Green Bay Fireworks Bingo

Really, Green Bay?

I know it’s hot outside but we can do better than this. We are a Super Bowl Champion town, let’s start acting like it.

Here's a fun game to play at the Green Bay fireworks until we get our shit together. It’s Bingo and you know the rules. I know this seems pretentious but it truly was yahoo central last night at the annual downtown Green Bay fireworks festival. Somebody needs to make fun of the situation and that someone is me.

You Win, MTV, You Win

Jess and some of my closest friends like to tease me that I’m an old man. Sometimes they call me Old Man Wollin in jest. And I always shrugged it off.

I’m sorry but getting excited about installing a new radon mitigation system in the basement does not make me an old man. It makes me prudent and .005% less likely to get cancer some day, but it doesn’t make me an old man. Ditto for getting excited about shirtless lawn-mowing. That’s just the way God intended lawns to be mowed.

But the angering up of my blood from the 2011 MTV Movie Awards might be compelling evidence to support the Old Man Wollin moniker.

Let me clear upfront that I did not watch one second of the actual award show last night. I just read the recap this morning but it was enough to get me reeling to the point where I had to vent on Brain Litter today.

Nominees

Winners

If I was a 12 year girl with a Robert Patterson poster above my bed, I would still feel like my intelligence was insulted. The Twilight series, arguably the worst thing committed to celluloid since the medium was invented, received a staggering five awards including best picture in a field that included Inception and Social Network.

My actual beef though is not from Twilight winning this year but the fact that it wins EVERY year. I did a little research and basically, the other Twilight travesties won the same categories in 2009 and 2010. At what point does one scratch their head and wonder if maybe, just maybe, this is just a stupid beauty pageant and not a good way to spend 2 hours of my time?

And one also has to wonder if Justin Bieber really had the most jaw dropping moment, from a quasi-documentary without a plot to substantiate audience suspense, or if MTV just invented the category and victory so a Bieber presence would boost their ratings. Hmmmmmm.

Again, I don’t hate the youth of today. Why, just yesterday, I saw some teenager with both a mohawk and a rattail at Ashwaubemay and I didn’t think to myself that this kid sort of looks like an asshole. No, I just smiled and thought to myself, shine on, you crazy diamond.

But I guess hating MTV would put me in the old man camp so I guess I’m an old man now. I’ll take the History Channel over MTV any day of the week.

FYI watching the History Channel doesn’t make me an old either. World War II was cool beans and I would go on a date with that dude that shows up on Pawn Stars every week that knows everything about medieval weaponry and antique guns than Taylor Lautner in a heartbeat.

Note To Self: Use Your Recorder More

I was digging through my junk drawer the other day and stumbled upon a voice recorder that I bought about four years ago. This is especially poignant since Norm MacDonald, the inventor of the note-to-self bit…classic, recently started hosting a new show on Comedy Central.

Which is great by the way, any show that utilizes the throwaway line, “Ping Pong is the only sport named after its inventor”, is aces with me.

Anyways, I remember purchasing this voice recorder years back because I was always coming up with hilarious blog topics and jokes in the most inopportune places and I needed a system to keep track of them all. But like everything else I embark on, it seems sweet and life-changing at first but then I revert back to my old ways because…well…eh.

So I started going through my old recordings. The very first recording was “Extra! Extra! Joe Smells!”, which is strange because I bought the device to record new information. I already knew that.

The next three recordings were ideas I had about a potential Brett Favre retirement sympathy card idea. WHICH WOULD HAVE WORKED. That idea was worth tens possibly hundreds of dollars. I had this brilliant scheme to come up with a line of sympathy cards to express your condolences to fellow Packer fans when Brett Favre inevitably retired back in 2008. Hindsight is 20/20, my friends.

Go back to early 2008 and that’s still a good idea. The problem was my creative copy. My third recording was “Sorry for your loss, he will be four-ever in our hearts”. Uh, terrible. I sounded really smug on the recording too, like I was the first person to ever use four-ever in some capacity. I’m embarrassed for myself.

On a side note, I did perfect that card eventually. The card cover: a guy wearing a Brett Favre jersey sitting on a card table chair in the middle of his garage, his head buried in his lap in frustration, a dozen crushed Miller High-Life cans strewn about his feet. The card inside: blank.

The front cover says it all. Simple. Perfect. Admit it, you would have bought that for your dad or uncle or buddy if Favre retired when he should have. And I could be on a beach somewhere with my big payday. Ashwaubemay beach most likely, but still, the beach.

I had two other recordings for blog ideas that I actually followed through with so I guess the recorder paid off. The last recording was “email Grandma”. That reminds me, I should probably email my Grandma.

I think I’m going to start using the recorder again. I still come up with great ideas all the time, maybe this time around I’ll consistently follow up with them.

I already recorded a new idea today. Maybe I’ll follow up with it soon. Or maybe four years from now. I hope “Dave Weisnicht + Mike Hubert = Tosh.0” is still relevant in 2015.

Holy Shit I’m Engaged To Jessica MacGregor!

Wait!? What!?

This isn’t Wednesday at noon. This is not a drill. Yup. You heard right. I’m engaged to the very lovely and beautiful Jessica MacGregor.

If you think about it, this really shouldn’t be a surprise. I’ve always been attracted to really cute little brunettes. That went to Ashwaubenon High School. That were in my grade. Named Jessica. What can I say, I have a type.

I’m really excited about it. Jess is too. Surprisingly, buying the ring was one of the easiest decisions I ever made. I’m the type of person that normally gets buyer’s remorse from buying a pack of gum but this was a no-brainer. I didn’t even have to administer the dutch oven method, that’s how confident I was.

I’m kidding, I had a 99 cent Swanson microwave enchilada dinner waiting for me in the freezer just in case she hesitated. I’ve been told that being waterboarded is preferable to hanging out with me after eating one of those bad boys. Trapped under the covers, I imagine she would have agreed to marry me plus called permanent chore duty forever. But that’s not what this is about.

My proposal was pretty simple. I surprised her when she came home from North Dakota this weekend. I bought some roses, lit some candles, took a shower, it was all very quaint and romantic. I was thrilled when she said yes.

I considered proposing to her via the blog but that’s almost TOO romantic. I need to save some of that heat for the Honeymoon.

So now we have some serious planning for next summer but it’s all very exciting. More to come as Jess and I take the plunge together. Wish us luck!

Dr. Mario and America

When Jess moved in with me, she also brought a Wii with her, which was admittedly a huge selling point for me. She’s the best and I love her and everything but…you know…free Wii.

I was recently dabbling with the shop channel the other day and discovered a new wi-fi version of Dr. Mario. Best 10 bucks I ever spent. Usually, when I’m bored, I’ll crank out a post here on Brain Litter or find another way to contribute to society, but lately, I’ve just been killing viruses blue, red, and yellow style.

Since I’m playing human opponents online, that usually involves killing viruses at a slower rate than some Chinese guy named insert wacky Chinese letters here. Yep, that’s a new stereotype and you heard it here first: Chinese people are awesome at Dr. Mario.

Despite amassing heavy losses to our Asian friends, I have yet to kick this crippling addiction, and that is despite the fact that the version is flawed and could be better.
I can tell you at least five things that are wrong with the “new and improved” Dr. Mario on Wii which is also an explanation for what’s wrong with America today.

1.) Your online profile only keeps track of wins, not losses. Our generation was raised to think that we would all be winners, that’s why we all got trophies for playing soccer just for showing up. But you can’t have winners without losers. Losing is a part of life, it builds character. This coddling nonsense has to stop.

2.) Not only does it not keep track of losses, but the win counts stops at 9,999. Didn’t we learn this lesson from the millennium bug? What a total lack of foresight.

3.) Instead of pressing down to speed up the virus killing process you can now also press up to have the pill instantly drop to the bottom. Are we so impatient and is our time so valuable because we’re sitting around playing Dr. Mario that we can’t wait an extra .5 seconds for the pill to drop regularly. Patience is a virtue.

4.) They added a feature where the pill shows up semi-transparent at the bottom of the screen based on its current trajectory. Thanks Shigeru Miyamoto, I already love having my hand held like a big baby for not showing my losses.

5.) Velco Fly by ZZ Top is still not a selectable song to pick besides Fever and Chill. Unbelievable.

But like I said, it’s still Dr. Mario so it still kicks ass. I can still beat the butts off most Americans and Europeans as well. If you get this version and are up against Ben Dude, be afraid, be very afraid.

Chicks: Why Are You Always Doing Laundry?

My mom just informed me that my aunts and grandma are coming over on Sunday after dinner to take a look at my new place. Normally, I wouldn’t care but as you probably all know, Jess has moved in with me last February. I just assume keep a "don’t ask don’t tell" policy in regards to living in sin but it looks like the cat is going to escape from the bag this weekend. On Easter. Great.

That’s bad news for me but good news for my blog readers because now that I got nothing to hide, I can start dishing about all the goofy stuff chicks do compared to dudes. Like excessive laundry.

What is the deal with the laundry, ladies? Based on the laundry usage in our household, I suspect that Jess can’t wear an outfit for more than half a day before it is considered too soiled to wear in public. Barring a half day worn shirt, there’s always a blanket or a towel or some random coat needing to be washed right away.

Only got one or two things that are dirty? That’s OK, you don’t need to wait to do a whole load. Girls LOVE running the washing machine for just a couple of things or less. It’s their specialty.

I wish I was being sarcastic but last night, Cheese breathed on Jess’s shirt and she told me the shirt was unsalvageable and needed to be, you guessed it, washed right away. In her defense, Cheese does have really bad breath, but still.

And I’m not just picking on Jess. I won’t name names but one time in Madison, I was living with Joe Daniels and this other girl and their dog Hercules and this girl constantly did laundry too. I know because she would often do laundry in the middle of the night and my bedroom was next to the utility room. My favorite was when it was jeans cleaning day or in my case, jeans cleaning night. I find the sound of metal buttons on dryer cylinders soothing.

I admit this is some low hanging fruit I’m picking here. I wish Jess had some goofier habits or she tried to change who I am fundamentally with hilarious consequences once she moved in but the transition has been very smooth and the cramping of my swinging bachelor pad lifestyle has been minimal so far.

In fact, the feminizing of my place has been so minimal, I could probably jam the really girly things in a closet on Saturday and continue the ruse with my family that if I got hit by a bus tomorrow, I would still go to heaven.

But then I wouldn’t have anything to blog about and I really wanted to post this picture I found in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.



Kintzler is giving Lucroy a textbook high five – Van Lieshout style. A Van Lieshout style high five is when you act like you’re going to give someone a real high five but then you creepily, gently rub the other person’s palm with the tips of your clammy fingers until the other person is grossed out and can’t handle it any more.

The Milwaukee Brewers are Awesome and Girl That Played With Fire Sort-of Reviewed

Now that Yovani Gallardo single-handedly delivered the Brewers first win this season and got them back on track to sweep the World Series, it is now safe to talk about the not-so-great Opening Day.

Monday was not great. It was pretty frigid outside for tailgating and our seats were in the Loge section in a location that did not allow viewing of the brand-new, very cool scoreboard. The worst part though was the congestion. It was the 2nd highest attendance ever in the new stadium which meant the bathroom lines were horrendous.

Normally, I’m no stranger to an impossibly long wait for a urinal (I’ve been to Lambeau Field after all) but Miller Park is not equipped to handle to crowd of +46,000. I missed the 5th and 6th innings waiting to use the pisser. People were getting irate. I thought a riot was going to break out when some people started entering through the exit doors to butt in line. I’m pretty sure they were closet Cubs fans. In any case, the general mood was palpable, there was no joy in that lavatory to say the least.

Of course the zeitgeist of the Section 222 Men's Room got to me and I got pee shy when it was finally my turn to go. I had been holding 5 high lifes in my bladder since the opening pitch and there I stood frozen like Prince Fielder on a 0-2 count with the winning run on third base. When is THAT guy gonna show up and start belting some dingers?

I digress.

Usually when I get pee shy, I try to clear my mind by thinking of a waterfall located in a mysterious wooded glen but I just couldn’t mentally find that magical place with 10 dudes breathing down my neck. My 25 minute wait for the urinal ended up a colossal failure. Then Saito gave up two solo home runs and things went from bad to worse.

But we won now finally so now I am in a much better mood. I’ve also relieved my bladder numerous times since Monday; all subsequent trips have been successful in case you are wondering and I know you are.

Which brings me to my next segment, my review of The Girl That Played With Fire. Warning: Spoilers coming up.

It was pretty good. I actually liked it better than the first one but only after my friend, Comrade Dmitry, pointed out that there was in fact, a zombie at the end of the book. I didn’t put two and two together at first but at the end of the book Salander gets shot in the head and buried in a shallow grave. She awakes from her coma, rises from the grave, and wrecks havoc in the nearby farmhouse in a bloody rampage. If that ain’t a zombie ending, I don’t know what is. At first I thought that ending was lame and implausible but now I love it. Thanks, Comrade.

Dr. Thunder Miracle

This has been an extremely unremarkable couple of weeks for me, hence the lack of blogging. The most exciting thing to happen to me was that I learned an easier and healthier way to make chocolate cake. Let me explain.

First you buy come chocolate cake mix. Then instead of adding eggs, water, and oil, you just add one can of Dr. Thunder soda to the mix. If you don’t have a can of Dr. Thunder, you could probably use Dr. Pepper as a substitute but I wouldn’t recommend it. Just mix that shit up and throw it in the oven BAM you got chocolate cake. It is super easy and healthier and you can barely taste the difference. Add frosting too, that’s key.

In other news, the Badgers really stink. They stink worse than my farts right now and I just ate a huge salad for lunch. With broccoli. It’s hard to win a game when you don’t score the first six minutes of the 2nd half. My brackets are officially on life support. Oh well, still got the Super Bowl. That’s going to be my motto for the next year. Hopefully not two years (stupid lockout, I hate it so much).

I’m going to Madison with Jess next weekend, hopefully something exciting arises out of that. According to our hosts, part of the weekend will consist of witnessing the spectacle of another Scott Walker protest, this time it is zombies that are pissed off about collective bargaining rights. I’m not kidding. A zombie protest march down State Street, you can’t make this stuff up. It seems a little silly to me, why would a zombie have an opinion, either for or against, collective bargaining rights? The only thing a zombie should be protesting against is skulls.

Girl With The Dragon Tattoo REVIEWED

During my cruise last month, I was able to peruse a few of my favorite periodicals and read a novel. Everybody has been talking about this Girl With The Dragon Tattoo book. I decided to check it out.

I didn’t like it at first because the story is set in Sweden and I prefer my stories to come from America. I don’t know much about Sweden except their greatest exports are modular furniture, meatballs, and Stellan Skarsgard.

In fact, it became impossible to envision the main characters in the story without one of them being played by Stellan Skarsgard. Then I started getting mad thinking about a film version without Stellan Skarsgard in it. And then I thought, why not throw Peter Sarsgaard in there as Blomkvist, that would be a juicy bit of casting.

PS Stellan and Peter aren’t related. I know! I thought they were too!

Well I imdb’d some stuff when I got home and learned that Stellan will be in the American version, thank God. Daniel Craig is going to star in it too which I’m okay with. I’d be happier if he was working on a new James Bond movie that DIDN’T suck but I don’t want to veer off topic here.

I’m really shocked that Kristen Stewart will not be playing Salander; that was another obvious actress choice in my opinion. According to the book, the character playing Salander is super skinny and unable to express emotion. Kristen Stewart is super skinny and couldn’t express emotion if it slapped her in the face. That could have been a slam dunk. Way to cast a movie, Hollywood.

So without giving away any spoilers, this book is a mystery/suspense that prominently involves a computer hacker and a sex dungeon. For being a talked-about best seller as of late, the whole book as I was reading it seemed a little too 2002-ish to me. Don’t get me wrong, some things from that time period get better with age, like my Motorola RAZR which no smart phone has yet to surpass in ergonomics, quality, and awesomeness.

However computer hackers and sex dungeons just aren’t doin’ it for me anymore, I was expecting something a little more modern. There’s not even any vampires in it.

But maybe the sequels will have vampires in it. Or better yet, zombies. I’m not holding my breath though. Even though I would rate the book as pretty good, I’m still probably going to end up reading the sequels because I’m stubborn like that. Or maybe I’ll just check out the Swedish version with subtitles, it’s on the Netflix. I don’t know. I don’t know if there’ll be enough time.

Here is a classic ecstatically happy or seething with anger pose from Kstew. Imagine if her and dipshit Ryan from The O.C. produced an offspring. That child would be first human being born with negative talent.

How is Topper Harley Getting Out Of This One?

Wow. That’s about all I can say about Ricky Vaughn right now. I’ve been following this story closely for over a week now, it’s a like a car wreck, I just can’t look away.

I’m getting all my info from avclub.com, the greatest source of entertainment news and commentary in all the lands. Here is a sampling of some of their maverick reporting.

http://www.avclub.com/articles/charlie-sheen-lashes-out-at-two-and-a-half-men-cre,52369/

http://www.avclub.com/articles/updated-charlie-sheen-continued,52384/

http://www.avclub.com/articles/charlie-sheen-planned-to-create-a-porn-family-alle,50755/


When this story first broke, I found it impossible not to compare Bud Fox to Adam Mallien circa 1997-1998-ish. As I kept reading Platoon’s quotes I kept nodding along thinking to myself, yep Mal would have said that, nope Mal wouldn’t have gone that far, maybe he would have said that, whoa I’m almost POSITIVE Mal once called Thomas Jefferson a pussy, and so on and so forth.

Try it, it’s really fun. If Navy Seals and sophomore year Mallien got together to make a sitcom, I would definitely watch it. I think those two would be right up there with my three favorite TV characters as of right now. Those characters being Ron Swanson, Phil Dunphy, and Magnitude.

I really do like Charles Sheen as an actor, the guy has great comedic chops and I think we can all agree that we want to see a Major League 3. I just hope he lives that long. If I were a betting man, I’d say he won’t make it to 2012. You could even make a bet that Red Dawn won’t make it til next dawn.

Let’s just pray that Young Guns gets his shit together or has the whatever Keith Richards has so that he can keep on Winning forever as an F-18 that could take us trolls out at any time.