Category: Foodstuffs

Holiday Viva Puffs! The Xmas Season Starts Now!

Another year has come and gone. And it went rather quickly at that. I mean, the site is going to be three years old soon, and it seems like just yesterday I was getting excited about making it to two. Of course, this is not the only reason that I’m particularly infatuated with the month of December. Clearly, the thing that’s currently on the minds of the masses at this time of year are the holidays. Be it Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, or whatever the Hell else that goes on at this time of year, people all over are feeling a little more festive, and everything starts to reflect that.

Supermarkets are no exception to the festivization that December brings, much like when Halloween rolls around in October, everything gets new boxes to reflect the season. While PC groups wouldn’t dare admit it, the world – or North America at least – starts colouring everything Christmas. Red and green start to appear everywhere, and products will take on shapes of trees, snowmen, and Santa. Everything comestible is either dyed or wrapped up to match the colours of Christmas, and today, I will take my first step into the holiday madness.

What better place to start than cookies? I love cookies, you love cookies, everyone loves cookies. And if I get wind that someone doesn’t like cookies, let’s just say they’d better watch their back. Nobody’s gonna make my broad statements false.

For the sake of accuracy, I’ve never really thought of Viva Puffs as cookies. They hardly fit the bill, but what else could they really qualify as? I guess if anything they’d fall under the s’more umbrella, though it would seem that s’mores are also sometimes referred to as cookies. I’m going to have to look into the cookie family tree to resolve this issue, but that’s going to have to wait, because I have to type a bunch of words about these cookies right now. Mmmm… Cookie tree…

I like to think that I’ve driven the point home that this article is holiday themed by now, but, you know, just in case you missed it.

It’s kinda funny, that without this little banner the Puffs really wouldn’t officially be holiday themed. Aside from the fact that candy canes are to Christmas like painted eggs are to Easter, there’s nothing on the box that really denotes a holiday theme. People celebrate Christmas and the like in plenty of places that may have never even heard of snow, and there are lots of things with green boxes that aren’t “holiday editions.” Oh well.

If you know Viva Puffs, you know that they’re already pushing the envelope of how many elements you can mix into a single cookie. Not only is it a marshmallow coated in chocolate, but it’s also got a crumbly cookie-esque base and that red goop in the middle. Like I said, it’s already a very complicated snack, but they’ve decided to take it yet another step and add a fifth part to the mix by injecting it with minty goodness. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for stuff tasting like candy cane, but that’s a lot of very different flavours to take in at once. I know I was going somewhere with this, but I’ve forgotten entirely, so let’s take a look at hot skiing girl.

Upon closer inspection, I think my statement was pretty accurate. She’s got no rack at all, but that can be overlooked because for some reason winter wear is inexplicably attractive. You may think to yourself that I’m nuts for saying that piling on more clothes is a good thing, but you know in your heart that it’s true. I know it. You know it. Hef knows it. I’m just wondering about those boots. Sure, it might just be the ski boots, but those are some mighty big clodhoppers. You know, I think I may have seen her Italian cousin the other day.

But I must digress. As much as I like judging cartoon girls, there’s cookie to be investigated. The back of the box boldly claims that Viva Puffs are “THE cookie with attitude.” That’s bogus on so many levels that I don’t even know where to start.

Firstly, the Viva Puff is not nearly good enough to deserve both capitalization and bold. It’s barely even good enough for one or the other, but using both is just ludicrous. Don’t get me wrong here though. I love the Viva Puffs, but there are so many other cookies that I would choose first. Namely the scrumptious offerings of a certain Dad. Secondly, Viva Puffs have no attitude. They’re actually quite tame. Sure, they have more flavours packed into a single cookie than most three-course meals, but none of those flavours really gets you thinking “Wow! I really need to eat more of these! They’re delicious!”

The box continues to make wild claims of the wickedness of the cookies and how they pop when you bite them. Now, I’m fairly certain that the writers don’t actually mean that it pops when you bite it, but let’s assume they do. Viva Puffs do not pop. Maybe if you were to put them in a microwave or something, which would probably just end up making it bubble up and make a huge mess, but the point stands that biting a Puff will not make it pop. That would be cool, and highly dangerous. Chocolate shrapnel is one of the leading causes of death in North America, you know.

Near the bottom of the box, they go on to promote the other offshoots of the Viva Puff line. Let’s face it, the goo in the middle is all that separates one Puff from another, and it’s not the tastiest stuff in the cookie. I’ll go on record as saying that the raspberry and strawberry types probably taste identical, whilst the fieldberry would just add some sort of sickly blue to the mix. The fudge Puffs would no doubt be the best, and I have an irrational hatred of any caramel that isn’t in a chocolate bar.

You may also notice the banner that asks you how you eat your Puffs. It implies that the website might care about this information, but I’ve been there, and it most certainly does not. I did, however, learn that Dare has a nut-free policy. Go Dare! Nuts only serve to make cookies and other baked goods gross and inedible!

Now we get to the real high point of the box. This little area challenges you to eat the Puffs in many different ways. And when text goes in a half-circle like that one there, you know that you just can’t walk away. It would insult your masculinity to walk away, and if you’re a chick, I’m pretty sure the box is calling you fat. Are you gonna take that? I didn’t think so. It’s time to crack out the puffs.

Ah, there she is. Our first victim. It’s sad that the Puff, like any product that consists of a marshmallow coated in chocolate, is consistently cracked. I would have thought the Puff was better than that, but I guess there is no coating that can survive the terribly difficult trial that is sitting in the cookie aisle.

Now, the box has presented me with four challenges. It says that I should be able to peel, smash, bite and twist these Puffs, and while I shall do it all without remorse, there is a chance that there is going to be some prejudice. Possibly of the extreme variety.

The first challenge I accepted was to peel a Puff. No problem, I’ve seen lots of things get skinned thanks to my vast experience with the internet and movies. Little did I know that the Puff’s chocolatey shell was much different than flesh, and it did its best to stick to the marshmallowy mantle. The fissure down the middle of the shell did help in the matter, as it gave me a good place to start picking at.

In the end, while it was a messy and far from complete operation, I think I made my point pretty well. The next Puffs will surely turn tail once they’ve seen what I’ve done to their comrade.

I weighed the rest of my options pretty carefully, and I chose to take the biting challenge next. Not only would it be the easiest of the four, but it would also prove to be the least messy. Indeed, after a mighty chomp, there were very few crumbs to be seen, and I was left with a pretty cross-section of the Puff. Well, maybe it’s not so pretty, but it surely wasn’t as mutilated as the Puffs which I smashed and twisted turned out to be. I also quite like the green dye in the marshmallow of the Puff. It’s kind of soothing, in a green sort of way.

The next Puff in line was destined for a fate worse than… No, wait, this was pretty much death. The Puff didn’t even see it coming. My fist smashed down on the poor little thing like the big boot on the purple grape. Actually, it was a lot harder than that. And only once.

In all fairness, I have to say that I’m surprised at how well the little guy held up under the circumstances. I guess I shouldn’t be, because it’s essentially made of fluff, which is essentially invincible, but I have to say that I did expect bits to go, well, flying. Essentially.

The last Puff was easily the worst off of the quartet. This one had to suffer through the agony of being twisted. Truth be told, I had no idea how to go about doing this at first. Twisting a dome-shaped object is not something that one normally does, so I had to think about it for a bit. I wasn’t sure whether holding the top and bottom and twisting would be for the best, or if I should hold it at opposite sides and give ‘er. It was a tough decision, and I had already eaten like half the box, so I couldn’t afford any more Puffs and went with the lengthwise twist.

I have to say though, that the twisting did end up with the messiest result. The poor Puff was in shambles, bits of chocolate and cookie strewn every which way, and gooey core spilling out everywhere. I would not wish this fate upon even the worst of my enemies. Well, okay, maybe the worst. What can I say? He’s one-upped me too many times for me to show any mercy. But that’s a whole different story. Let’s just say that I wouldn’t wish the twisty fate upon even my second-to-worst enemy.

Technically, I’m not here to review the Viva Puffs. I just wanted to poke fun at the box and mutilate some cookies. But it’s probably a good way to go out. So the holiday Puff is easily the best Viva Puff ever released. The addition of the minty flavour makes it delicious. As I said before, I love when they add “candy cane” flavour to anything. I spend lots of time during the Xmas season plotting ways to thieve candy canes off of our tree. Last year I managed to get a whole bunch of the stripey treats, and my stash lasted me well into February. And uh, Viva Puffs are funny.

Month-end wrap-up

Ah, the end of November is upon us, and it’s both excellent and tragic.

Bad news first, eh? Well, seems I failed to complete two articles per month during October and November, as I expected might happen. The drive just isn’t there. But I did add a lot of little things in October, and I was pretty blog-happy during this last month, so it all kind of evens out.

So then why’s the end of November excellent? Simple: it means the beginning of December, and bar the snow and cold, December is an awesome month. Firstly, it’s holiday time. While the world is now almost entirely non-specific about it, I’m getting psyched about Christmas already, and with the Xmas comes the themed goods. I’ve got an article almost ready to go up (should be done tomorrow), and it’s gonna kick off the TE Christmas season. I don’t know how many seasonal articles I’ll do, but there will be at least this one and the yearly Xmas haul overview. It all depends on how much red and green coloured crap I get my hands on. Chances are also good that we’re going to be seeing some sweet Nintendo Wi-Fi action here pretty soon, so there’s gonna be that to write about too. My brother’s really spearheading that operation, and even though I tried to resist the Mario Kart, he’s had his way with my self-control and well… Tony Hawk’s American Sk8Land is also a must-have, but that can wait for now. I think that’s everything that needed to be said. You might also see some minor changes in the main page’s colour scheme, but that’s just a “possible, not probable” at this point.

Sowing the seeds of boredom

You know what’s cool? This is almost perfectly accurate as far as what goes through my mind during a day. Especially the Lucky Charms bit. You have no idea how often I forget the Lucky Charms jingle and spent hours trying to remember it. And who would put Reese Witherspoon at #100 on a list of 100 girls you want to sleep with? She’s gotta be at the very least around 15 to 20. In any case, it’s kind of a relief to know I’m not the only one who has entire conversations with my brain.

I’ve been thinking about buying webspace lately. It’s become a serious thought, even though my site has no visitors and such a venture would end up being a huge waste of money. But first, I need a domain name. And while I’m currently drowning in options of webhosts and domain name providers, I have a much more troubling conundrum. What should I use as my domain name? I seriously have no idea. “Torrentialequilibrium.com” would be too long and hard to spell (sadly, many of my friends are horrible spellers), and I don’t really want to use my name at all. It’s a very important decision that will require much thought and many opinions. This would be a question well suited to be posted at a certain message board, but alas, said message board is long dead.

Hearts, stars and horseshoes, clovers and blue moons. Something about a rainbow, then a red balloon. I’m sure an internet query would solve my dilemma for good, but then I’d have one less thing to do with my free time.

In case you’re wondering about today’s slightly-more-random-than-usual post, I’ve decided to stay up all night, and anything that passed through my mind that I deem important will end up here.

To answer another question that may be floating around in your noggin, yes, I do actually have a day planner where I’ve written down what I should be doing with the site each day for a couple weeks in advance. Currently it’s just a text file, but someday I hope to acquire some piece of technology that will be able to perform a similar function.

I don’t know how this will go over, but I’ve come up with a new genius scheme to attract more visitors. It came to me a while back when I linked to the Sneeze and I checked my referrers page to see that he had visited my site from his referrers page. So for the next however long, I will be making regular plugs to various sites in hopes that their webmasters will check my own. This will work as long as you make sure to click on any link I post. And I promise that no more of them will lead to anything potentially scarring. Sheer idiocy, or pure genius? You make the call.

Lastly, I’ve signed up for a deviantART account… thing. It’s a lot easier to upload stuff there than it is to add to my handmade galleries. Oh, right. The link. There’s also one on the sidebar.

The Super Article – Triple Surprise Bags!

It’s here, everyone! The “Super-Article” I’ve been teasing you about is finally upon us! And it’s not so super after all! Ha ha! You’ve all been duped and I am a genius. Hey, why don’t we just forget about all my attempted hype and get to the article. Yeah, it’s about surprise bags. You all love them, so here’s a really big article about them with big pictures, some package scans, and even a video. This is gonna be the best article ever!

The surprise bags are getting to be sort of a mainstay on the ol’ site, and I’m thinking that they’re gonna be sticking around for quite some time to come. I mean, they’re easy to review, and there’s always a cornucopia of interesting stuff inside ’em. Movies are tougher to review (at least for me) and video games usually end up being way too similar to one another, so surprise bags are a good alternative.

The only problem is reviewing the same kind of surprise bag. See, the first time you do one, you’ve got the bag and stuff to review as well as the contents, but the second time, you’ve gotta skip the bag or paraphrase what you said last time. Course, you could always think up new stuff to say, but that’s aside from my point. It’s time to bust out a new type of surprise bag. We’ve seen the legendary Nintendo Surprise and Dick Turtle has spawned two articles, now you will tremble in fear as I introduce the Surprise Sac Bag!!

Yeah, I know. It’s really just Surprise Bag. But some fools out there who don’t know French might be confused into thinking that it’s actually called a Sac Bag. Though really, “sac” should have a “k” at the end, but I’m just reaching now. And it’s only been three and a half paragraphs so far. So now that I’m off to a terrible start, let’s take a look at some package scans! The most logical place to start would be the front of the bag. So there it is. Time to do some reviewin’.

Well, this one’s got a clown on it. Not quite as cool as Nintendo characters, and not nearly as inconsistent as Dick Turtle, but he certainly fits the bill. I think. I mean, clowns are known for entertaining kids, and the bag is for kids and stuff. So it works out. It also makes sure we know that the bag contains toys and candy by having it printed on the bag a thousand times. There are even a several spinning tops pictured on the bag, so I’m hoping that I get me a spinnin’ top. I love them tops. But I don’t love TopMan. Particularly TopMan.EXE. Stupid old geezer.

The back of the bag is just as eventless as the front, and maybe even a bit less entertaining. Among the few bits of information we can glean from the back, we noticed that this particular line of surprise bags is produced in Quebec. Later on, you’ll find that the origin of the contents of the bag might be a little more… overseas. Anywho, the back also sports ingredient lists (which would help show that the edible contents are standardized) and a Nutrition Facts box. There is no nutrition in candy, so it’s really just showing how much sugar is in the stuff. Yeah. Asinine, I know. But it’s standard protocol, I guess.

But enough of that crap. There’s nothing on the back to talk about. So let’s see what’s inside this baby.

Notice immediately the lack of spinning top. I am both disappointed and filled with rage. But there is quite a bit of interesting looking crap there, so we’ll take a closer look and find out just what’s going down. That big red bubble thing is just calling out to me.

First up we’ve got a buncha candies. The package says that they’re called “Chik”. Stange name for a candy. A little too strange if you ask me. They seem to be produced by a company called Gomy, but this Gomy is an elusive fellow. I searched and searched, but the best I could come up with is this. Elusive indeed. Perhaps they should rather be called… um… I don’t know. But to get back to the candy, the Chiks are actually gum rather than candy. They’re not too bad, and have a surprising longevity as far as retaining flavour goes. The downside being that not only do they resemble cinderblocks in shape, but also in toughness. My teeth would have probably been better off if I were chewing on a brick.

Wow. Just looking at it makes me think of the good times. I don’t know why, though, because this round lump of plastic is like the biggest mystery I’ve never solved. It’s got a ring stuck into one end, so I’m guessing that it’s supposed to go on your finger or something. But that’s about as far as I get. It might be some kind of very low-budget water squirting device, but it doesn’t lend itself very well to being squashed. Hell, it could even be part of some group of objects that were split up and placed in random surprise bags to be spread around the world and then collected and assembled to grant you a wish or something. No, wait. That’s a Dragon Ball. Damn. So much for my lead.

If you have any idea whatsoever of what this doodad might be, I urge you to send me any information you might have. Not knowing what this thing is will plague me until the end of time! I request your aid for the greater good! Or something like that. Until then, I’ll just go around sporting a bulbous hunk of plastic on my finger in hopes that some passerby will be able to identify it for me.

These, my friends, are Gestitos. While it sounds similar, they are not in fact tiny burritos. Rest assured, the world weeps right along with you. What they are is… well, foreign hard candy. While I can’t find anything at all about the candy, according to a Google search, “Gestito” seems to be some sort of Spanish slang. And Urban Dictionary didn’t help much either (not that I truly believed it would), but I do love to get in a good man nap every once in a while.

To summarize, the Gestitos are pretty good. I ate an orange one. I didn’t even open the others to see if there are different flavours. Why? Well, there’s a chance that these are infected with many different diseases, what with coming from a Spanish country and all (Would you consider that racist?), and I’m only taking as much for the team as I have to so that I can file a decent report, not even a tiny bit more. That means I’m only going to ingest one piece of any types of candy that are contained within the confines of a surprise bag. Except Nintendo surprise. Nintendo doesn’t have a reputation for spreading foodborne illnesses. Yet.

OOH! A lion! And it’s one of those rare white lions to boot! Look at that display of majesty and his king-of-the-jungleness as he stalks his prey of stray hairs and Dorito crumbs. I should probably vacuum my floor every once in a decade. Well then. Maybe the white lion isn’t as impressive as I thought it to be. Or as rare.

Chupa Chups. Nummy nummy. Chupa Chups. Some people are freaks.

I was a little disappointed at the false rarity of the white lion, but here’s a rare beast for the aaaages. Entei! King of Fire! But alas, Entei is most certainly not Pokémon number 93. This I know because I am a loo-hoo-hooser. Also known as “grown man who likes Pokémon”. Meh. I’m not the only one.

The Entei disc-thing is a little curious not only in it’s numerical error, but also because while it touts that it was made in the U.S.A. I have a really hard time believing that claim. Do you want to know why? Well, I’ll tell you a bit later once we get some more evidence rounded up. As they say, “gotta catch ’em all”. It makes sense in my head.

And so concludes this surprise bag. Ah, but wait, I promised a Super Article with bigger pictures, scans, and a video? Well I most certainly delivered on the bigger pictures bit, and did a half-assed job of scanning stuff, but I guess you caught me on the video bit. You could have also gotten me by noting that the length is hardly even fit for a sidekick, nevermind a full-fledged Super Article. Well, if you think it’s really over, I’ve got a surprise for you. That is, if you didn’t already just scroll through the whole page looking at the pictures. You cheater. I oughta have you banned. But nay, you shall get what I deserve, and have to read about…

Two more Surprise Sac Bags! Bwa ha ha ha ha ha! The look on your face is most delicious! Soon you will be consumed by the monstrous monstrosity that is the rest of this article! Prepare for DOOM, infidels! DOOOOOOOM! Hey, I warned you in the title. You signed the proverbial waiver.

So I noticed something interesting on the back of the packages. Check this out.

A HAH! I knew it. Those dirty Mexicans (literally, I have nothing against them except for the filth, really) are behind this, and only using Quebec as a front! And I bet those damn separatists are happy to help the Mexicans peddle this shit (n. Things; items.). This also further proves that the Entei disc was not made in the U.S.A. as it would like to have us believe. And there will be more, my friends. More and more and more and more. And then maybe even some more. But that would be the end of it there.

The second Sac Bag didn’t yield any more spinning top than the first, so I’m putting all my chips on lucky number three. Or third time’s a charm. What?

Yeah, not too much new in this bag, so it’s gonna seem like familiar territory for at least a while. Just keep your limbs and head in the vehicle at all times and try not to vomit on your seating partner.

What a surprise. More Gomy Chiks. but it seems that these ones are of a different race. The last ones were red, and these yellow. But what’s that in the background by that mostly empty CD rack? A purple Chik? This is astonishing, and a very interesting development in what we know about the social lives of Gomy Chiks. It would appear that Chiks will only hang out with those of their own colour. This closely resembles the social habits of the marshmallow Peep, which will only very seldom, almost never even, be seen with Peeps of a different colour. Too many links makes Ryan’s article look boring and too full of links.

Chupa chupa chupa chupa. Chu chu chu? Chupa chupa Chup! Chupaaa… >:(

Cuadri Gum. Of all the things I’ve seen and am going to see, I’m pretty sure this one is going to be the one that is the most essential to Google. And after said Googling, I found one single result. And I’m pretty sure that page wasn’t written with sanity in mind. However, this was using quotations, so I probably could have found more, but we’ll say that the internet doesn’t recognize the existence of Cuadri Gum. Honestly, I got results for gum, and Cuadri, but none for both. I don’t want to eat the Cuadri. Don’t make me eat the Cuadri. Please?

For the sake of good fake journalism, I’m gonna bite the bullet here. After five minutes of trying to separate the wrapper from the gum, I was horrified to find that it was already well moistened. Light was literally gleaning off the wet bits, and I was totally not prepared to put it into my mouth. Hell, touching it scared me enough. But every good captain goes down with his ship, and while that has no relevance to this situation, it’s an honourable gesture. So the gum was gross. At first it tasted like normal, but then it grew more and more vomit-inducing. Here’s a tip. If you ever come across Cuadri Gum, take it to the nearest church, have it exorcised, and then shoot it repeatedly with a bazooka. I swear that this stuff was not made in Mexico, but in Hell itself.

Oh come on! Screw you guys, I’m no eating this one. Though the word “caramelo” did at first trick me into thinking that it may have originated from Italy, I quickly reaffirmed that “caramelo” is Spanish for caramel. I’m not a big fan of caramels anyway. Especially not the suave ones. That’s just what I need, freaking caramels that are better with the ladies than me. Wait… Forget that last one. I’m excellent with the ladies. In fact I have plenty of ladies right here right now. They’re all fighting over me and other things that ladies do. You know. Things.

Oh ho ho. Here’s an interesting one. Since my ability to take pictures ranks up there with my ability to create matter, I scanned the package for all to see. A Google search for Sobre Sorpresa didn’t bring up much, but I did find some Indian graficas. You know. Like tomahawks and teepees and shit. But that’s not important. the tatuajes are where it’s at!

According to the package there, you can look for 60 designs! ¡Colecciònalos! It also describes that it should contain one normal tatuaje, one holographic tatuaje, and a dulce. Whatever a dulce is. Sorry, my Spanish is a bit rusty. Upon closer translation, a dulce is a candy. Unfortunately, this package of things did not contain a candy. I’m thinking there are two possibilities. Firstly, the candy could have fallen out and gotten mixed with the rest of the Surprise Sac Bag stuff (I’m thinking the caramelo). That’s not likely at all though, so I came up with the second possibility: it never contained a dulce at all! Bastardos! Hey… Upon closer inspection, the Sac Bag package itself shows that dulce is Spanish for candy. Damn, missed that easy one.

I bet you wanna see the tattoos, don’t you? No, you really don’t. Trust me.

OK, Entei was only off by the number, but why do they call Togetic “Togechikku”? Because it’s his Japanese name, that’s why! < /obvious > So the Togetic disc’s got two strikes against it. Not only is the number wrong, but they used his Japanese name, and no Mexicans would bother doing that. No normal Americans would either. There’s only one breed of freaks who would. Anime purists. Those fetid scum who refuse to use any American names or stuff when it comes to anime. Sure, a lot of the American versions of stuff gets butchered pretty badly so I can let most of it slip by, but if you’re using the Japanese names for Pokémon and you don’t live in Japan or speak Japanese exclusively, you’ve likely got some issues and are probably gross and addicted to Pocky.

Yo, …yo. Like a Transformer, there’s more than meets the eye here.

Aww, isn’t that cute, a Marril that’s missing an “R” and a grossly deformed Pikachu. Yeah. I thought the Pokémon discs would end too, but now we’ve got a whole litter of the things. But since you can’t see how terribly fudged up the Pikachu disc it, I had to extract it from the craptastic Yo-yo. Here’s the scan. Notice how this one is spelled oddly as well? Yeah, something’s up. These discs must be horrible bootlegs, or made in Japan and then just stamped with “Made in U.S.A.” to make people who buy them feel more patriotic or some bull like that. Either way, I’m disappointed in Pikachu for scaring the crap out of poor little Togepi like that. All he can do to retaliate is Metronome. Goddamned almost always useless Metronome.

Finally we reach the final bag. It’s got a lot more interesting stuff than the previous bag, but I’m pretty sure I’ll end up typing a couple one-sentencers in for this one too. I guess we’ll see. Yup. Almost done. I’m actually as relieved as I imagine you must be. I foolishly rushed this article, and now it’s making me want to half-ass all the way from here to the end. But I’ll give it a shot, see how far I get, you know the drill. But at the moment, it’s dinnertime, so maybe you should go get a snack to see you down the home stretch.

Lookit that, it’s a hodgepodge of candy we’ve found in the other bags. It seems that while the Chiks don’t associate with other colours of their own kind, they get along quite well with other candies. Or some bullshit like that. I’m sorry, I’m bored. I can’t write about the same kinds of candies over and over.

What’s this? What’s this? A Toy Pop sits right there. What’s this? What’s this? It gives me a right good scare. I see the word “caramelo” on the package and I decide against opening it. Plus, it promises no actual toy, it’s just called a Toy Pop. Mostly, though, I don’t savour the idea of a caramel-flavoured lollipop. Then again, the package also mentions that it’s raspberry flavoured. Raspberry caramel. Yum yum. I’m-a gonna pass this one up, if you don’t mind. You can have it if you send me any amount of money (at least 6 cents) via Paypal. (Local only. I’m not shipping this thing should I have some unknown foreigner reading my site.) My E-Mail’s at the bottom if you need it.

It’s a tiny plastic comb. What do you expect?

The final Pokémon disc is upon us. Look upon it, with all its majesty and roundness, and fall to your knees in awe. Or fall off your chair in awe, whichever is more applicable for your current situation. So Mew looks like he just pulled a pretty good prank. All sneaky-like, trying to hide his laughter. I still won’t believe that these things are made in U.S.A. until someone flies me down to the plant.

Lastly, but oddly enough, not leastly, we have the Magi-Ojitos. Or if you prefer, the Magic Eyes. On the upside, these are not in fact strange pictures that hide a secret that only witches can see, but rather some googly eyes that you can put on your fingers to… stuff with… and things. Ah, the back of the package has some ideas for things to do with the googly eyes. This bag promises candy as well, but again, does not deliver. It was open, so maybe it just fell out, but I’ll assume the worst.

Well that was a surprise. I didn’t think I’d have to put the Magi-Ojitos together. Oh well, there could be worse things that it could make me do… Woah! Take a look at this! It’s the uncommonly seen North American Elephand! Such a majestic creature, it’s just too bad he spotted us. I’d have liked to get a closer look at the beast. Possibly stick my thumb up his bumhole. Someday I’ll find another of these beautiful animals, but at least for now I’ve got video evidence! And you’re pissed off about how much I hyped up that video, and how much of a cop-out it was. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! I win!

Yep. that’s the end of it all. You’ve seen all of the crap I promised, my friends. I gave you bigger pictures, package scans, and a video, even if it was the worst video ever recorded. Plus it’s a decently long article to boot, so as long as you weren’t expecting entertainment, you don’t have anything to complain about. It wasn’t very super, no, but that was all part of my plan to piss you off. Now if only I really had hyped it up. I mean, a single graphic isn’t quite enough to build up a good hype for something. Especially when it’s likely to be a video game review.

That actually wasn’t so bad. I was thinking that maybe I would explode before I was finished with this one. Which is too bad… I wanted to explode… There’s nothing more to say really. Nothing more than to tell you to go out and buy surprise bags! If nothing else, you can throw the things you find inside at people or just make fun of Mexicans for producing such shoddy products. I mean geez, those tatuajes could be a lot higher quality than they are. And the Magi-Ojitos are kinda crap too. But whatever. I like the lion, he’s got a place on my dresser. I’ve got nothing else. End.

Chicken Wings – Food of the Gods*

Chicken wings kick ass. I really can’t think of any other “side” food that’s more enjoyable. I mean, they’ve got so much going for them, and nothing against. Can you think of an appetizer-level food that’s better than chicken wings? Maybe, but I’m going to ignore any ideas. So it’s time I compiled a list** of why chicken wings are so awesome. Just so that I have some reason for actually writing about chicken wings.

1 – Everyone likes chicken. OK, maybe not everyone likes chicken (I myself only really indulge in the legs and wings), but the phrase “Tastes like chicken” is way too cliched for any less than 95% of the earth’s population to not like the stuff. Then there’s the vegetarians, but they don’t count because they lick ass. (But only the ones who think eating animals is wrong. If you just don’t like meat, I can’t really blame you.) This point sucks.

2 – They’re hot. Not all chicken wings are hot, but often enough, they’re at least jazzed up enough to scare off some pussies. And then there’s the bonus of many levels of hotness. You can have some simple BBQ wings, go for the Super Hot wings, or even search out the fabled Suicide Wings. I have an affinity for spicy food, so obviously, I love chicken wings for this trait.

3 – Finger food. Almost falling into my “messy” point (wait for it), this has a similar idea. Finger foods are way more fun than stuff you eat with utensils. Think about it. Would you rather scarf a burger, or waste precious time meticulously cutting a steak? While steak is great, I’d still probably choose the burger for it’s convenience.

4 – They’re manly. Feeling insecure about how manly you appear to others? Few foods will make you look as masculine during and after consumption. Don’t know what it is exactly, but chicken wings are a truly manly food, much like steak and potatoes. Salad and yogurt are prime examples of the least manly foods available.

5 – Eating contests. It could be a large scale competition, or just you out to prove your worth, but chicken wings are a common choice when it comes to an eating challenge. Not only are you proving you can eat like a glutton, but chances are you’re taking on the added feat of overcoming the hot sauce too. This will impress bystanders twofold, should you come away victorious.

6 – They’re messy. Messy foods are awesome, and are fun as well. You’re expected to get a little crap on you when you eat chicken wings. I’m a meticulously neat eater, so it’s great for me to be able to be a little messy while eating wings. People make a really big deal when I don’t eat really neatly, so the expected messiness that comes with chicken wings is a huge sigh of relief for me.

7 – Good anytime food. I can’t think of a bad time to eat chicken wings. Breakfast is a bit of a stretch, but if steak can be a breakfast food, so can wings. Not only that, but they’ll be a hit at pretty much any event. Birthdays, holidays, office parties, funerals, wedding receptions, and especially sporting events, but I’ll get into that a little more in-depth for my next point.

8 – Even better sports food. When you get together to watch sports with the guys, be it at home, the local tavern, or the arena/ballpark/what-have-you, chances are that you’ll be eating chicken wings and drinking beer. Perhaps it is this association that makes them so manly. But whether or not that’s the key, chicken wings are definitely a staple of the sports feedbag.

9 – The sauce. Chicken wings often come in some sort of container. This container will usually contain a good amount of the applied sauce one the wings are gone. Not only is the sauce delicious, but it also goes well with fries, onion rings, or whatever might come along with your wings.

10 – They’re tasty. Obviously the most important trait of a food. Luckily chicken wings excel here. While the sauce is what you’re going to be getting the most of, the chicken itself is usually pretty damn good too. This is, of course, assuming that the provider of the wings makes good wings. But I’ve not tasted a bad one yet, so the point stands.

So there you have it. Ten reasons why we should hail chicken wings as one of the greatest foods ever. I hope this incites you to go out and get some for yourself. Unless you’re a vegetarian. Then you should go get someone roughly twice your size to beat some sense into you.

*I’m totally not ripping off Mike. Mine is more thorough.

**The list isn’t in any particular order.

The Return of Dick Turtle

It’s again the time of year when the snow has vanished, and it’s time for the revival of outside-type activities. Well, for normal people anyhow. Me, I still just sit inside and play video games or type up crap like this. But in the spring and summertime, I often get the chance to sit inside and play video games out at the cottage. And if there’s anything better about going to the cottage than getting to play with the air rifle, it’s getting to browse the dollar stores in the local town. Oh yeah, it’s time for round two.

This year, I knew what I was doing. It wasn’t just a “find anything at all that stands out” affair like it’s been in years past. I knew that the “surprise bag” articles were among some of the top ranked that I’ve written, so I had a mission: find me as many of the damn things as I could. Sadly, as I said in last year’s Dick Turtle review, the places don’t restock stuff like this. The most likely cause is that these things went out of production seven hunred years ago. So unfortunately, I was only able to grab two of the Dick Turtle bags. There were no others, and I decided to leave one behind to see if anyone else ever bought these things. I guess I’ll find out next time I go.

On the pro side, if I were able to buy these things en masse, they’re only fifty cents a bag, so it’s not like it’s a big drain on my funds. Those name brand bags (which are crap as far as surprises go) can go for anywhere up to two bucks, so a cheap reject from the stupid age is like a blessing filled with several little curses (should you try to consume the contents).

Ah, the memories come flooding back. In case you missed the first one (which I’d like to doubt) here’s a link to that one. If you don’t want to read through it, or just want a little refresher, basically, this “Dick Turtle Surprise Bag” is a very old-looking plastic bag containing several assorted things. These can range from candy to toys to fake jewlery to mini-ninjas. God knows when these things were actually made, but the bags themselves look to be about five thousand years older than most of their contents. But age is of no consequence. It’s time to move on.

Ripping open the first bag, I found that it contained a much wider variety of crap than last year’s bag did. No, wait. It’s just a bunch of useless junk and bad candy again. Nevermind what I said. It contained essentially the same spread of stuff as my last DT bag did. Let’s take a closer look, shall we?

Starting off on the same foot as last time, we see that ol’ Dick is as inconsistent as ever. But at least he’s consistently inconsistent. I think. Anyhow, I’ll point out for nostaligia’s sake that the Dick Turtle on the card shown above is clearly not the same Dick Turtle that graces the front of the surprise bag. How the producers of this product managed to think that they’d get away with this travesty is beyond me, but they managed to pull it off. I guess. … OK, onto the next paragraph.

This time around, Dick tells us to avoid skating on frozen lakes or ponds. I can tell you from experience that whilst ponds and lakes may be dangerous, it is perfectly okay to skate on a frozen river. Just don’t walk around on it. That’s when you fall through and end up a Ryansicle. Unless you’re just heading out to the ice fishing hut. Then you’ll be a-okay. The moral of this story: there was no story.

You know, after going over this puzzle less than once, I realized that clue #4 has absolutely no bearing on the result. Assuming that you’re crossing off pirates once they’re ruled out, and following the clues in order, you’ve already found the culprit by clue #3. I really wanted to make a joke about how one of these guys looks like some sort of pop culture icon, but none of them bear any resemblance to anything. It was pirate E. And he sucks, because he failed to steal the treasure.

How accurate. Kinda makes you wonder how widely these were distributed. Or maybe they were just thrown together by one of the locals in an attempt to make a quick buck (or $1.50, considering I’m probably the only one ever to buy these things). I mean, they have no sort of… Wait a tick! Upon closer inspection, they were produced by… a bunch of Newfies. Apparently they go by the name “The Surprise Bag Company”. After a little research, I discovered absouluely nothing other than this. Hover over the clown picture for a little briefing on the SBC, and click on him to be taken to a webpage that isn’t there. Other than that, there isn’t a lot that Google can tell me about them. I guess it’s a good thing I never noticed the mailing address on the back of the bag last time, or else I’d be out a paragraph of material here.

Woah. Stop the presses. Forget what I said about accurate. The Jets never won the Stanley Cup. As far as I know, they never even came close. Yes, the Winnipeg Victorias took it waaaaay back in 1896, and then again in 1901 and 02, but I hardly think anyone would fashion a toy ring for events so ancient and obscure.

Next up…. A fake tooth. Yow. That one was in deep. Either way, it’s neither interesting to look at, read about, or even write about, so how about I tell you about my day about? No? Fine. Aboot.

Ooh! Candy for all you technologically inclined types out there. They even spelled it ‘bytes’. I guess that about sums it up. Aside from the redundancy of putting both ‘mini’ and ‘micro’ in the name, the package hasn’t got anything to offer, aside from it’s sweet, sweet (here’s hoping) contents. Oh yeah, and remember that raindrop-headed guy. You’ll be seeing more of him before the day is done.

The candies certainly do look appealing. They’re all colourful and tiny. Mini they are. And micro as well. So I threw ’em back, and it turns out they’re pretty good. You know Sweet Tarts? Kinda like those, but not as chewy. Or at least not as chewy as Chewy Sweet Tarts. And just now I looked at the back of the bag, and the thing is dated 1998. Candy doesn’t really go bad, right? I survived the last bag of stuff, after all. But I can’t recall actually eating any of it. If I turn up dead in the next little while, I blame Newfoundland.

This one’s a bit of a toss-up. I really should have just put the two pics side-by-side, but screw that. I’m getting my extra paragraph. By the by, I pretty much destroyed that capsule trying to get it open. I’m not good with vending machine capsules. Never have been, never will be.

Did you see that coming? I didn’t. Why would anyone want a tiny decorative plate featuring a sleeping star who’s mouth is zippered shut? Moreover, why would anyone want a tiny decorative plate? Perhaps to compliment their tiny sports team logo’d mugs? So they have something to display in their tiny china cabinet? To throw in the air and shoot with their tiny clay shooting rifle? Life is full of mysteries, and this is certainly one that will never be solved. I hate that star.

When the casket fell out of the bag as I was shaking it furiously, a wave of pure dread washed over me. Not only because I had to try to review something a second time and make it seem like new, but also because I feared that the skeletons from last year were out for revenge on me. But this one could hold something different, right? There was no guarantee that even though it looked the exact same and had the same “Mr. Bones” engraved on the top, it held the same stuff as the last coffin.

Hopes were crushed, curses were placed, and untruths were typed. There was no curse, nevermind several of them. My hopes that something different would be inside were indeed crushed, however. It’s the same bone candy that I discovered in the last article, and this batch is just as brittle and crappy as the last, making it impossible to actually hook the bones together. So I’m a little sad that there’s a repeat item, but at least this a repeat of a somewhat cool item. We’ll be suffering much greater disappointment a little later on.

And that does it for the first bag. I’d say the Winnipeg ring is the best thing in there, simply because of the coincidence of finding a toy ring that is emblazoned with the name of my city in a bag of completely random junk. The biggest let-down was the tooth. Sure, it had blood on it, but nobody, and not even nobody’s uncle Leopold would for even a second believe it to be a real tooth, so it’s got no prank value for something that should be rich in the stuff.

Now we’re gonna kick it up a notch and delve into the mysteries of the second Dick Turtle Surprise Bag. If it were possible for me to write more about this junk, you’d be clicking a link to go to a second page, but even I can’t reach for that much filler with this crap as source material, so you get off easy this time.

Dick’s advice is a little less stupid this time. I mean, not every kid is going to be presented with the option to skate on a frozen lake or pond, but almost every child will, at some point in their life, have to cross a road. But really, we all know that Dick goesn’t give a flying rat’s ass about children. He’s just trying to better his image to give himself more leverage with the voters. Bastard is all about politics.

Do you want to colour a giant space turtle humping a rocket? I don’t, but if you do, today’s your lucky day! Save the pic, blow it up a little in Photoshop or something, and colour it in! Send it to me afterward, and I’ll make a Dick Turtle gallery and put all of your pretty pictures in it. That’s a promise. If I get even one submission, the gallery will be there. Eventually. So do it!

But seriously, where do they get off calling this a puzzle?

Well, well, well. Look what the cat dragged back in. At first glance, it’s just the Mini Micro Bytes again, but if you look real close, you’ll still think they’re the Mini Micro Bytes again. But these packages hold a terrifying secret! While the previous ones were more cylindrical in shape, these bytes are… circles! Okay. I’ll admit it. I’ve got nothing. But then again, do I ever really have something?

I don’t know what the hell this is. Some kind of cat toy of something. It’s just a smiley face in the middle of a plastic ball, with little balls boucing around inside. You can make it jingle a bit, but not much else. At least it should make good lighter fodder come stuff-burnin’ season. Which is now.

You can’t tell from the tiny pic, but that pink thing on the corner of the Mini Tarts packages is the same dude from the Mini Micro Bytes. Word on the street is that he calls himself the Goody Guy. Anyhow, further investigation reveals that not only are the Mini Tarts the exact same candy as their Mini Micro bretheren, but that they were produced a year earlier. I’m not sure what the deciding factor is, but these ones taste marginally worse than the others. Maybe the year made a difference after all? Or perhaps the Bytes were just an improvement on the Tart formula. We may never know. I hope you stay up all night pondering, cause I’ll feel bad if I’m the only one.

More bytes. Only this time they’ve got a block in a diaper representing them. Oh, and they’re made by an entirely different company. Hard as stone and more revolting than a bag of pig ears, these are certainly not good candy. Simply put: they’re shitty Chiclets. They won’t make you want to induce vomiting like those damned bones (a fact I may have omitted earlier), but they do border on nasty.

Two items left, and we’ve got another crappy ring. Only this one looks like a bad Dino wannabe. I’m not even sure if it’s supposed to be a dinosaur at all, nevermind a ripoff of an established character. It could very well be a very poorly drawn duck. I’ve seen worse.

And our final item of the day is this… notebook… thing. It’s tiny, and I doubt anyone without mad skillz similar to mine could have any change of writing legibly in it. Crap. I’m tired of writing about stuff. It’s time to wrap things up and hope I never find another Dick Turtle bag again.

I guess that maybe, maybe if the remaining Dick Turtle Surprise Bag is still sitting in that Bargain Shop next summer, I’ll pick it up and review it. I really don’t think so though, because it took two of them to fill an entire article, should you neglect that a lot of stuff that could have been said was written during the first DT bag review. And if there’s only one left, you’re probably only going to get a mini-review out of it at best, unless I just throw length to the wind and decide to do it just for the sake of getting to use the word ‘dick’ more.

So yes, that’s probably the last of Dick Turtle you’ll be seeing on this website. Unless of course, someone acutually takes up my offer of colouring the Dick Turtle picture. Of course, if you really need a Dick Turtle fix, you could drive out to Lac du Bonnet and search out that last bag for yourself… Me, I’m just gonna look up an antidote for all that candy that probably poisoned me.

Prolonged dumpage

This one here’s kind of a follow-up to yesterday’s post. Some continuation, some new thoughts, it’s all good. Unless you have no interest at all in what I think about.

I was out all day, and again took the liberty of playing my DS all over the place. Today I attracted the attention of no less than three people, and on a broad range of ages too. I’m starting to feel like the Nintendo DS version of that dude from the Wendy’s commercials. I’mma have to get out more, and make sure I get selling those DS units. Maybe somewhere along the way, I’ll find a friend who will play with me. Maybe I’ll be able to beat a human opponent at Madden. Oh yeah, I bought that. I have to say, I made the right decision. Not only does it interest more casual gamers, but I’m quite enjoying it as well. I really needed something different, and football has answered my call.

My next article will not be so much an article, but something akin to this, should I ever figure out how to do it. After looking at the source, I could probably put it together, but it’ll take a long damn time. Possibly all week, or longer, depending on how ambitious I feel. Or maybe I’ll just rush it and not mind it looking like crap. And that’s all you’re getting for now.

I also picked up The Urbz for DS, under my brother’s counsel. He was right. I really like the game. The only problem is that it uses both the face buttons and the touch screen, so you either fumble between stylus and thumb or just use your finger on the touch screen. The game doesn’t really call for extremely precise pointing, so the latter is acceptable, but after being stylus-trained by WarioWare and Feel the Magic, it feels kind of odd not to use it. Anyhow, it’s a really good game. I’m kind of upset I didn’t know this earlier.

I finally found a Tesla CD! Thank you, Music World! I mean, it’s the newest one, which is excellent, but I really wanted The Great Radio Controversy. Still no show from Firehouse though. I did pick up Foreigner’s The Very Best and Beyond, which is also great, so I’m not too disappointed.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance is no longer available anywhere. I’ve looked through around six electronics stores, three gaming stores and two trade-in stores, but nothing. I’ve found Sons of Liberty, and even The Document of Metal Gear Solid 2, but no Substance. So here’s the deal. You find it anywhere, you pick it up and bring it and the recepit to me. I’ll pay you the cost, plus a $15 bounty. The same goes for the Evil Dead 2 DVD. I’ve found Evil Dead and Army of Darkness, but no Evil Dead 2. Maybe I’ll put up a bounty chart of things I want but cannot find, and cannot be arsed to buy online.

I found the first season Corner Gas DVD today. I can’t recall exactly why I didn’t buy it on sight. As I said yesterday, I love the show. Possibly even more than Futurama, and I have all the Futurama DVD sets. Mmm, I love material posessions.

I can’t eat 40 timbits without getting sick. I’m a sham of a man.

The problem with me constantly buying CDs (aside from the rapidly depleting storage space) is that I’m never going to get around to doing that article on my CD colleciton. Maybe it’ll have to go under the pseudo-articles and be updated as new discs come and (God forbid) go.

That’s all for today. I’ll try not to bog down the blog with so much impertinent information during the next week. I’ve got the weekend off, so I’ll be making sure I devote (at least) Saturday to article production. That is, if I’m not too wrapped up in Samurai Legend Musashi. Two days, baby.

Exhibiting uncharacteristic behaviour

I really don’t have much to say today. I watched those charming Don Hertzfeldt cartoons again today. If you’ve never seen ’em, or just haven’t watched in a while, I recommend doing so. Sometimes making no sense is the best way to go about it.

I’m totally making a “silly hats only” sign for my room. Oh, and if you don’t have them immediately available, the media archive at GorillaMask has them all. I’d host them for you myself, but you know, the no webspace thing.

As a bit of a follow-up, I got the full version of MegaMan X8. After the atrocity that was X7, it’s really nice to see that X8 turned out to be excellent in every respect. It’s rather tough, the graphics are great (the cutscene style is beautiful), the sound is awesome, and it’s much more fun than its predecessor. All this, and there are unlockable things! Like characters! And weapons! Most amazing of all is the fact that after inputting a code, you can face off against an 8-bit CutMan! They even remixed the old boss theme. It’s absolutely hilarious, and it’s just in there because some Capcom dude thought it would be fun. You get nothing for finding it, and it lasts all of maybe 10 seconds. I love it. I’d take a screenshot, but hooking the PS2 up to the PC is a rather complicated production, and you know how I am about doing stuff. After all the Battle Network E-Card bullshit, this game has restored all of my faith in Capcom.

EDIT: I was in the neighborhood, and, well, here’s your damn picture. It’s tiny though.

Making loud noises!

I watched Anchorman: the Legend of Ron Burgundy for the second time this morning, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s frickin’ hilarious. It’s a perfect blend of idiot humour and man humour (which some may believe to be one and the same), and that’s why I love it so. It’s nice to see that some of Hollywood is still devoted to making a great dumbass movie. While I like adventure, action, and a more sophistocated comedy, nothing gets to me quite like the idiot humour. Brick Tambland is one of the funniest characters I can think of, and the cast is great. Tons of familiar faces, most notably Will Ferrel and Vince Vaughn. But it’s nice to see other great actors playing bit roles, such as Tim Robbins and Jack Black. Ah, such a great movie, and so damn many quotes to go with it. “Mr. Burgundy, you have a massive erection.” “Don’t act like you’re not impressed.”

Oh yes, and in a strange turn of events, I, of all people, got athlete’s foot. I know it hasn’t got anything to do with being an athlete, but it’s still kinda funny if you don’t think about it too much. Uh, it’s actually been a week or so now, and it’s mostly gone, but I figured it was something you might find funny, if not a bit gross.

I also got my first taste of a Charleston Chew today, and I have to say that it must be the candy that God eats. It’s just so delicious and chewy. Just slightly less chewy than a good taffy. I dare you to provide a candy better than the Charleston Chew. DARE YOU. I’ve seen the light, and am convinced that a superior candy bar could not exist.

And on a side note, I fixed the link at the end of the previous post. Enjoy.