I got carded at the grocery when I was 47. The kid looked at my drivers license and pulled out a calculator
I still get carded. 41. I assume at this point that they card everyone when I get carded.
Sometime of the liquor store systems around here make you swipe ID.
You don’t look underaged to me either. I was looking foward to not getting carded anymore, but as **Dangerosa ** says, they card everyone around her now, so that time will probably never come.
Never been “carded”. I’ve always looked older than I am. One time in Sydney’s Chinatown, some sixteen year-olds asked me to buy booze for them. I said no - I was THIRTEEN.
I’m huge, and I’ve been scary and fully bearded all my adult life. Got rid of the beard recently, but I’m approaching middle age, getting lots of grey, and still wondering what being carded feels like.
I am rarely in situations where I would be carded - they don’t card in yarn stores after all, but recently I was carded twice. Once was in a TGIFridays and another was at the door of a bar where my husband’s band was playing. The lady at the door was scanning my license for a birthdate for like 30 seconds. Meanwhile, I am 44 and really look no less than 40 on a good day. I even said, “Come on, you looked at my license and you looked at my face. Don’t you think it’s enough?” I said it in a pleasant tone and she didn’t seem to mind, but didn’t let me go on till she found that date.
I think I’ve been carded less than 10 times in my life. I turned 18 in 1975 and had been hanging out in bars for about two years by then. After I turned 18, I got carded for the first time by a bar manager showing the new bartender what he expected… when he saw my age, all I got were raised eyebrows because he knew I’d been a regular for a year and a half or so… 
Those of you who don’t get carded are lucky. I still get carded for everything, and I’m 25. The last time I bought an R-rated movie at Wal-Mart, I got carded. The last time I bought superglue I got carded. Every single time I buy cigarettes, I get carded. Last week was the first time I ever ordered a beer in a restaurant and did not get carded. I was pretty happy about it until later on when it turned out that the waiter was friends with the people I was eating with, and that was the only reason he didn’t card me.
I also get a lot of people who want to argue with me or refuse to sell because they think I have a fake ID. My driver’s license is about a year old, in very good condition (I know having a beat-up/torn/scratched ID makes some folks suspicious that it might’ve been tampered with), and the photo looks exactly like me. Yet they don’t believe that I’m the age it says on my gov’t ID. Drives me batty when I have to reel off the DOB/address/zipcode/astrological sign. I just want my pack of Camel Lights, dammit!
I guess it’s flattering that people think I look younger and all, but for me, young != attractive, and it’s a minor irritation to have to fish out my ID to buy stuff I get all the time. I can’t wait until I get some wrinkles and gray hairs.
Me, neither. I’m 47, and balding…
Having also been in that vehicle and at that Dopefest…I would just like to say that I’m 32 and I was carded. With the uncarded STG sitting at the same table. Neener neener.
Sweet young lady like you? You could knock me over with a feather! I think those clerks have lost their marbles taking chances like that. I hope they don’t let all the pretty girls like you get by without carding them.
And that was before seeing your photo. You smile just warms my heart.
Interesting. I don’t think I was. That destroys my theory that no one at that table was carded. My experience has been that groups of people who aren’t all the same age are very unlikely to be carded, just because it seems less suspicious. If I go out with a bunch of my 20-something buddies, the younger-looking ones will often get carded. If I go out with a mix of older and younger friends, we’re not likely to get carded at all, unless it’s the kind of place that cards every single person walking through the door.
I’m 26. I thought the rule for most places was ‘card anyone who looks under 35.’ My mom insists I could pass for 16; I really doubt it, but I don’t think I look my age either (on the other hand, I’m terrible at guessing ages, so what do I know?)
I dunno, the two times I bought booze at my usual grocery store, the cashier was a girl my age-ish, so maybe she figured I was fine. And, of course, I wasn’t just buying booze; I was buying groceries. And not acting nervous at all. (I’m buying groceries, I’m tired and I just want to get home and away from people.)
I don’t get carded because I don’t go places/do things where they card people. But last fall, after my grandmother’s funeral, our family decided to “honor” my grandmother by going to a nearby casino for dinner. (Grandma would have been horrified–she strongly disapproved of gambling, and would not eat at the nearby casinos.)
Anyway, the group of us unloaded from the van and strolled casually to the door, entering in groups of one and two. And then the early entrants stopped, because we started to realize that my brother and his wife were not keeping up. My sister-in-law had been stopped and asked for ID, which she couldn’t provide because she’d left her purse at the hotel, because she’d known she wasn’t paying for dinner and knew that if she decided to buy something later, she’d be able to get money from my brother. She was 28? Something like that.
Eventually, she was permitted to come in, provided she wore a tag on her wrist that announced that she was underage and not to be gambling, and my brother was given a list of rules for their behavior. The rules were kind of funny, mostly because they were written in a way which would be more appropriate for a parent/child situation than a husband/wife one. If I recall correctly, one had to be at least 12 to enter the casino, and at least 20 to gamble.
But it did make me wonder if we’d walked in as a group of 7 mixed aged adults, rather than the two of them appearing to be a couple with her being quite short and very young looking, whether anyone would have been carded, or if the carding might have included my brother and I (both of whom did have ID on us).
Incidentally, the younger members of our group had never been to a casino before while the older ones had, for dining purposes, so the younger ones had no reason to think about being carded, and the older ones hadn’t realized that age was being checked.
Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. I know I was recently because the cashier (this was a grocery store) told me they’d had a big sting operation and a bunch of people got caught, so their new policy was card if you think they’re under 40. I was feeling all “Woohoo!” about getting carded until she told me that, since I’m 32, but whatever.
Most establishments by me (suburban Chicago) post signs that they card everyone who looks like they are under 40. I am upset when I am not carded - I am 36, but look young for my age (or so I am told.) When I am alone, I always get carded, but when I am with my husband, I am often not - he is 37, but has lots of gray hair at the temples.
snort chuckle cough Oh, please tell me this is a joke. Please? It sounds like a straight line.
Also, my dad was carded when buying cigarettes a few years ago, much to his amazement. He was 44 at the time, went gray early, and looks quite rough around the edges. He says all he could do was a confused double take and just stare at the cashier, who smiled and said, all chipper, “I’m sorry, but our policy is to check ID for all tobacco and alcohol purchases!” He tells the story with something approaching wounded pride.
I think I’ve been carded once since I was 14, and that was in a place that had a policy of carding everyone. My older brother, on the other hand, got carded regularly for years–even growing a beard didn’t entirely stop it, until the beard started going gray.
Well clearly they wouldn’t card you when you’re made up like the second picture. Who cards a goddess?!
As for myself, I don’t usually get carded, not with my beard-face, although it’s even more hobo-esque now. Forgot to mention I’m 24.
I usually don’t like beards, but yours suits you, Auto. And thanks for the compliment. :o
Someone upthread mentioned how whether being carded or not depends on the people you’re with, which I think is quite true - I get carded often if I’m with The Guy, who looks younger than I do, or with my best friend, who also looks quite young, but not when I’m with a bigger group.