I moved into Park Slope in the summer of 1997, during the ass end of when the area was still kind of sketchy. There were loads of dodgy elements at the time, but the memory that's bringing a smile to my face comes from when I was still drinking way too much beer on a daily basis (which led to me weighing around 270 pounds; these days I am about sixty pounds lighter).
There was one afternoon where I realized my fridge had no beer, so I went to a now-defunct bodega to stock up. I was a regular at the place and the owner/shopkeeper knew me on sight. I went to the cooler and picked up a case of Budweiser (not great, but cheap and it got me where I wanted to go), but when I went to the counter to pay, the owner was nowhere to be found. Instead the counter was manned by his adorable daughter, who was all of maybe six years old. I waited for her dad to return but something held him up, so, being quite aware of exactly how much a case of bud cost, I gave the little girl exact change, which she put away into the cash register like a pro, and then I departed. Yes, I bought a case of beer from a six-year-old girl. That was how it was back then. Today, in modern boujee Park Slope, one of the most desired neighborhoods to live in in NYC, that would be unthinkable.
Side note: Though I swilled Bud with abandon from high school through age 42, I bet if I tried to drink one now I would spit it out in disgust. Back then I had no palate. I simply wanted to numb myself with what was decent enough to afford in bulk, and Budweiser was my cheap stuff of choice. That said, if I could have afforded sixers or cases of it in bulk, my beer of choice would have been either Grolsch or Bass ale.
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