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Atari 2600

2 Oct

Sadly, my downstairs neighbors, Marc y Mark, moved out a few months ago.  There is, however, usually a silver lining to every cloud.  In this case, it was free stuff.  I was gifted a number of vinyls, a few DVDs including Fellini’s “Amarcord” which saves me $30 (fucking greedy Criterion Collection), a statuette of the Stay Puft marshmallow man, a Mr. Beer kit and an Atari 2600.

The system, released in 1977, admittedly predates my time, though I did play some growing up with older cousins.  I have amassed a sizable collection of video games which I will continue to post on.  The Atari fills an important void in my collection of home consoles as it was really the first of its kind.

I actually have the 1982 “Darth Vader” model.  This is not the first Atari I’ve owned.  In fact Continue reading →

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Cell Phone

1 Oct

I hadn’t hated myself more in recent memory than today.  I woke up at 2:40pm still drunk from last night and went to grab my phone which usually sleeps with me.  It wasn’t there.  I checked the floor, the common room, the kitchen, the refrigerator (I’ve found it in there before).  I couldn’t have lost it out, because I didn’t go out…because it was a Friday and I’m in my mid-20’s.

I felt a draft from an open window and the thought occurred to me that I should check the back deck.  There was my phone, sitting precariously on the back ledge, completely soaked.  I barely recalled going outside at around 4am to have a cigarette that my friend left behind which I completely didn’t need for two reasons: 1) my health, and 2) a cigarette at the end of a long night of drinking usually cuts my drunken motor skills in half and I end up decorating my body with bruises.

I immediately disassembled the phone and  dried it the best I could.  It didn’t respond to the power button.  I left it on the charger in front of a fan for two hours (because I don’t own a god damn blow-dryer).  Now, the power button doesn’t work, but the phone does respond when it is opened.  I am praying that the touch screen still works, otherwise, this will be the third Droid that I have gone through.

This whole experience was a bit of a reality check.  I am far too dependent on my phone for somebody who is not important at all.  I wonder how many times a day I check facebook on my phone thinking “I wonder what’s new” only to realize that I checked it 15 minutes prior and nothing ever happens ever.

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Jever Pilsener

30 Sep

German Pilsener

Rating: B-

Poured from bottle to pint glass.

Color is a transparent straw-yellow.  It has a thin, bright white head with nice retention and lacing.  Aroma is very green bottle skunky at first, then earthy, malt and grass.  At first, the taste is honey-sweet and then gives way to a strong, but not entirely unpleasant bitterness.  There are hints of cracker and grainy malt with a bit of astringency.  Medium body with good, zingy carbonation.   The dry finish sort of sits on the back of your tongue.  Pretty average.

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Lagunitas Pils

30 Sep

Czech Pilsener

Rating: B-

Poured from bottle to pint glass.

The beer is a clear yellow with a 1-finger, tiny-bubbled white head.  Minimal spider-webby lacing.  Nose is extremely bready up front, followed by apricot, citrus, earthy hops and a bit of malt.  The aroma gets a bit grassy as the beer drinks down.  A crisp, caramel sweetness transitions to hops, crackery malt and then back to sweet.  It seemsto be a little too much on the sweet side, but is a fairly well-balanced nonetheless.  Medium body with light carbonation, a little oily on the tongue.  I thought the finish would be crisper, but it is slightly wet.  It doesn’t seem terribly indicative of a Pils, though a decent drink.  I would have it again, but wouldn’t rave about it.

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Childrens Hospital

30 Sep

Childrens Hospital is wildly entertaining, and the episodes are so short at five minutes, that one could easily rip through the first two seasons in an evening.  Created by former Daily Show correspondent, Rob Corddry, and produced by Stella triplet David Wain, Childrens Hospital surrounds the lives of a bunch of incompetent doctors Continue reading →

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The Mangler

30 Sep

Two years ago I was living in a two-family home with five friends.  It was like a frat house minus the bros, rape and shitty beer.

My friend and roommate at the time, joeb87, noticed one morning that someone had taken his block of pepper jack cheese out of the refrigerator, gnawed on one corner, and replaced it in the deli drawer.  We laughed, wondering who the hell would be that much of a dirtbag.

Throughout the next two weeks, there were another three or four attacks.  The culprit hit the pepper jack again, hard, joeb87’s jar of peanut butter got hand-scooped and there was a mysterious disappearance of a bag of Doritos.  We began referring to said monster as The Mangler Continue reading →

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The Auteurs – New Wave

29 Sep

New Wave by The Auteurs (1993)

This debut album has a slew of great tracks.  The Auteurs, unlike Oasis and Blur, find themselves amongst a number of other Britpop bands that never made a [big] name for themselves in the US: namely Suede, Pulp and Denim.  (I feel like I need to start a Britpop band named “Flannel”…who’s with me?)  The Auteurs’ sound, Continue reading →

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Orval Trappist Ale

29 Sep

Belgian Pale Ale

Rating: A+

Poured from bottle to pint glass.

Pours a thick, fluffy white head that lasts for some time.  The color is a rich, cloudy amber.  Very pleasant aroma of spice (cloves), orange, malts and yeast.  The taste is very malty upfront, but gives way to a hoppy backbone with accents of fruit.  Medium bodied with high carbonation.  Surprisingly well-balanced.  The uncommonly high ABV at 6.7% is masked well without any astringency.  The dry, bitter finish ends on the roof of the mouth.  This was the first time that I had tried this beer and I would highly recommend it.  Extremely satisfying.

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Hesse – Steppenwolf

28 Sep

Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse (1927)

Der Steppenhipster

Our protagonist, Henry Haller, is introduced in a brief preface by Haller’s landlord’s nephew.  The preface is largely expository and not all that interesting.  This novel takes a good 100 pages before it really drags the reader in; that’s when I start finding more and more notes and dog-eared pages.  Haller is plagued with a “sickness of the times.”  At the end of the preface, the nephew tells us that the story is “an attempt to present the sickness itself in its actual manifestation.  [It] means, literally, a journey through hell, a sometimes fearful, sometimes courageous journey through the class of a world whose souls dwell in darkness, a journey undertaken with the determination to go through hell from one end to the other, to give battle to chaos, and to suffer torture to the full.”  I learned from Hesse’s 1961 forward to the novel that Continue reading →

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Corsendonk Abbey Pale Ale

27 Sep

Belgian Tripel

Rating: B+

Poured from bottle to pint glass.

The beer pours cloudy and golden with some visible sediment. Thin, small-bubbled eggshell head leaves almost no lacing behind. The aroma is spicy (definite coriander), citrusy and fruity (apple among others). The taste is lemony upfront and then sweet, champagney and very fruity with a bit of malt. The mouthfeel is crisp and medium bodied with med-hi carbonation. Dry, bitter finish. The sediment leads me to believe that my bottle may have been a bit out of date.  I owe this beer another shot.

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