Tag: Misc

Saint Patrick’s Day is one of those “not-really-a-holiday” holidays. It’s like Flag Day. You don’t get the day off, the malls are open, the mail is delivered, and street parking isn’t free. It’s like, um, a normal Monday…thru Friday.

Although, if you get smashed enough on Saint Patrick’s Day, you can call in sick the next day, which is sort of like a real holiday, except with aspirin and dry heaves.

Despite Saint Patrick’s Day being a “not-really-a-holiday” holiday, there are a lot of great things about it, like you don’t need to buy gifts for anyone, don’t need to attend dysfunctional family dinners, don’t need to spend $100 on flowers, don’t need to buy some lame greeting card, and hookers look a lot better, due to beer goggles.

Of course, Saint Patrick’s Day is the best day to get drunk, because alcohol is cheap, plentiful, and sometimes green.

So what’s the second best day to get drunk?

Any other day.

So in honor of Saint Patrick’s Day and the possibility that I might not have a review for you tomorrow due to a hangover, I wrote a poem about Saint Patrick’s Day. (No, I did not write it drunk) It goes a little something like this:

The Saint Patrick’s Day Poem

Top of the morning to you all and Happy Saint Patrick’s Day.
I hope you’re dressed in green, or you’ll get pinched right away.
It’s time to get rowdy and it’s time to get drunk.
You should start in the morning, when things are usually rough.
Forget the wine, champagne, light and nonalcoholic beer.
Hard liquor and real beer is essential for this time of year.
So get yourself a drink, or maybe two, three, four or five.
Make sure you have a designated driver to get you home alive.
So head to the nearest bar and let the drinking begin.
Start yourself off with something like a tonic and gin.
Chug a screwdriver because you need your OJ in the morning.
Don’t drink with an empty stomach, this is just a warning.
Have a few glasses of Guinness, which is blacker than coal.
Or have a shot of whiskey, if getting drunk is your goal.
If you’re drunk by now, consider yourself a lightweight.
If not, have some more and see how much you can take.

Have a drink with your friends Jack Daniels and Jim Beam,
and remember it’s illegal to buy liquor for a teen.
Get a margarita if that’s what you really like.
Get one the size of a kiddie pool, you can drink it all night.
Order a Scotch and make sure it’s on the rocks.
Too much alcohol makes an ulgy person look like a fox.
Tank a few bottles of Foster’s without any fear,
and remember that Foster’s is Australian for beer.
Now if you’re Irish, you’re probably still quite sober yet,
but if you’re Asian, you’re probably redder than an apple can get.

Take a shot of a German Death and a Harley Davidson.
They both go down really hard like NyQuil medicine.
Have a shot of tequila with a wedge of lime and some salt.
If you swallow the worm it’s really your own drunken fault.
Sip on a really dry martini with an olive in a glass.
Have it shaken not stirred, like James Bond, a man with class.
To wash that all down order yourself a vodka and tonic,
and if you start seeing leprechauns, consider yourself an alcoholic.
Well whether you’re passed out, throwing up, or okay.
I wish you all a safe, fun, and happy Saint Patrick’s Day.

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Item: Saint Patrick’s Day
Purchase Price: FREE (alcohol not included)
Rating: 3 out of 5
Pros: Don’t need to buy gifts for anyone. Mail is still delivered. Green beer. Hookers look better.
Cons: Don’t get the day off. Possible beer goggle situations. Getting pinched for not wearing green.

I love living on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, but living here has its share of disadvantages.

For example, I can’t take long road trips here. On the mainland, you can drive to another state or another country and see something different. For example, if you live in California, you can drive to Las Vegas to go gambling at the ungodly hour of 4 a.m. or drive to Mexico to get drunk off of cheap tequila and experience Montezuma’s Revenge because you were so drunk that you actually drank water from Mexico.

Here on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, you can’t drive very far, unless you enjoy going around and around in huge circles.

Another disadvantage is getting sand trapped in places you don’t want sand to be. I’m pretty sure this is not a problem for people in such states as Montana, Oklahoma, and either of the Dakotas. Chafing that involves sand is never good, except when you’re planning to repaint something.

Finally, there aren’t any Red Circle Boutiques here. We’ve got three World Dominating Superstore Behemoths and two “The ‘K’ Stands For Krap” Superstores, but no Red Circle Boutiques.

Unfortunately, I’m not expecting one to open up soon because I think it’s impossible to build a Red Circle Boutique here on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, because if someone does, this rock will sink like Atlantis.

The reason why I’d like to have a Red Circle Boutique on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean is because I’d have easy access to Method cleaning products. There aren’t any places here that sell them. Sure, I could buy them online, but I’m too much of a cheap bastard to pay for shipping.

Fortunately, friend/Impulsive Buy junkie Akiko bought some Method products for me while on a trip to the Dirty South (Do the kids still call it the “Dirty South?”). Actually, she only bought me the Method hand soap, which I reviewed a few months back.

(Editor’s Note: Oops, actually, Akiko also bought me Method dishwashing detergent and bathroom cleaner. I forgot about them in the closet. You know what they say, “Out of sight, out of mind.” I suck as a friend.)

Recently, Akiko gave me her slightly used bottle of Method Laundry Concentrated Detergent. She gave it to me because she didn’t care much for the overwhelming Morning Bloom scent. Although, I have my suspicions that she gave me the bottle because she wanted to drop the hint that I need to wash my clothes more often instead of recycling my worn clothes out of my laundry basket.

Hey, I just follow the two rules of recycling worn clothes:

1. If it doesn’t have stains, out of the washer it remains.
2. If worn clothes has no smell, no one else will be able to tell.

One of the first things I liked about the Method detergent was the fact it’s concentrated. With only 32 ounces of detergent, it’s much lighter than the smallest container offered by other liquid detergent brands, which usually contain about 100 ounces. This makes a big difference because I’m out of shape, or more specifically, I’m weak, like Popeye without spinach and Screech from Saved by the Bell.

Since it’s concentrated, the Method detergent can still deliver the same amount of laundry loads as the other brands’ 100-ounce containers, which turns out to be about 32 loads of laundry.

One of the neatest things about the bottle is that it has a self-measuring cap. Just flip the cap lid, squeeze the bottle, measure the amount of detergent, and then pour. (To see a clip of the self-measuring cap in action, just click the picture on the right. Quicktime format – 1 MB)

I tried to test its stain fighting power, but nowadays I hardly stain my clothes, since I don’t referee bikini mud wrestling anymore.

As for the Morning Bloom scent, I didn’t find it overwhelming, like Akiko did. I thought it was a pleasant smell and smelled better than the big-name brand stuff I usually use, but it definitely didn’t smell morning-ish. Of course, my mornings usually smell like “Oh crap, I have to get up.”

Overall, I liked the Method detergent, especially the self-measuring cap. Maybe I’ll start washing my clothes more often, just so that I can play with the self-measuring cap.

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Item: Method Laundry Concentrated Detergent
Purchase Price: $8.00
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Kick ass self-measuring cap. Concentrated. Nice scent. Biodegradable.
Cons: Scent maybe overwhelming for some. No Red Circle Boutiques on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Lame road trips. Sand in my crack.

Oh yeah, baby! A Wheaties pill!

I knew this day would come, but I never expected it so soon. Finally, thanks to science, someone has figured out a way to condense a whole bowl of cereal into the form of a pill. It’s a frickin’ meal-in-a-pill.

It’s a frickin’ scientific breakthrough!

No need for milk, a bowl, a spoon, or a bib. No more soggy flakes. No need to recycle bowls and spoons out of the kitchen sink, because you’re too lazy to wash them. No more wasted cereal because you poured into the bowl milk that expired a week ago.

I can finally bypass the bland taste of Wheaties, but still get all the vitamins and minerals.

Oh, wait…

(Actually reads label)

Dammit! This isn’t a scientific breakthrough. It’s just a regular multivitamin, except it has the word “Wheaties” on it. Maybe I should start reading the labels on drugs before I buy them or stop taking generic NyQuil.

Damn you, generic NyQuil!

Anyway, now that I know the Wheaties Multivitamin isn’t a meal-in-a-pill, I have a lot of questions about it and I’m sure you have a lot of the same questions. So below are my attempts to answer some of those questions.

Question 1: Does it taste like Wheaties?

Answer 1: No, they taste as bitter as any multivitamin, but they kind of smell like Wheaties.

Question 2: Do they get soggy in milk as quickly as Wheaties?

Answer 2: No, they are in tablet form, so I’m going to assume they stay harder than an old man who has had one too many Levitras.

Question 3: In Answer 2, don’t you think it would’ve been better to use Viagra, instead of Levitra, since it’s a name more people recognize.

Answer 3: I think in the context of the sentence, readers will know that Levitra is a boner pill.

Question 4: Will eating Wheaties or taking Wheaties Multivitamins really help me become Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, or a gold-medal winning Olympic athlete?

Answer 4: No. Eating any cereal does not turn people into famous athletes, even if you eat them with steroids.

Question 5: What kind of vitamins and minerals come with each tablet?

Answer 5: I could list them here, but the list is so long and full of words that I don’t know how to spell or pronounce that I would literally blow my mind if I tried, and no amount of generic NyQuil will fix that.

Question 6: What makes these Wheaties Multivitamins different than other multivitamins?

Answer 6: Um, they have the word “Wheaties” etched in each tablet and they’re frickin’ huge. Oh, plus they have Lutein, Lycopene, Green Tea Extract, and Black Pepper Extract. Yes, I said Black Pepper Extract.

Question 7: Do you think my picture will ever be on a box of Wheaties or Wheaties Multivitamin?

Answer 7: If you work hard enough, stay in school, and don’t take drugs, your chances will be slightly better than someone who is lazy, got kicked out of school, and smokes the pipe everyday.

In other words, no way.

Item: Wheaties Multivitamin
Purchase Price: $5.52
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Smells like Wheaties, which I think is a good thing. Chock full of healthy stuff I can’t spell or pronounce. Stays hard in milk.
Cons: Typical multivitamin. Not the scientific breakthrough I originally thought it was.

(Editor’s Note: It’s Request Week here at the Impulsive Buy. Over the past month or so, several readers have asked us to review certain products. Being the friendly quasi-product review blog that we are, we were happy to oblige. So this week we will be reviewing products that you, our readers, have suggested.

To start off Request Week, we will be reviewing a new mint called AquaDrops, which was suggested by poor graduate student lightpinksheep. Enjoy.)

In honor of the duet by Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez of the Spanish-language song “Escapemonos” they performed at the Grammy Awards, I’ve decided to do a very small part of this review in Spanish, which I have no experience with, except for what I’ve learned by reading the menu at Taco Bell and watching Sesame Street as a child.

Wait, now that I think about it, all I remember from the Taco Bell menu are taco, burrito, and Chalupa. Actually, I don’t think “Chalupa” is a real word. Also, the only Spanish lessons I can remember from Sesame Street are how to say open (abierto) and closed (cerrado) and how to count to ten (uno, dos, tres…um…).

Actually, I only remember how to count to three because U2 lead singer, Bono, has messed me up, thanks to the song “Vertigo.” At the beginning of the song, he count “uno, dos, tres” and then he jumps to thirteen or something. Ever since hearing that song, I can’t remember how to say numbers in Spanish after three.

Damn you, Bono!

Donde esta el aqua?

Holy crap! Where the hell did that come from?

Wait, that does say “Where is the water?” in Spanish, right?

Wow, I guess listening to Menudo records, not only puts me to sleep, I also apparently can learn some Spanish through osmosis.

Anyway, the question ”Donde esta el aqua?” was directed towards these new AquaDrops Hydrating “Mints.”

Oh, the “Mints” are in quotations marks because there’s not much of a minty thing going on with these. The one I bought was melon-flavored and basically that’s all you really taste.

It’s definitely not like one of those powerful sinus-clearing mints, like Altoids. Although, after I sucked on an AquaDrop for awhile, there was a little tingling sensation in my mouth, which I assumed was the minty part. If it wasn’t, I may need to see a doctor.

Despite being called AquaDrops, I didn’t notice a drop of aqua in them. I even smashed one with a hammer, but there wasn’t any liquid at all.

Anyway, these melon-flavored AquaDrops were pretty good, even though they were sugar-free and had no aqua in them.

OH, WAIT! I feel some liquid!

Oh, never mind. It’s just my saliva.

My bad.

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Item: Sugar Free Melon AquaDrops
Purchase Price: 99 cents
Rating: 3 out of 5
Pros: Melon-flavor is pretty good. Like eating melon candy. Sugar free. Thank goodness my English isn’t as bad as my Spanish.
Cons: Not a drop of aqua. Not really minty. Packaging says excessive consumption may have a laxative effect. Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez duet.

There’s a container on my shelf that I specifically use for loose change and the occasional button. Recently, that container became full and I needed to figure out a way to get rid of the loose change.

I could’ve taken them to a bank and have the teller who helped me dream of shoving an adding machine down my throat. Or I could’ve given them to the panhandlers that hang outside of the convenience store down the street and watch them drown out their problems with alcohol. Or I could’ve stuck them in between my couch’s cushions, so that I can finally say I found loose change in between a couch’s cushions.

I eventually decided to cash them in using a Coinstar machine, which can count my coins for me. Sorry, drunk-ass panhandlers.

First, I had to find a Coinstar machine, which I did by visiting their website. There, I just inputted my zip code and the site told me where the nearest Coinstar machine was.

The nearest machine was at the locally-owned grocery store down the street that I hardly step into because their prices are slightly more expensive than the national grocery store chain I usually shop at.

I grabbed my container of coins and walked to the store. Unfortunately, this was a bad idea, because I had to pass the convenience store, and guess who were hanging out there. Yes, the panhandlers.

Now, when they’ve ask me for loose change in the past, I’ve told them that I didn’t have any. This time, I couldn’t say that with ten pounds of loose change in a container that was impossible to hide.

I really hoped they were too drunk to notice the Fort Knox of loose change I held in my hands. Fortunately, they were.

When I got to the store, there already was a guy unloading a small cooler of pennies into the Coinstar machine. I waited for 15 minutes as he dump over 5000 pennies into the machine.

After waiting and being amazed that 5000 pennies could fit into a small cooler, I began to dump my coins into the machine, which accepts pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, half-dollar coins, and dollar coins.

One cool thing I read about the Coinstar machine is that it can detect if you’ve accidently slipped in buttons, Japanese Yen, Canadian coins, other foreign coins, or those stupid penny souvenirs that are worth less than a penny. If you happen to stick in non-American money or crappy penny souvenirs, it will drop it into the slot labeled “Coin Return,” which seems kind of ironic to be called that.

When the machine was done counting my coins, it spit out a receipt that showed me how much money I put into it. My gross total was $50.06, but the machine subtracted an 8.9 percent processing fee. So my net total was $45.60.

After I got my receipt, I headed to the cashier with the shortest line to cash-in the receipt. For me, the shortest line was the four-items-or-less line, which also had the prettiest cashier. When I got to the pretty cashier, I handed her my receipt and she opened her register to get the money.

While counting the money, she asked me, “What are you going to with the money?”

Internally, I said, “Well, how about you and I spend it on dinner at a nice restaurant?”

Externally, I said, “Uh, I dunno,” and then walked away.

(I’m such a pussy.)

As I walked out of the store, I began asking myself questions to figure out how to spend the money.

“How many products can I review with this money?”

“Could I really feed an entire village in Ethiopia for just 25 cents a day?”

“Could I use an iPod Shuffle?”

“How many tricks can I get with this scratch?”

I eventually decided to use the money to help with the purchase of an iPod Shuffle.

Thanks, Coinstar.

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Item: Coinstar
Purchase Price: FREE to use (8.9 percent fee for every dollar of coins counted)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Easy to use. Convenient. No need to roll coins. Takes all types of coins, except those stupid penny souvenirs. Can turn your loose change into an iPod Shuffle.
Cons: Noisy. Drunk panhandlers. I am a pussy.