullin from Florence, found in her bag the day after trick-or-treating. It wasn’t the full alcohol kind but a dealcoholized lager beer with lemonade known as Radler, which contains .5 per cent alcohol.
“I looked at it the night before and asked, who gave you beer? And she was like, ‘Mom. It’s lemonade,’” said Marlyce MacMullin, who was out trick-or-treating with her daughter.
“I didn’t think anything of it. Then she came down the next day and said, ‘Oh my God, Mom. Olivia got the same one and it’s non-alcoholic beer.”
The girls were trick-or-treating in the Meadowbrook subdivision in Sydney Mines, a place they go every year.
“I wasn’t overly concerned … it’s mostly people we know from growing up and the kids would know their kids … and it’s safe,” MacMullin said.
“I just laughed it off. I said, well you’re not drinking that. She was like, ‘Well, can I smell it’… She smelt it and said ‘That’s gross.’”
Morgan wasn’t the only child to get a can of de-alcoholized Radler, which can be bought at grocery stores.
Tanya Gracie’s 12-year-old daughter Olivia was trick-ortreating with Morgan and got one too.
“Liv comes upstairs yesterday and she’s like, ‘Mom, I think you need to smell this ... I think it’s one of those beers (her dad drinks),” Gracie said.
“It was funny. Just her face when she came upstairs, she was just, like, in disbelief.”
Gracie also thinks it wasn’t intentional.
“I really honestly think it was a mistake. Somebody obviously thought it was lemonade,” she said.
It seems this is a mistake a few people have made. One comment on the Facebook post Gracie made about the beer in the treat bag said his mother-in-law had sent his kids to school with cans of this lemon Radler a couple of weeks ago.
“I wonder how many other people got them,” MacMullin said.
Another theory Gracie has is that someone ran out of treats and “just said screw it.”
“Maybe there’s a bottle of wine in there. I better check.”