2007: Still No Freakin' Hoverboards

This is bullshit. Seriously.

I was hoping that my treatise on Hoverboards in 2006 would have sparked a creative movement amongst inventors across the world. My dream was to get venture capitalists to divert their precious resources from biotechnology and pharmaceuticals to the more lucrative field of plastic boards floating on cushions of air.

I want a Pit-Bull for God’s sake, not a stupid cure for cancer!


Hoverboards don't work on water. Unless you have power. Or a Pit-Bull (shown on the right).

In a way, though, it was my fault. I did not come up with a realistic solution to bring Hoverboards to the general public. Even though my heart was in the right place when I thought reinstating the former Soviet Union to start a new arms race was the appropriate solution to put Hoverboards into mass production, everyone knows that Rocky Balboa effectively ended Communism for good when he defeated Ivan Drago in 1985.

Therefore a new plan is needed and the approach is three pronged:

1. Create Awareness

I don’t think the average American realizes how dangerously far behind we are in the creation of even a working Hoverboard prototype. Therefore, I suggest that TNT run a 24 hour Back To The Future II marathon on New Years Day, similar to what they do with the A Christmas Story on Christmas Day to create awareness of the problem at hand.

In between commercials, they could show a bunch of news features of little kids crying because there were no Hoverboards under the Christmas tree this year. Then we’ll have a celebrity swoop in there and console the kid. It’ll be a one-two punch because Americans can’t enough of crying kids and celebrities. The net effect of this media blitz will be a call to action that will force the eggheads at NASA or Mattel or wherever to get their heads out of their asses once and for all.

Plus, Back To The Future II is awesome, so at least I’ll be entertained while I nurse my hangover that day.

2. Innovation

Remember the media hype surrounding the Segway when it first debuted a few years ago? The inventor of the Segway promised us a new form of transportation that was going to change the world. We all sat at the edge of our seats, anxiously awaiting this new marvel of technology and how it was going to impact the future.

What did we get? A glorified scooter with a $15,000 price tag. Did it change the world? Hardly. The Segway boasts some of the most sophisticated circuitry and gyroscopic balance mechanisms in any vehicle ever made, but the whole system rests on a dead technology:

The wheel.

The wheel had a great run in its heyday, but the shelf life of this once prominent technology is near expiration. The inventor of the Segway should have realized this in the conceptualization stage of the Segway and scrapped the project right then and there.


Wheels!? Where we're going, we don't need wheels.

But I do think that this dude is mankind’s best bet for creating an operational Hoverboard. He clearly has the brains, financial resources, and risk adverseness to stake a company’s future on a novelty form of transportation. Plus he’s going to want to redeem himself for the whole Segway debacle. We need to sell this guy on the Hoverboard dream as soon as possible.

3. Sponsorship

Everything needs a sponsor these days and I found the perfect fit for the Hoverboard. Think about it for a second. What group of people is responsible for the greatest leaps of technology that still subside in society today? I’m not talking about the internal combustion engine or the microchip processor here, think waaaaaaay farther back from those innovations. I’m talking about the wheel…fire…the fulcrum. Ring any bells?

I’m talking about cavemen of course. Don’t you think they are about due for another big hit? Cavemen could fund Hoverboard research and development in the hopes of getting their dignity back after being forced to earn cash through those Geico commercials. So instead of shilling for car insurance companies, they can, once again, contribute to the advancement of civilization. It’s win/win for everybody.

Call me an idealist, but I honestly think my little plan here will at least get America pointed in the right direction. If not, I already have action plan in place for next year. It involves What Would Marty McFly Do rubber bracelets.

Who's with me here!?



Hoverboards: So easy to use, even a human could ride one.

How to NOT Scalp Packer Tickets

So it turns out I am NOT the crafty negotiator I once thought I was.

It wasn’t my fault though; I was completely blinded by my desire to see Brett Favre trounce the Minnesota Vi-queens in Brett Favre’s possible last game at the motherland of Lambeau Field.

Even though I know Brett Favre is going to play for at least another six or seven seasons, I didn’t want to take any chances missing the game. Although it is a commonly known fact that Brett Favre can not be stopped by any man or manmade object, there was always the possibility that a stray meteorite or a bolt of lightning could take Brett Favre’s right arm out indefinitely.

Or make him, more stronger?

Anyways, Turk “Ding” Freeman and I were scrounging around the hallowed grounds of Green Bay looking for cheap tickets right after the kickoff but things were looking bleak for us, despite the miserable weather that typically scares away the wannabe Packer aficionados. Even after five minutes elapsed from the first quarter, there were only buyers to be seen and no sellers.

We almost abandoned all hope when we came across a dude with two tickets right next to each other. He was a shining beacon of light in a murky tunnel of despair. I would have sold my unborn children into a lifetime of manual labor for those tickets, but luckily my bartering instincts took over. With any luck, we’d be sitting in the stands in moments, scarfing down hot dogs, chugging cold beer, and watching Aaron Kampman crush the bejezus out of the Padawan Viking quarterback.

Talking to the scalper was like talking to Mr. Testeverde, the turbo-tongue teacher from Saved By The Bell. There was a lot of gibberish and a lot of numbers being fired out between the two of us like an old-timey auction. Not a lot of sense was being made and I was really getting caught up in the moment, but I eventually talked the guy down from $200 for both tickets to $160. I should have held out for less but I was getting anxious.

Right as I was about to complete the transaction, this other dude comes out of nowhere with two other tickets and I instinctively yelled $150 to get a better deal.

Sold!

I learned three valuable lessons as the dough left my wallet and the two tickets were clasped in my greedy little hands:

1. When going to a game with a buddy, make sure the tickets you’re buying are NEXT TO EACH OTHER.

2. Make sure the tickets are NOT in the nosebleed section in the corner endzone.

3. It’s probably not wise to buy Packer tickets from a spaz that looks like he’s on crack.

Ding, upon realizing that I way overpaid for two crappy tickets that were on opposite sides of the stadium, promptly swore me off and proceeded to go watch the game with better company at the Sidelines bar off of Ridge Road. To make matters worse, the crackhead that I bought the tickets from kept hounding me and tugging on my arm to give him more money, like my generous contribution to his drug habit wasn’t already good enough.

I deserved it all. By the time I found another buyer, the first quarter was almost complete. There was a nary a soul around by this time so I ended up dumping the extra ticket for twenty big ones to a lucky passerby and then booked ass to my seat for the duration of the game.

I was stewing in anger for most of the football contest (don’t get me started on Bubba Franks) but the miraculous game winning field goal by Dave Rayner in the final minutes made the price of admission almost worthwhile. I was really just hoping to bear witness to the spectacle of a Brett Favre TD pass and to, consequently, rock out to Todd Rungren but there’s always next year.

Now if you excuse me, I have to dust off my calculus book. I’m going to figure out all the mathematical possibilities for the 7 and 8 Pack to get into the playoffs. It’s going to be a long night.

Get your shit together, NFC.



Wanna know what's worse than paying $54 for a single Packer seat in the corner endzone? Paying $130 for it.

txt msgs r STILL 2 cool

BBRRRR! That’s the buzzer and that means time is up.

The correct answer to the question

Is it acceptable for a guy to use smiley faces, winks, exclamation points, etc in a text message?

is… Yes. Within reason.

To illustrate my point, I’ll use a real life example based off a series of exchanges between me and this girl I met last Halloween. I met her at The Pub and she was dressed up as Rainbow Brite, so going forward, she will be called, you guessed it, Rainbow Brite.

What happened was I just kind of bullshitted with Rainbow Brite a little on Halloween and nothing happened but then I ran into her a few weeks later while she was bartending at the Essen Haus. We exchanged phone numbers and it’s been an exciting game of cat and mouse ever since. And by “exciting” I actually mean “tepid” but I’ve been busy lately and don’t even get me started on the November Rule.

One night, Rainbow Brite texted me out of the blue to see if I was downtown to meet up for a drink. I responded with Hey! yadda yadda yadda. I think using Hey! as an opener is a perfectly acceptable way to greet someone you are actually excited to hear from or from someone you just haven’t heard from awhile or from someone you don’t normally correspond with via the text messaging.

Another time when I was hanging out at the Essen Haus, she had a shot of Jager sent to our table. I didn’t get a chance to thank her for it so I texted her when I left the bar Thx for the shot, I owe u one! The exclamation point usage in this scenario is questionable but I still think it worked well given the context.

Later that night, she texted me to ask me what I was doing at the Essen Haus that night. I texted her back saying I was meeting up with friends at the Come Back Inn (a different bar that is connected to the Essen Haus) and that I just popped in to see my fave fraulein :) FYI they make all the waitresses wear lederhosen to go with the German theme of the bar.

Anyways, I thought that text was MONEY. Plus I finally got to apply the two semesters of German classes I took in high school to try and pick up chicks. About time!

I suppose I could have texted her and said just popped in to see my fave fraulein. You see, I am trying to create a candor with you that is light and airy. I am joking and flirting with you and a fun time is being had by all. but I figured the smiley face could say that and more and it wouldn’t have taken 20 minutes to type in.

My whole point here is that unless you’re some kind of James Dean character, leaning up against a wall with your arms crossed, smoking a cigarette and exuding a devil-may-care demeanor, then, no, using emoticons is NOT going to help your image. In fact, if you are that guy, you probably shouldn’t be text messaging at all, unless you just text blank spaces to people, the electronic equivalent of the indifference head nod.

But, if you’re anybody else in the world, why wouldn’t you choose to express yourself a little bit? Since 85% of communication between people is done through body language, doesn’t it make sense to take some liberties with emoticons and slang in that fragile remaining 15% in order to make your text message understandable? To me, if you took all of the examples I mentioned above and used periods in place of everything else, the message would sound like it was being narrated by Stephen Hawking.

On the other hand, you don’t want to sound like a 13 year-old teeny bopper, texting her girlfriend about seeing her crush at Abercrombie the other day (OMG!!! im in luv!!! CML!!!) so I say find a balance that makes you comfortable with your masculinity and stick with it.


Sure he's the most brilliant physicist of all time, but that doesn't mean I want to sound like him when I'm trying to score a date for Saturday night.

txt msgs r 2 cool

I love text messaging. Actually, I love all forms of one-way communication where the receiver can't interupt me. Kind of like a blog...

But really, have you EVER ignored a text message? You can’t because it’s impossible. A person can ignore your phone calls and they can ignore your voicemails but they can’t ignore your text messages. They just have to read it and put up with it no matter what. It’s great.

I only wish I could figure out that T9 bullshit. Sometimes I can literally see people text faster than they can talk and it’s obviously due to the fact that they’ve obtained mastery over the awesome force that is T9. In my case, I think my brain might be too big or something because it never understands the brilliance that is coming from my fingertips.

It’s sort of equivalent to the chess match between the Russian World Champion, Garry Kasparov, and IBM’s super computer, Deep Blue, back in 1997, except in my case, the human out-smarted the computer instead of visa versa.

I suppose I could get a Blackberry or something like that but I just don’t think I’m cool enough for one. Don’t get me wrong, I think I could pull off Bluetooth wireless earpiece cool, but I just don’t think I have the cajones to pull off Blackberry cool. Maybe in another lifetime, I guess.

Switching gears, I honestly don’t know how people ever met up in bars before the advent of text messaging. I think we’ve all experienced the following conversation at least once in our lives:

(ring ring ring)

Drinking Buddy #1: HEY, I’M AT BROTHERS, COME HERE!
Drinking Buddy #2: I’M AT BROTHERS, TOO!
Drinking Buddy #1: WHAT!?
Drinking Buddy #2: I’M AT BROTHERS! I-AM-HERE-RIGHT-NOW!
Drinking Buddy #1: DUDE, I CAN’T HEAR YOU, I’LL CALL YOU LATER!

(click)

Drinking Buddy #3: So was that Drinking Buddy #2? Is he coming out?
Drinking Buddy #1: It doesn’t sound like it. I think he’s with his girlfriend or something.
Drinking Buddy #3: That’s lame.
Drinking Buddy #1: Yeah, I know. Let’s get outta here.

Regular old cell phone technology is basically obsolete on any given weekend night without the ability to send electronic whereabouts to our friends. Thank you, Cingular. I owe you a shot the next time I see you out.

Switching gears again, I would now like to tackle the finer points of cross gender communications and text messaging. In order to accomplish this, I would like to conduct the very first ever Brain Litter poll. I want EVERYONE to participate in this and by EVERYONE, I mean CHICKS:

Is it acceptable for a guy to use smiley faces, winks, exclamation points, etc in a text message?

If the answer is no, then please explain to me how a guy is supposed to joke around or flirt or be playful or whatever via cell phone, keeping in mind that actually calling and talking in a normal conversation is completely out of the question.

The floor is now open for suggestions…


"Mom, why won't girls talk to me?"

Poker Strategems: The Green Bay Kid Method

Last Friday, I got my ass WHOMPED in my first ever no-limit Texas Hold’em Tournament. I actually played pretty well, but I got burnt hard on two hands that, statistically, I should have won. Oh well.

Poker is kind of a funny phenomenon with its incredible rise in popularity over the last few years. I was recently perusing the newsstand section at Barnes & Noble and came across no less than THREE Poker related periodicals. I didn’t realize the game has changed so much that a monthly subscription was needed to replace that Rules to 7 Card Stud bonus card that you get along side the two jokers in a fresh pack of playing cards. A flush still beats a straight, right?

And forget about throwing the game winning touchdown in the Super Bowl; that was your Dad’s fantasy before he started to live vicariously through you. Nowadays, men fantasize about going “all-in” against Johnny Chan, Phil Helmuth, or that dude that looks ridiculously like Tiger Woods in the World Series of Poker at the Horseshoe Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. Never in the history of time has sitting on one’s ass ever been considered an athletic competition but the programming directors at ESPN will have you think otherwise. I better start drinking and smoking more if I want to be ready for the Championship in 2007.

I kid, I kid. Poker involves a lot of skill, strategy, and lightning-quick probability reasoning. That’s why you see the same guys win these tournaments year after year. Here are some lessons I’ve gleaned on my own so that you can become a poker champion.

1.) No matter how grammatically correct your vernacular is, announcing your intention to play in a Texas Hold Them Tournament will NOT make you sound smarter, in fact, you will look like a complete jackass. Believe me, I know.

2.) You’re going to want to give yourself a nickname, preferably something Texas sounding-ish but a nickname based a different city or state will work fine too. When I sat down at my table on Friday and introduced myself as the “The Green Bay Kid”, I could tell that at least one guy at the table was slightly intimidated.

3.) Never fold out of turn, that’s just annoying.

4.) Every guy wants to be the Matt Damon character from the movie Rounders. You know, the guy that can sit down at a poker table and instantly know exactly what every player has in their hands based on their facial expressions. Even though every player has a “tell”, I still think it’s pure Hollywood when a guy can read that another player has a pair of 6’s, the 2 of hearts, the 9 of spades, the Queen of clubs or something crazy like that after the other player looks at his hand for two seconds.

But I do think a viable Poker strategy is to pretend to be THAT guy on every hand even though you have absolute no idea what’s going on:

Ben: I’m going to raise $100. Bill, you’re chasing a dream with that inside straight draw, and Steve, you know as well as I do that your pair of nines is not going to hold up at the showdown.
Dealer: Um, sir, I haven’t dealt the cards yet.
Ben: Whoops, sorry ‘bout that, fellas. I got a little excited there.

Anyways, make sure the cards are actually dealt before you start asserting what everyone has in their hand. You are sure to confuse your opponents with your peculiar demeanor and irregular betting habits using this strategy and being unpredictable is always good. You might just annoy your way to victory as well.

5. Bluffing is another good strategy; just make sure to only bluff when you have a great hand to back it up.

6. Finally, use Poker lingo whenever possible to describe your hand, i.e. say you have a pair of ladies when you have a pair of queens. When in doubt, make stuff up. You can be logical like calling the 8 of spades and the 8 of clubs, a pair of 8-balls, or call a pair of 4’s, a pair of Favre’s.

The best, though, is when you make up something really abstract and random, like having a 3 and a 9 in your hand before the flop, and calling it the ol’ monkey goblin or something like that. If someone asks you where the term originated from, just shrug and say, “I don’t know, I didn’t make it up,” and then smugly look at him, like HE is the idiot for not knowing what a monkey goblin is.

If you follow these pointers, you are sure to be a big hit at your next Hold’em tournament. Who knows, maybe someday you’ll be going all-in with a monkey goblin against James Bond at the infamous Casino Royale…



Maybe if you get good enough at Poker, you can start wearing uber-lame little boy short swimsuits, too. Kidding, there are probably about five men in the whole world that can pull off this look, and YOU are not one of them.

Axl Rose is a Wiener

Let me be the first one to say it. I was getting ready to do some serious rocking out in the good land of Milwaukee last Wednesday, but a certain Guns N’ Roses concert was CANCELLED because said singer mentioned above was sick.

Now I can understand if he came down with something serious and needed an immediate cure like, say, a gun shot wound, but it wasn’t anything close. It was an EAR INFECTION!

"Hey Axl, my two-year old cousin called; he wants his affliction back."

But seriously, can you imagine the disappointment at the Bradley center on Wednesday night?

“Attention Metalheads, there will be no rocking out this evening; Mr. Rose is suffering from a slight ringing in his ears. You can all go back to your parent’s basement now and reminisce of what might have been. Good night.”

C’Mon! What would the world be like today if Led Zeppelin stopped touring because Robert Plant and Jimmy Paige came down with the sniffles. Or how successful do you think Woodstock would have been if Jimi Hendrix couldn’t perform his rendition of the Star Spangled Banner because of an irritating itch on his lower back that he just-couldn’t-reach.

It would be a pretty bleak future which is what, I guess, is in store for our children if our rock stars stay the course of becoming a bunch of whining assholes. The inconveniences I mentioned above are about the equivalent of what Hack-xl Rose is going through right now but we never heard those Guitar Gods complain. They were too busy expanding our minds with their high octane guitar solos and lobe-bursting drum beats. That AND abusing drugs and alcohol, but, hey, that’s just part of the job.

I should not be putting GnR on the same pedestal as Zep and Hendrix. Maybe it even worked out for the best. After all, Slash is shilling for Volkswagen now and the rest of the original band is touring with Scott Weiland and Velvet Revolver. The concert on Wednesday was essentially going to be the best GnR cover band ever assembled. At the very least, there would have been pyrotechnics, and I am a HUGE fan of fire. Oh well.

One more thing, I got my 50 bucks refunded from those crooks over at Ticketmaster. I wonder how many squirrels I could buy with that…


"WHAT DID YOU SAY!? I CAN'T HEAR YOU! THERE'S RINGING IN MY EARS!"

GnR me ASAP

I’m going to a Guns N’ Roses concert in Milwaukee on Wednesday and I’m pretty excited. I was never really THAT big of a fan of GnR but there have been a few standout songs of theirs that have always struck a chord with me:

Welcome to the Jungle
I have some conflicting feelings about this song. On the one hand, it’s like, oh, man, I LOVE this song; it totally reminds of me of high school football. On the other hand, it’s like, aww shit, I HATE this song; it totally reminds of me of high school football.

My Michelle
We used to have this smokin’ hot intern at our office named Michelle and it was damn near impossible for me not to hear the riff from this song inside my head whenever she walked by my cubicle:

‘Whoa Whoa Whoa, you never can tell, Whoa Whoa Whoa, my Michelle!’

One time, she actually caught me playing air guitar after she borrowed a pen from me. It was awkward. I had to pretend I was stretching, but I think she knew I was rocking out. She probably gets that a lot.

Incidentally, have you ever discounted a potential dating partner’s intelligence, looks, or personality solely because their name is featured in a song you really like? I think that would make a good topic for a future blog post…

Sweet Child O’Mine
That’s just a really good song. I don’t care what anybody says.

Paradise City
Remember that one scene in Can’t Hardly Wait where that lovable nerdy kid that looks like Matt Becker lip synchs to this song? There’s a point where he falls off the table and the music stops and you’re thinking, “that's too bad, that lovable nerdy kid that looks like Matt Becker had a nice run there, he almost assimilated himself with all the cool people at the party,” and then all of a sudden BAM! He hops back up on the table and the microphone shoots up in super slo-mo and the music starts again and it looks like he never missed a beat. That was awesome. Can’t Hardly Wait pretty much sucked ass but that one scene is one of my favorite movie moments of all time.

So that’s that. I guess you could say that as long as they play anything from the Appetite for Destruction album, I’m going to get my money’s worth.

More coverage to follow this week…


Wanna know something funny? I'm pretty sure Kyle Nelson bought the soundtrack from this shitty movie when it first came out. What a dork!

The Girl of My Dreams

When I first looked into her eyes, she took my breath away. I’ve never seen a girl like that in my entire life. I was trembling with excitement, I could barely think straight. It was getting late so I knew I had to act fast, but I was beginning to hesitate. Do I really have a shot at this girl? Then she looked up at me and I knew it was time to pull the trigger.

Ka-POW!

The smell of spent gun powder stung my nostrils as I sat back in my deer stand. After the ringing in my ears stopped, I went over to my bait pile to see if my shot was true. It was. I had bagged my first deer, a great big doe. And it only took me 11 years!

Some of you may remember my I am Blaze Orange Cowboy post last November where I arrogantly asserted my ability to dominate the white-tailed deer of Northern Wisconsin. I even went as far as saying that I had a hair on my chest for every deer I shot and that my chest was likened to Austin Powers. These bold statements were far from the truth. In fact, up until last Saturday, I hadn’t even earned the one straggler on my chest that I have to shave every other day. I am such a poser.

Well now I’ve finally earned the right to let that hair grow out and reach its full potential…but I’m probably going to keep shaving that little bastard anyways. It looks kind of ridiculous, but at least now I don’t have to feel guilty about it!

Now I would like to address the pundits out there who are thinking to themselves how cruel I am for shooting Bambi’s mother. Let me just say right now, you are absolutely right. I did not want to shoot Bambi’s mother. I would have much rather shot Bambi’s father. Especially if Bambi’s father was a 10 point buck with a 20 inch spread.

The fact remains that deer overpopulate the state of Wisconsin every year, causing economic hardship to farmers and tens of thousands of car accidents. The Department of Natural Resources issues a set amount of tags each year to regulate the herd and keep things in check. Hunters are just doing their duty. Enough said.

Another thing that hunters do is sit around in the woods all day with nothing to do. Besides catching up on zzz’s, it’s also a really great time to get some serious thinking done. I am willing to bet that some of the most innovative and influential ideas of the past century were conjured up while hunkering down in a deer blind. Did you know that Albert Einstein came up with the theory of Relativity while bow hunting in upstate New York? (Note: I totaled made up that last fact, but it’s probably true).

I usually come up with some whiz-bang ideas myself over opening season, but for some reason all I could think about was how much I like squirrels. I’ve always been a big fan of squirrels; after all, they do have puff tails. But for some reason, I just found them tremendously entertaining this year, scurrying around the forest like they were constantly late for some real important meeting. Plus, there was this one red squirrel that actually came into my deer stand and it looked at me. The squirrel’s name was Jim. It was hilarious.

So, to sum up: I shot my first deer and squirrels are my new favorite animal. Overall, it was a pretty productive weekend.



If anyone out there is wondering what else to get me for Christmas besides a Playstation 3, I would gladly accept a domesticated squirrel for a present. Actually, if you do happen to run across a merchant of domesticated squirrels; go ahead and pick up as many as you can and I’ll pay you back for them. What could possibly be more fun than having seven or eight of those little guys running around the house?

My Christmas Dilemma

I can’t decide what I want for Christmas more: A girlfriend or a Playstation 3.

It’s really a tough choice. Do I REALLY want to get something that’s going to be expensive, tough to figure out, and take up lots of my time or do I want to play the best video games on the market. Sure, you can the make the argument that an inanimate object won’t keep you warm at night, but who’s to say that sucker won’t run hot after a marathon session of crashing cars and shooting Nazis?

“I love you, Playstation 3. Let’s cuddle up and go to bed. We’ve got a lot of gaming to do tomorrow.”

Okay, that’s a little weird, but I still think that until women start offering 1,080 scanning lines of high definition graphics, wireless controllers standard, and a 20 gigabyte hard drive; I’ll probably be choosing companionship through the Sony Corporation.

Make fun of me all you want, ladies, but when was the last time you killed a weekend with a necklace or a pair of earrings?

Hey-Oh!



Damn! Check out those sexy curves!

Starbucks Coffee: The Next Best Thing To Beer

I know a lot has been said on the subject, but I think it’s a subject worth exploring.

Starbucks is to coffee like Brett Favre is to quarterbacking: they are the absolute greatest in their respective categories. I’ve been hooked on the brown stuff since my sophomore year of college and have never looked back since. Everybody needs a vice, and I like to rationalize that caffeine is the lesser of all the evils out there. Simply put, Starbucks has been fueling my crippling addiction to the real vitamin C for the past several years and I feel all the happier albeit slightly more jittery because of it.

But Starbucks ain’t perfect.

One thing I don’t care for is their sizing system: Tall, Grande, and Venti. What the hell does that mean!? They all sound like the exact same thing. It’s like to going to McDonalds and seeing that their French Fries come in sizes of large, big, and huge.

I’m exaggerating, it’s a pretty easy system to figure out, and I’m sure a lot of people think it’s real cute. But the joke wears thin real quickly, if you ask me. And everybody takes it SO seriously. If you don’t believe me, try ordering something the next you walk into a Starbucks and call it by its proper name. You’ll get a dirty look every time, like you’re some kind of dufus.

I do this purposely now for the shear entertainment of watching these baristas get all riled up.

“Um, excuse me, server, I would like a medium coffee, please, no room for cream.”

The server (baristas HATE being called servers) knows damn well that I’m not new because only a Starbucks veteran would perform a pre-emptive strike on the question of whether or not I wanted room for cream. The server’s only retaliation is to bark my order to the other coffee bartender person, accentuating Grande coffee in the most condescending way possible, as one final rebuttal to get me to play by their rules.

My response? In an unwavering manner, look them straight in the eye as they hand me my beverage, and coldly say, “yeah, thanks again for that medium coffee.”

Take THAT, Seattle!

I’m only kidding about that last transaction. I would never order a medium coffee. It’s all or nothing for me, and if you get anything less, you are getting hosed. Here’s why:

Small: 12 Ounces $1.50
Medium: 16 Ounces $1.70
Road Rage: 20 Ounces $1.80

You get an additional 8 ounces of coffee for 30 cents! To keep the math simple, think of it this way, 20 ounces is almost DOUBLE of 12 ounces and 30 cents is worth almost NOTHING by itself so basically you’re getting twice the coffee for free. Think about it.

The only argument against my logic is that these prices vary from city to city, so if live in a market where the Road Rage size puts you over the $2.00 threshold and you don’t want to deal with a butt load of stupid stinky change, opting out of the 20 ouncer is completely understandable.

Well all this talk is making thirsty. It’s time for some SB action. My heart is palpitating irregularly just thinking about it…



I’d like to see Starbucks come up with some sort of big gulp 64 ounce size to satisfy my daily requirement of Vitamin C. Maybe they could put a little handle on there, too. Not bad, huh? Cool, well, see ya later!

Shit That Happened to Me in 7th Grade: Everything I Know About Girls 1998

Before I get going on this hilarious post, I’d just like to show you the cover of my most prized possession:

When archaeologists unearth this journal from some dig a thousand years from now, the argument that “Green Day Rules” is blatantly scrawled out on the grocery bag cover (damn parents couldn’t even buy me a composition book, jeez!) should put to rest any debate on the authentication of this artifact. In addition, the 8-ball drawn on the top left-hand corner actually does a better job of tracing the journal back to 1995 A.D. than carbon-dating ever could.

I don’t know why people thought 8-Balls were so cool during middle school. At first I thought Zak and I were the only ones that thought they were cool but Joey later confirmed for me that 8-Balls were revered by everyone at that time. All I know is that when I first dusted off my journal after remaining hidden for so many years to write this piece, I actually found a bunch of 8-Ball POGS in between the pages. Sweet!

But enough about 8-Ball POGS, let’s delve into what exactly I knew about women around February 4, 1998:


Wow, I was pretty wise back then! A lot of that stuff still holds up today. The one thing I would definitely change though is that first piece of knowledge about upper classmen because I was an upper classmen for five years (God bless that bonus Senior year of college!) on two non-consecutive occasions and that never really panned out for me in the girlfriend department.

I deliberately left in that top section about the Wollin Beatdowns. The whole Wollin Beatdown thing was a dark, dark, very dark period of my past where my posse of friends would commit random acts of assault upon me. Someone would yell, “ Wollin Beatdown!” at some random time when we were all hanging out and then everyone would stop whatever they would doing and proceed to tackle me and inflict various forms of pain, most commonly punches to the back, shoulders, and kidneys while I was in the fetal position. It was kind of like when someone said the word of the day on Pee Wee’s Playhouse but with more atomic wedgies.

Don’t you love the oxymoronic-ness of me claiming I know these “facts” about girls, yet I also claim that they don’t make any sense to me, thus negating all those little bits of sage wisdom in the first place?

Well, I think from this journal entry that it is clear that I knew a thing or two about the subtle nuances of the opposite sex back in high school. Well, that’s not entirely true…

Yeah, so that’s an equation that I wrote about three weeks later on what it would take for me to go out with Tricia, the girl that I liked at the time.

Incidentally, what is the passage of time that needs to elapse before it’s appropriate to talk about old crushes on the World Wide Web? 10 years? 9 Years? 8 Years, 8 Months, and 12 Days? I would like to provide an equal opportunity to embarrass ALL the girls I ever liked in Middle School and High School (how progressive of me!) but to play it safe, I’ll keep my posts limited to the girls I liked before Junior year.

Back to the equation, I guess I also thought that being tan and freckleless was another important factor to pick up chicks. I sure was a confused lad back then.

It’s kind of funny, the crush I had on Tricia back when I was a Freshmen was completely hopeless, but towards Senior year, we actually got to be pretty good friends and she even picked me to be her partner for our Senior Homecoming Pep Rally skit/dance thingy. If I could go back in time and tell myself that something like that was going to happen to me two years down the road, I probably would have called my future self a dirty rotten liar and then would have attempted to kick my own ass.

This would probably be very embarrassing for the both us, since I didn’t know how to fight back then and I certainly don’t know how to fight right now. But after exhausting ourselves from all the arm flailing, I would smooth things over by reminding me that life would get a lot better from here on out.

Then I would give myself a Sports Almanac from today, in the hopes of creating an alternate 2006 where I am a shady industrialist and the kingpin of a vast gambling empire.

Hey, if it worked for Biff, it could work for me!


Now that I think about it, I would easily trade in my future as a casino tycoon to own a flying DeLorean. It doesn't even need time-traveling capabilities. Ooh, yeah, I want a hoverboard, too.

Halloween is the New Christmas II

If you came looking for the most critical and objective coverage of Halloween Madison 2006, then you came to the right place. Your ace reporter in the field has gotten the complete scoop in case you missed out on this year’s festivities.

I know some of you must be wondering to yourselves, “Isn’t Ben, like, 25 years old or something? What’s his geriatric ass doing on State Street with all those young college kids? Shouldn’t he have grown out of Halloween by now?”

Well, I have three VERY good reasons why Halloween is still my favorite Holiday:




Okay, let me explain. I had good and honest intentions to just snap pictures of the best and worst costumes on State Street, and maybe some riot coverage if the shit went down. But after a few whiskey and cokes, the camera kind of started doing its own thing. Imagine that!

But here are some of the best costumes I saw this year. They probably vary quite a bit from a normal person’s idea of a great costume, as I tend to judge based on obscurity, randomness, and suffering caused from exposure to the frigid October weather.


I went as Ace Ventura this year. Prior to this picture, I just got done executing a buttonhook fly pattern in super slo-mo.



My hat goes off to you, Teen Wolf. Michael J. Fox would be proud.













I wonder what the Over/Under is on these guys coming out of the closet within the next year. I've got a hundred bucks that says they'll be quitting their jobs and working in beauty salons by the end of the month.





And the Obscurity Award goes to Buster Bluth, complete with hook hand, from Arrested Development. Nice work, buddy.



My brother's rendition of Magnum P.I. even though, personally, I think he looks more like Mike Ditka on vacation playing a round of golf.









This costume reeks of effort.


Award-winning photography right here.


This chick simply can't get over how awesome my costume is.


My biggest beef with Halloween this year is that the stupid $5 cover charge to get on State Street sort of sucked the life out the event. Halloween used to be about debauchery, drunkeness,and getting as rowdy as possible, all in the name of good fun. You certainly wouldn't expose a small child to it. This year there was about half as many people in attendance and half of THOSE people were a bunch of old farts gawking like a bunch of slack-jawed yokels. It's gotten too commercial, mannnnn. I fear the glory days of Halloween Madison may be waning.

Anyhoo, the winner for best Halloween Costume goes to...drum roll please...


Joe Barrie as Robert Goulet. From two years ago. Seriously, Joe, you set a bar that will probably not be beat for quite some time. I thought I made a pretty decent stab at the title last year with my human sudoku puzzle but it still pales in comparison.

Happy Holidays, Everyone!

6 Reasons Why Phoenix Might Be More Rad Than Wisconsin

I was in Phoenix most of last week for work. It’s a pretty sweet town. Below are six reasons why Phoenix might be more rad than Wisconsin.

1. In-N-Out Burgers:
Have you ever been to one of these before? It’s genius. Some brilliant restaurateur back in California woke up one morning and said to himself, “you know what, from here on out, my menu is only going to have two things: cheeseburgers and french fries. And they’re going to rock the pants off the competition.” Well, you did it, guy. You kept it simple and the result is the best fast-food meal on the market. You get TWO Gold Stars for the day.


2. Circle K Convenience Stores:
I made a point to only frequent Circle K Convenience Stores whenever I needed gas or random shit. Why? Because every time I got out of my car, I would say real loudly in my best Keanu Reeves voice, “Something strange is afoot at the Circle K.” Then I would look around with a bemused look on my face, like I couldn’t believe how clever I was being, to see if anybody “got it”. Nobody did. Apparently no one in the greater Phoenix metropolitan area has ever seen Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. That is definately most non-triumphant. That bit would have killed amongst my friends here. Wyld Stalyns Rule!


"Hey, Ted. I don't think anyone in Phoenix has ever seen our 1989 classic."
"Whoaaaa, Bogus."

3. The Blue Angels:

I was checking out a development site near Luke Air Force Base when all of a sudden, the Blue Angels Fighter Squadron came screaming over my windshield where they proceeded to perform some of the craziest aerials I have ever seen. Some locals later informed me that the Blue Angels were practicing for an air show that was going on later that week. It seemed like a logical explanation, but I knew deep down, those amazing acrobatics were meant just for me. It was the United States Air Force’s way of saluting, “tipping their hat,” if you will, to the grand machismo that is Ben Wollin. It was a fine gesture indeed, and one that I’m sure I would get more often from our other branches of the Armed Forces if it wasn’t for Wisconsin’s stubborn weather conditions, which brings me to my next point…


Don't let anybody tell you otherwise, these fighter planes are fueled exclusively with raw testosterone.

4. Bitchin’ Weather:
Sunny and 85 degrees with not a cloud in the sky. Would you like that forecast in late October, sir? Yes, please.

5. Cabela’s Superstore:
If Ted Nugent and Walt Disney’s cryogenically frozen head ever got together to design a new theme park, it would probably come close to the Cabela’s Superstore in Glendale, Arizona. The store is 160,000 SF of guns, knives, boats, bows, guns, camping gear, fishing tackle, outdoor clothing, and guns. Seriously, this place boasts an armory that rivals most industrialized nations. But it also has a lot of stuff for the fam, like an aquarium, animal museum, restaurant and candy store, and a play area which includes a shooting gallery. Firearms and kids, together at last!

6. Drive-Thru Liquor Stores:
If an idea like this is going to work anywhere, you would think it would most definitely work in Wisconsin. Why don’t we have these here!? Woodmans, I want you taking notes on this. I expect a full report and implementation plan by the end of the week.



"Um..could I get a number 2, but with Colt 45 instead of Old English, a side order of bottle of Jack Daniels, and two, wait, do you guys need something back there, yeah, better make that four bottles of Boones Farm. Oooh, I see pack of cigs is now on your value menu. We'll take a couple of those, too."

Motorboating: Passing Fad or America's New Favorite Pastime?

Every once in awhile, a movie comes along and redefines the definition of sexy. When the movie Ghost came out, nobody looked at a pottery wheel the same ever again after that steamy scene with Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore. Likewise, nobody EVER thought of getting into threesomes until the release of Wild Things, where Denise Richards, Neve Cambell, and Matt Dillon taught us that sex with more than one other person can be more than just a pipedream.

I like to think that instances of Motorboating have skyrocketed after being popularized by Vince Vaughn in Wedding Crashers. In case you don’t know what Motorboating is, it is simply the act of sticking one’s face between two breasts and making a hilarious motorboat sound. I know this entertaining act is taking the country by storm, but is there a way to prove it?

Since there is not a lot of reliable data out there on the subject of Motorboating (dammit Census Bureau!), I decided to seek out empirical evidence, but I didn’t know where to start. Then it hit me:

My roommate has ginormous boobs.

I’m not kidding. Her boobs are so big, I have to charge them separate rent. Apiece. One month, I almost had to evict one of them because of a late payment. That was a weird conversation:

“Abbey, I’ve always appreciated your timely rent payments, actually you AND Sally Sweetmilk have always been great tenants, but something HAS to be done about Ms. Daisy Danglehard.

Anyways, I naturally assumed that my best friend Joe, who is dating this girl, was an expert in the art of Motorboating so I thought I’d get the scoop from him. I’ve transcribed the results of my investigative reporting below:

Me: Hey, Joe, How often to you go Motorboating on Abbey?
Joe: Um…don’t you think that’s kind of inappropriate?
Me: Yeah, but so was naming your girlfriend’s left and right boob, and I didn’t stop there, now did it?
Joe: I guess I can’t argue with that logic. I Motorboat two or three times daily, four if she’s had a particular rough day.
Me: Interesting. This conversation fascinates me.

So there you have it, folks. Based on this one fictional conversation with Joe, I think America’s love affair with Motorboating will continue indefinitely.

I can already envision how great my married life is going to be some day because of this exciting turn of events. I see my kids grabbing their Knightrider Lunch Boxes off the counter and hurrying off to catch the bus to school. Myself, I look down at my watch and notice I’m running late, so I throw down my Wall Street Journal on the breakfast table, grab my briefcase, and say good-bye to my loving wife before I dash off to another day at the rat races.

But instead of the clichéd peck on the cheek, I’m going to grab her real close, get my face all up in ‘em, and, well, you know, BBBTTTPPPBBBTTTPPP!

If that doesn’t say “Love ya, hun”, I don’t know what will.



Hey!? This isn’t what I ordered! Talk about false advertising! Oh well, at least I have my subscription to Taint Quarterly to keep me occupied…

Happy Brett Favre Day!

Tis’ the season everyone. I know it sounds like another one of my fantasy blogs but our very wise state legislators thought the constituents of Wisconsin needed another reason to celebrate Brett Favre’s greatness by giving us a state holiday today to honor his birthday. I was already planning on celebrating, I’m just happy congress legitimized it.

If you don’t believe me, check this out:

Doyle Passes Law to Celebrate Brett Favre

Crazy, huh? In order to properly celebrate this monumental occasion, I’ve created some Brett Favre Day E-Greeting Cards to pass on to your family, co-workers, and no-good rotten friends from Minnesota.

This one is classic:



If your dirty Minnesota friends give you shit over this one, politely remind them that the Minnesota State Legislature is free to honor Brad Johnson with a holiday whenever they please.



Speaks for itself:



I like this one because you can send it whenever you want, it works all year round.



There you have it. I would have been happier if the state legislature would have made the holiday four days instead of one (it only makes sense), but I’ll take what I can get. Now if only there was some way to get off work.

To kick off Brett Favre Day, I recommend watching this clip from Monday Night Football. I watch it every day before I go to work and sometimes before I go to bed. It puts me in a good mood. I recommend you do the same.

Shit That Happened to me in 7th Grade: The Hottest Girls of Parkview Middle School 1995

I decided that I would like to add a new regular column to my beloved Brain Litter, a segment called Shit that Happened to Me in 7th Grade. This segment will feature entries and pictures from my journal at that time period, the original Brain Litter, if you will.

Let me give you a little background here before you just go diving in head first into my deepest, most personal thoughts from eleven years ago.

The year is 1995. I just started Parkview Middle School after transferring from Edison Middle School on the east side of Green Bay. I was kind of chubby, my voice cracked after every other syllable that sputtered out of my mouth, and my mother still dressed me with hand-me-down clothes from God knows where. Add to the fact that middle schoolers are generally just evil and ruthless to any kid different in any sort of way and you’ll get a fairly accurate idea of the mentality that I was in.

My journal was a way to vent my frustrations with the world and to sort out any other random idea I had in my head at the time. I suppose I could have talked it out with Zak Mott and Mike Petresek, who were my best friends at the time, but I’m pretty sure they were only using me so they could play with my Sega CD.

The best way I can describe my journal is to paint you a picture of a typical entry. Imagine me sprawled out on my bedroom floor with my notebook, Zak and Mike are playing Sewer Shark, completely indifferent that I’m even in the room, and Weezer, the Blue Album, is playing at full volume in the background.

Okay, I know you’re all dying to see my list (dated April 1, 1994) so here it is. Keep in mind that the page before this list contained a map that I drew of where all the popular kids sat in the cafeteria and the page after this list contained schematics for a water balloon bazooka:



First of all, if you’re a girl from the AHS graduating class of 2000 and you’re reading this blog post right now, I’m sorry you didn’t make the cut. In all honesty here, it was probably because you didn’t have any boobs yet. What can I say? I was really immature at the time.

Secondly, yup, Katie Knott. She was the only girl I knew going in to Parkview because she went to my church. When I first started my journal, I basically transcribed, verbatim, every dialogue exchanged between the two of us during band practice. Then I would write about what song we performed in percussion and how well I played. It was not compelling writing to say the least, but I got progressively better at capturing my thoughts as the drama of 7th grade unfolded before me.

Third, the Word of the Day. I concluded all my entries with a word of the day. Sometimes the word of the day had enormous reverence to the journal entry preceding it, sometimes it was an obscure reference to The State on MTV. I’m guessing in this case, I was leaning towards the latter.

Well, I hope you enjoyed Part I of Shit That Happened to Me in 7th Grade. Even if you never had the privilege of attending Parkview Middle School, I hope you can appreciate the universal themes of surviving that hellish period in life known as puberty.

More to come in the next few months…

Alright, alright, I know you all want to see the map of where the cool kids sat at lunch time. You didn’t actually think I would hint about something THAT funny and not post it, now did you?



Hey, look at this motley assortment of characters!



This photo has gotten pretty dinged up over the years. I'm still not sure why I poked holes in my own eyes. I was probably lashing out at the world because my mom wouldn't buy me the Gibaud jeans and Cool Water cologne that was neccesary for me to fit in with the cool crowd.