Folks, I very much appreciate your patience and strong feedback. I’ll try to get to some of your comments soon. For now, a little more news on Anheuser-Busch’s big day in New Jersey, in which shareholders voted strongly in favor of InBev’s takeover.

We caught up with Anheuser-Busch chairman Pat Stokes and chief financial officer Randy Baker when the meeting broke up. Excerpts of the brief chat:

Baker said the deal has “a high certainty of closing.” No news there, since both A-B and InBev have been saying that for months. But then someone piped up and asked what would happen if “they” (presumably InBev or its big lending banks) get downgraded. Baker said that is “unexpected.” He said the companies are still projecting a closing day before the end of the year. If approvals come down from regulators, the closing could be just a few days after, he said.

What about raw feelings in St. Louis, or frustrations among beer drinkers who wanted Anheuser-Busch to stay “American”?

Stokes said it “will be up to the new leadership to forge the relationship with the St. Louis community.” On whether a significant number of drinkers would move away from Anheuser-Busch because of the sale, he said probably not. The beer industry is “globalized to a large degree,” he said, noting the combinations of Molson Coors (Canadian and American) and SABMiller (South African and America). “This is no longer a situation where you have just one country alone,” he said.