It starts with a “Ska” and ends with a “Tch” and everyone wants to drink it, because anyone who’se a man drinks Scotch. There is of course the issue that many people abhor the taste of scotch, but if I can quote myself from a drunken misadventure many years ago “Drunk people can’t say no to whiskey” (Which incidentally is gospel truth and should not be doubted)

Even if you’re not a huge Scotch drinker, this gift still has it’s allure in being techy, cool and something involving booze (the guy trifecta). They are, without further ado:

Whiskey Stones
Whiskey Stones!

The idea is actually pretty simple… you take the things, stick them in your freezer then when they’re ready you drop them in your drink and they chill it without watering it down.

This is essentially the same thing as those creepy purple and orange globes they spat out in the 90s that were supposed to do the same thing but didn’t get cold and didn’t look nearly as cool. Plus more than any other drink out there, people who have a giant boner for their scotch pride themselves on how little water they can use in their scotch. Which makes ice the perfect cheating tool, so you can bust their balls (or help them out if they’re legit) by using these thingies.

This alone is an awesome gift, but in case you’re also debating buying some scotch for someone, I’ve got the following quick click gift guide to Scotch, organized by price.

Also blended Scotches tend to be looked down on by more mid-range Scotch drinkers because they’re less pure. In their quest for the perfect Aryan scotch they’ve gotten slightly jaded, but don’t worry, there’s no ethnic cleansing slated for this holiday season. Ultimately if you’re buying Scotches for people who know their Scotches they’re going to find something snarky to say about your selection, but if you want to fake it here’s my recommendations:

Booze it up my friends:

20ish bucks a bottle:
Johnny Walker Red, J & B, Glenlivet (my personal favorite out of the bunch, as it was my training wheel Scotch)

30 bucks a bottle
Lismore – When I had a wicked case of swine flu, an amazing friend gave me this to cure it, and it worked. And it got me drunk. What’s not to like? Also:
Glenmorangie 10 Year – I’ve spent many a night loaded on this stuff, another of my friend’s favorites

40 bucks a bottle
Glenlivet 14 – I’ve heard mixed reviews from mi amigos

Balvenie Double Barrel – Another I havent had, but my hombres say it’s amazing (I like using Spanglish when talking about Scotch)

50 bucks a bottle:
Unfortunately the only time I was drinking 50 dollar scotch I got blackout drunk so I can’t really remember what I was drinking. Good luck!

At this point we’re thoroughly out of the range of Scotch’s I’d ever buy on a regular basis, so that means if I’ve had these later ones I was drinking heavily at the time so certainly have no frame of reference for what these actually taste like. As such, take my word for it that if you buy a dude one of the following Scotch’s he’s obligated to bone you when and where you want, and if he doesn’t, we’ll find him and take his Man Card.

150 Bucks a bottle:
Macallan 18 – My scotch swilling buddies swear by this

160 bucks a bottle:
Johnny Walker Blue – This isn’t one of those things that’s expensive cause it’s rare.

So there you have it, from cheapish to expensivish, Scotch on the Rocks (literally) for December 2nd. Get shopping folks!

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Posted by admin - 03/12/09 - 0 comments

 

So I figure with the holiday of your choice coming up soon, I’d type up a possible “dude” gift each day, to help those of you with a Significant Other, Child, Parent or Hot Neighbor Kid, with a few inches of meat dangling between their legs, who you’re trying to butter up and get to love you by throwing money at them in the form of gifts.

As I am pretty much the world’s worst gift purchaser for women, I figured I’d spend a little time helping the fairer sex pick out some gifts for the big hairy smellball in your life.  And so without further ado, here’s gift #1, and let me tell you.  It’s Badass.

No really… it’s a book called Badass by Ben Thompson and you can just take my fucking word for it and buy it with this link:

Oh, you’re not convinced?  You require convincing because you are a stupid person who doesn’t do as they’re told?  Fine… first of all this book has a chick, and a dude with an axe on the cover.   That alone should make you want to buy it, but if not I bought 2 copies of it when I saw it because I knew it was so awesome I’d have to give away two of them.

Secondly, this book is basically a gathering of a bunch of awesome things from the “Badass of the Week” website.  If you’re not familiar feel free to go enlighten yourself presently at Badass of the Week or just read the following mercilessly stolen from there.  You’ve maybe seen 300?  Then you’re probably familiar with the following story:

“Once upon a time there was this place called Sparta, where everyone who lived there was a total badass.  They were so badass that whenever one of their citizens said some stupid bullshit like, “Hey man Democracy kicks ass… I like reading books, petting small puppies and not violently killing people with pointy sticks that are on fire”, they just shipped his pansy ass off to Athens or Thessaly or Bill’s Gay Land to philosophize about the nature of the soul, pick fresh daisies and have sex with men.  Sparta was one of the hardest cities ever built;  It’s men were all trained from birth to be highly-disciplined explosive killing machines of death who didn’t fuck around and it’s women were taught to raise strong children and encourage their husbands to die honorably in battle.  In fact, all citizens were required to be able to break at least three wooden boards with their foreheads, another four with a well-placed judo chop and punch bullets out of mid-air with their bare hands.  Anyone who failed this test was sent into exile.

Well one day some fucking jackass named Emperor Xerxes I of Persia got all pissed off at how awesome Sparta was so he sent a bunch of soldiers to invade it and burn all of Greece to the ground so that he could make Persia the most badass civilization in the known world.  Well obviously this didn’t sit well with the Greeks.  They hate it when fuckers burn down their cities.

Anyways, Xerxes’ army of about 200,000 dudes created an impractically large pontoon bridge across the Hellespont and arrived in Greece in 480 BC with the intention of kicking everyones ass and possibly even taking names while doing so.  However, in order to get through the countryside and sack Athens, they needed to pass through a hugeass mountain pass known as Thermopylae.  The Spartans knew this, and they had every intention of using this to their advantage.

The Spartan King Leonidas I hand-selected a force of 300 of the most hardcore balls-out warriors in Sparta to defend the pass at Thermopylae.  Knowing that it was pretty much a suicide mission, all the men he chose to accompany him had sons that were old enough to take over as head of their families.  When Leonidas’ wife was like, “what shall I do while you’re gone?”, Leonidas was just tipped his helmet and said, “Marry a good man, and have good children”, before puffing on his cigar and riding out into the sunset Clint Eastwood-style.

The Spartans arrived at the pass along with a force of about 4,000 other Greek troops.  The Spartans were like “get out of here, losers” and sent the other troops home to organize the defense of Athens while the Spartans stretched out, did some jumping jacks and then oiled themselves up like professional wrestlers.  The other Greeks got the fuck out of there, except for a contingent of about 600 Thespian citizen-soldiers who may not have been hard as hell, but were totally brave as shit.

Xerxes showed up and was like, “what the fuck is this shit?”.  He opened a parlay with the Spartan King.

Xerxes: What the fuck is this shit?

Leonidas: Eat me.

Xerxes: There are 200,000 dudes here and you’ve only got 300 pussies guarding this pass.  You’re so fucked.  Just lay down your weapons.

Leonidas: Why don’t you come and get them, bitch?  We’ll see who’s a pussy when I shove all 200,000 of those knuckleheads up your ass.

Xerxes: Fuck you.

Leonidas: Good one, fag.  I’ve heard better insults from retards.

Xerxes: That’s it.

Xerxes got totally pissed and assaulted the Greek defenses but the Persian light infantry was ill-equipped and way too lame to dislodge the battle-hardened Spartan warriors.  They were torn to shreds by huge spears of the Greek phalanx and then put into a huge water balloon launcher and catapulted into the Aegean Sea.  Xerxes finally ordered the light infantry to pull back and moved his archers to the front to fire a couple of volleys at the Greeks.  One Spartan remarked that it was all good because there were so many arrows it was like they got to fight in the shade for a while.  Seeing this was unsuccessful as well Xerxes brought in his bodyguard contingent of 10,000 Immortals, an elite unit in his army that was world-renowned for its ass kicking skills.  The Spartans and Immortals clashed in fierce combat, and Xerxes could not believe it when he saw his most disciplined and experienced troops getting seriously fucked up by Leonidas’ men.

At the end of the second day of battle, the Greeks still held the pass and the Persians had lost a shitload of soldiers.  Unfortunately for King Leonidas, a Greek traitor defected to the Persians and told Emperor Xerxes about a secret way around the mountain pass.  During the night, Xerxes sent what remained of his Immortals around to the other side of the pass and when the Spartans got ready to fight in the morning they noticed that there were now Persians on both sides of them.

Xerxes: Alright, bro.  Nice try, but now you’re toast.

Leonidas: Come on down here then.  I’ve got a present for you.

Xerxes: Dude, you have no chance to survive.  Just give up.

Leonidas: I’ve got a better idea.  How about you shut the fuck up and bite my dick?  That sound like a good plan?

So the Persian forces assaulted the Greeks from both sides.  The Greeks held out for far longer than they should have, throwing themselves against the onslaught and battling with whatever they had — spears, swords, fists, teeth, sticks, knees to the crotch… you name it.  Eventually the last of the 300 Spartans fell to the Persian army as they tried to defend the body of their fallen King.  The Persians found the body of Leonidas I, beheaded it and crucified his body outside the pass.

It takes a special kind of person to volunteer for a suicide mission and battle to the end against impossible odds.  Leonidas found three hundred men willing to do just that.  They did not fail the honor of their city or their people, willingly and unflinchingly facing an entire army to defend their homeland.  The 300 Spartans (and 600 Thespians) held the mountain pass against impossible odds, being slain to the man but inflicting an estimated 30,000 casualties on the Persian army’s most capable units.  They dealt a serious blow to Xerxes’ forces and managed to hold back the Persian advance long enough for the Greeks in Athens to prepare for a major military engagement at Salamis, where they would crush the Persian navy and effectively end the invasion of Greece.”

Whether you know someone in your life who needs a serious kick to the stomach to make their balls drop, or if you just know someone who’se badass enough that their name deserves to grace the cover of Badass 2: “It’s the one that says badass motherfucker on it” then this is the book for you.

And even if you don’t buy this book for someone… at least go check out badass of the week and learn how you too can grow a pair.

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Posted by admin - 01/12/09 - 0 comments

 

So I watched the movie Surrogates and was totally underwhelmed.  Normally I’m pretty easy to please when it comes to movies, and it’s way easier to destroy than create so I thought I’d give up my long silence on here by talking for a minute about this craptastrophy.  I’ll try to avoid spoilers but if you’re really dead set on not having your ‘moviegoing experience ruined’… well don’t see the movie.

The premise is pretty simple.  People go onto the internet to control robot versions of themselves in the real world.  95% of people use these robots.  Bruce Willis is on the FBI, and investigates a crime involving someone dying while plugged into the internet.

Ostensibly this is all fine.  The most immediate problem however is a more glaring one.  The robots are all made by James Cromwell.  He’s the kindly old man who invents robot technology that ultimately goes awry.  You might remember him from 24 (as Jack Bauer’s dad), LA Confidential and Babe… you might also remember him from I, Robot, in which he plays the kindly old man who invents robot technology that ultimately goes awry.  Allow me to ask frankly… how the fuck do you get type cast into THAT specific of a roll?

James Cromwell Conquering the World

This robot is really good at making bacon.

He’s fairly believably in the roll, which makes sense since James Cromwell was also born roughly 80 years old, and hasn’t aged since.  (Much like a robot)

The basic idea of a science fiction story is pretty simple.  You come up with a neat concept “People log onto the internet and live out their fantasy lives as someone else”.  Then you think of the social implications and ramifications of that, and then build a story.  That’s the forumla.

Surrogates however looks like it was something drunkenly scrawled on a bar napkin that somehow made it into a movie.  One of the first assertions is “Due to surrogate technology, prejudice has gone away”.  Firstly, this doesn’t play a roll at all in the movie, and secondly if anything the internet is one of the strongest strongholds of racism in the universe.  I’ve heard more racial slurs hurled at me within 5 minutes of signing into Call of Duty that I have in my entire life walking around in meatspace.  Giving someone a robotic version of them to go out into the world and act irresponsibly is, in no conceivable way, actually going to make less crime or discrimination in the world.

The whole movie is like someone standing on a rock shouting angrily in the direction of Second Life because his wife won’t log out and give him the time of day cause she’s busy blowing a half-man half-unicorn online.  Which brings up another point.  In the movie everyone is pristine and perfect looking, with only one person in the movie being ‘weird’ and they were just blue.  If you could have a robot look like anything, where are my sexy devil or bunny eared chicks.  Have a little imagination with your robot porn!

((Man I don’t know why I never posted this, it’s been sitting in my Drafts folder for weeks… Enjoy!  And don’t go see Surrogates!))

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Posted by admin - 01/12/09 - 0 comments

 

People always ask me “What kind of music do you like to listen to?”.  And when I tell them “Everything” it’s totally true.  I love Southern Rock, Showtunes, Classical Music, Gangster Rap, the Blues, some Gospel, some Country, and a fair share of alt/indy rock and trip-hop.

But there’s really only one genre of music that makes me stop what I’m doing and really talks to me down in my soul.  Today that music is going to be voiced to you by Propaghandi.   Here’s a music link for you to listen to while you continue reading.

Rock For Sustainable Capitalism

One of the reasons I love punk music is if you don’t read too far into what people are really saying, the core heart and soul of the music is so desperate.  This song still has it’s moments more in the tone of the song itself, but from here to Fifteen, Rancid, and Against Me! There’s a certain type of punk rock music where people are screaming and pleading for everyone to wake up out of their shells.  It’s the Crimethinc document “Join the Resistance: Fall in Love” (which is elsewhere in this blog).  Even a song that’s just a comment on the music itself (like Rock for Sustainable Capitalism) is in this case so bitter, sardonic and despondent at times that it really resonates home (not that I’m bitter, sardonic or despondent).  Anyways random blogging about music.  I’ll write more about my life when I come up for air again.

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Posted by admin - 24/06/09 - 0 comments

 

I was looking through my iPhone at my lists of bits and I found a good bit of writing titled “No one writes truthful personal ads”.  In case you were wondering what I look for in a woman it goes something like this:

“Wanted: Someone who can comfort the cold shivering terror I feel at the thought of a world where there is no afterlife and every moment that passes is one second closer to death that we’ll never get back.  Someone who, ideally, will be ok knowing that there are other women I still love desperately but as I can’t have them… Need someone to raise me out of this soul crushing depression.  Also ideally someone hotter than me with big tits”

Though to be fair.  I don’t feel all that depressed in generally anymore :)

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Posted by admin - 25/05/09 - 0 comments

 

I just started up a new idea/theme/journey. Check it out at www.ikillit.com

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Posted by admin - 25/05/09 - 0 comments

 

I just started up a new idea/theme/journey. Check it out at www.ikillit.com

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Posted by admin - 25/05/09 - 0 comments

 

I realized last night that I’ve never, regularly, slept on a bed my size.  Like, in my life.  The closest I’ve come was 2 years ago when I was sleeping on a double.  The rest of my life has been spent sleeping on couches, backseats, aerobeds, twin beds and fouton mattresses.

I don’t know how that happened, but maybe one of these days I should try out a properly sized bed for an extended period of time.

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Posted by admin - 24/05/09 - 0 comments

 

This post is neither a cry for help, nor particularly uplifting.  It’s just some brutal honesty about my life that I put to paper to try to make sense out of in my head.  I think it worked to some degree.  Feel free to skip this one.

There are moments.  They come when I sit in a hotel room.  Far away from anyone or anything I know.  They don’t come at the normal hours, but they come later.  When the TV is off, the distractions distant, but the mind still wheeling along too fast to apply the brakes and crash into sleep.  Instead I lay in this awful place with this feeling gripping my heart.  It starts, first, when I think on my life.  My mind wanders first to what I’ve accomplished and I begin to cut life into segments.  It’s something I’ve always done to attempt to handle a task more effectively.  If I had to run 10 laps during football, I would say in my mind.  When I have run 5 laps.  I’m halfway done.  And when I run 2 laps, I’m halfway to that point.  And so as you cross continual smaller goals you draw nearer the final goal.  but I find myself doing this with my life.  Partitioning off how much I’ve lived and how much I have left to live.  When I think of my life ending in a quiet snuff, with nothing continuing after a sortof cold terror wells up inside of me and I can’t sleep.  I can’t do much of anything, because my mind becomes more alert and awake the more I think about it.  A self fulfilling prophecy if ever there was one.
And then I try to think of ways to stop thinking of this.  And in the end the only distraction that works is companionship.  The sound of someone’s voice or the solace in their arms.  It’s why I seek so desperately to find love.  As wonderful an emotion as that is, all the more it drives away those cold, dark and grasping feelings of condemnation.  Like a cow in line at the butcher’s suddenly realizing the futility of its course.  Far beyond the point of being able to alter its destiny.  The only other option is a sooner exit.  And so when I finally meet someone who awakens happiness and hope within me, it is a miracle.  I can find these moments of terorr pass so quickly, because as the feeling of dread wells up inside me, quick on its heels floods a feeling of warmth and beauty.  Certainly I may die and have nothing thereafter.  Just a cold bleak emptyness.  But this is an inevitable fact.   Even as I write this I feel the same feelings.  The skin on my cheeks begins to prickle like ice.  My heart feels heavy in my chest, and I become acutely aware of my breathing.  When I actually type out the words of what it feels like it seems so simple and unfrightening.  But when it happens it’s all I can do to keep my sanity.  And right now I don’t have someone to find solace in.  Only the memories of them, and the thoughts of them leaving, or my leaving them.  And its in these quiet moments in the hotel where I find myself either thinking of death, or pining back for more life.  In either situation I just find myself… wanting.
The end result of course is a sort of mild desperation when it comes to meeting people.  Whether it’s friends or loved ones, it feels like the only thing that staves off the mounting bouts of breathless uncomfortableness is contact.  An instant message, phone call or just hearing someone laugh.  It creates a legacy.  This is the great realization that I’ve come to that keeps me running, and it’s why I don’t get stressed at life’s curveballs anymore.  Your race is from point A, to point B.  You can’t alter your trajectory no matter how much you flail your arms and scream.  In fact, from the moment you’re in a constant battle to not die.  You can give up at any point, and that’s it.  So I had to look for something else.  What’s the difference?  If we’re all just these particles cascading randomly through the largest fishbowl ever.  Who cares?  The answer is, I suppose, no one.  So then the goal should be, in my opinion, to enjoy the freefall as much as possible.  And if you reach a point where you can’t enjoy it anymore, then rather than just give up, why not do what you can to make someone else’s meaningless freefall that much more entertaining?  It doesn’t cost you anything.  It’s a zero sum argument.  The answer at the same is still the end.  No matter how many times you flip the coin eventually it comes up tails.  And when it does, nothing else matters.  You’re done.  But other people are still flipping.  It won’t change your life any whether or not they continue to do so, but the chaos of all those spinning coins is far more interesting to me than the barren order of when they all stop, and the inert matter sifts itself away into nothingness.

The feeling is coming back.  I need to go find a way to shake my mind off of things and think more meaningless thoughts.

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Posted by admin - 20/05/09 - 0 comments

 

So after like a year of not having a car or any real keys, the day is finally upon us.  I now have a big ass Cadillac.  I’m still on the prowl for good names for it, but so far I’m totally happy with the purchase.  Ask me again in 24 hours though… who knows by then I might be wanting to claw out my eyes from issues I’m having.  I need to go to the DMV sometime in the near future and see about actually transfering the title… I suppose there’s a chance right now that I get pulled over by the cops at gunpoint for driving a stolen car.  And I need to check in the trunk for body parts, but so far, so good!

Ghost-Name the Whip

Ghost-Name the Whip

Name Ideas?

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Posted by admin - 01/05/09 - 3 comments