Edge-Pushing Cartoons: Cartoons with No Bounds or Bars

Certain comedy cartoons which are not aimed at the little child target market have developed massive popularity over the last thirty years or so. These certain cases of cartoons achieving mass appeal has categorically been due to the program's satirical qualities and its ability to make fun of the real universe in its cartoon meta-universe.

The world of Omni-popular cartoons aimed at everyone except little babies is a small historical sample size to work with. We shall be looking into the four cartoons which have garnered mass appeal over the last few decades (shows which have generated huge audience, movie deals, etc.).

We shall give these shows a final tally and rating based on....um....I dunno.

You can rate stuff with numbers, obviously, but it's not an all encompassing variables rating system by any stretch. You can assign something a 5 or a 77 or even a 88.125 but what does that really tell anyone? It's just a dumb number.

You can use letters and assign something an A+ or a C- or a D, but again, they are just dumb old letters. Some people try and use "stars" like gold ones because they look cool, and some folks use "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" but that is only a two-variable system which leaves no room for any details. You either have a gold star or a upward thumb or you don't...pretty shoddy system.

I believe I shall use a geometric rating system. Yes, the shows shall be rated using standard geometric shapes. Each component of the cartoon show which improves it will be shown with a face/vertex/frequency/side. Whilst each bad component of the show shall materialize itself within the shape as well.

So, yeah. Our rating system for this review shall be geometric in nature. The final grade shall indeed be a shape.

The Simpsons

Everyone is familiar with this show, it does not matter whether you live in Kathmandu, Podunk or North Haverbrook. This is the first show which exploded into an all encompassing target market behemoth which rained down comedy on the masses. An instant success.

I was in the first grade (age 6.5) when the Simpsons came on the scene and its culture bomb invaded my elementary school in a decisive wave of popularity. Every kid had Bart Simpson shit...t-shirts, lunch boxes, stickers. Yo, one time I was standing in line in like grade 3 and this girl wanted to look at my Bart Simpson t-shirt where Bart is dressed as a Ninja Turtle (combined marketing appeal) and I couldn't turn to show her. I felt really sick that day and she was getting mad at me for not turning to show it to her....and then I puked. Everywhere. It was the only time I ever puked at school. I puked a lot though and the teacher gave me a blue rectangular container to puke in. It sucked and was embarrassing but when I think about it now...I laugh. I remember it pretty good for something that happened like 22 years ago.

Anyway, the Simpsons was very well written when it first came out. The creator Matt Groening was the mind behind Life in Hell and ran the Simpsons as a short on the Tracy Ullman show before hitting it big. The early shows were heart felt and down-to-earth and very likeable. They were the most loveable dysfunctional unit of humans on T.V. and they weren't even real people. Shows about how they got their dog or how Lisa coped with her obtuse opinions were very well received with audiences.

As tame as the 90s Simpsons is by today's standards....it was hated by parents/teachers/church/etc back in the day. Early Simpsons did indeed push the edge, it made fun of our society by exaggeratingly mirroring it in their yellow tinted universe. The good part about old Simpsons episodes can be summed up with one word...subtlety. The satire and rebellious nature wasn't as in your face as the shows that came after it but it was always there.

Take a look at the authority figures in the Simpsons for example. None of them are presented as being competent or regarded as upright citizens. The Mayor is a crook, the chief of police is a pig-faced moron, the owner of the nuclear power plant (the richest man in town) is down right evil and sadistic. There's nothing wholesome or heroic about these people....these aren't your Leave it to Beaver friendly people in your neighborhood types. Yet they are more realistic that's for sure. It was not common in programs watched by young people in this era to find authority figures being presented in this realistic fashion.

The Simpsons was the original Edge-Pusher and it broke ground subtly, left a huge mark, and was the trail blazer for future Edge-Pusher cartoons. Sadly, the Simpsons got really horrible at some point and never regained composure.

I've been trying to pinpoint where it officially jumped the shark, and I think I have the answer.

NO FONZE DON'T DO IT! THERE'S NO WAY BACK!

Where exacty did the Simpsons jump on water-skies and attempt to publish a show to the airwaves so unforgivably retarded that they crossed shark infested waters and had no way of ever getting back to where they once were?

For me personally, I remember when it happened, and I remember well. In Season 9 they ran a show so pointless and convoluted for no apparent reason other than that they had literally NO ideas left. The show in question is where Seymour Skinner reveals that he is not Seymour Skinner but is actually...Armin Tanzarian.

Never has a story line been so pointless, never has a cliff hanger been so stupid, never has an idea been so convoluted and inherently pointless as the Armin Tanzarian episode. I remember sitting there after the show was over and having an inner dialogue with my stupid ol' self that was like...

"Wait, that was really bad..."

"But, the Simpsons is cool...how can something cool be bad? It's a fallacy"

"No, but this was shit. This episode was total shit. Why did they go with this idea?"

"You're crazy. The Simpsons rules and it always will!"

"You're wrong self. The Simpsons sucks. It's terrible. It's the WORST EPISODE EVER"

"...but, if the Simpsons sucks, what else is cool that actually sucks?"

"I dunno bro...probably EVERYTHING EVER"

(Me, inner monologue, circa 1997)

The idea that "The Simpsons Sucks" smashed my rosy-colored view of the world and left me feeling very cynical. Next thing I know...everything sucked. Like, I watched an episode of Saturday Night Live (which the previous week was ok)...but after Armin Tanzarian water-skied over a sea of venomous sharks...SNL started to look like total shit too. I couldn't even watch it, I wanted to jump into the screen and tell Kris Kattan to stop making a mockery of comedy and find something better to do. I haven't watched either of these shows in 15 years.

So to whoever wrote that episode of the Simpsons back in 1997 (Ken Keeler), way to go man. Thanks for ruining the Simpsons dude.

Rating: Thanks to nine good seasons (1989-1997) The Simpsons has some good depth to its shape. Nine sturdy lines, nine healthy and witty vertexes. Yet thanks to 16 horrible seasons to its name the shape is represented differently. It's nine-sided nonogonic nucleus of sturdy good qualities is overshadowed by an entwining 16-sided uncomfortably cumbersome hexakaidecagon. The final tally of the result of its rating is:

Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon

As you can see the nine-sided nucleus is well connected and sturdy...yet the additional 16 sides of the polygon are cumbersome and unnecessary. The only logical geometric rating to give The Simpsons is the Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon, obviously and undoubtedly. 

If making some cartoons is like building a house...then who would want to build a house shaped like a Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon? Probably Ken Keeler.

Beavis and Butthead

 
Okey-doke, so naturally moving along chronologically in our compendium of cartoons we arrive at the hit 1993 cartoon show...Beavis and Butthead.

I've written before about my enjoyment derived from watching this program so the rating may be a tad biased but it's just a stupid blog about my opinions so that's all you're gonna get. You're gonna get heavily biased views. Thank you very much.

This show had a million times more controversy than the Simpsons ever generated. From Senators denouncing it on the house floor, to Carl Sagan denouncing it in Demon Haunted World. This show got up everybody's trouser legs and just like the Simpsons it took a great deal of subtle (well not so subtle) satire up there with it.

 Now who is dis here Beevo and Buffcoats what-have-ya?

Previous entries on Beavis and Butthead: 

1. Beavis and Butthead are Back

2. Dear Carl Sagan Who art in Somewheres...

Rating: Beavis and Butthead had 1+6+1 seasons. Yet the first season was of notoriously poor quality and offered no subtly (straight out shock 'til you drop style). So in essence it is 6 core seasons + 1 notoriously bad one (1993) + 1 late-addition REALLY GOOD add-on (2011). It is in essence a hexagonal base structure yet it's core has so much depth that the lines are not flat. In fact it is a six faced structure...a cube to be more precise. 

The first season acts as a rough nucleus of non-concentric circle wavelengths radiating at the core of the six-faced core-cube. The first season acting as the most offensive season thus a radio-wave catalyst and driving force...yet still very unrefined. The 8th and final season in 2011 acts as a second wavelength of concentric circles which merges with the non-concentric circle wavelengths to create Pi (π)  and smooth out the core into a smooth sphere. Yes, Beavis and Butthead's most accurate rating variable in regards to this review is the Sphere-Nucleus Cube.

 Sphere-Nucleus Cube

South Park 

Our next sequential entry is the take-no-prisoners tour-de-force known as "South Park." Its first episode aired in 1997 and I remember it well. 

A station in my region bought the original 6 shows in 1997 and aired one...then waited for the complaints and ensuing damage-control needed before airing any others. Meanwhilst, in 1997 the internet was going strong and I had already figured out how to stream videos and watch whatever the fuck I wanted.

So, lo and behold...all the kids at my high school were talking about how funny that ONE episode of South Park was and I dropped a bombshell when I stated that I had already seen six shows. Naturally no one believed me so I took the time to storyboard out the shows at lunch period and said to the naysayers...

"Ye who doubt that I have seen 6 episodes of South Park lest only watch when the other 5 finally air and ye shall see that all my divine prophecies ring true. For in the next installment, Kathie Lee Gifford is parodied and Cartman gets very very fat!" 

Obviously when the station in question did finally air the second episode my prediction rang true and all the two or maybe three people I told it to thought I was pretty friggin' cool and everything.

As far as controversy goes...honestly it didn't get as much as Beavis and Butthead because Mike Judge had kinda plowed a good deal of chillness (in regards to cartoons) into society by this juncture. 

Though South Park had to always do more and more and more to push the bar so low that not even fucking James Cameron could fish it out of the abyss. Yet through all the bar lowering the show stills has an acerbic deadly wit behind it. It's shock and awe, all the time, but when you burrow underneath the surface there's a lot of really intelligent stuff going on with this show.

Even after SEVENTEEN FUCKING YEARS the new season is looking strong. The tour-de-force has never lost its drive and there's even still potential in this show. Unlike the Simpsons which jumped the shark and died soon after...South Park has managed to find a way to be shark proof.

  As Shark Proof as The Batman

Maybe it was in Season 2 where they depicted Fonzie jumping over a shark...and then the shark caught and devoured Fonzie that broke the curse for them. Maybe they've been shark proof and free and at ease since 1998. Either way, alls I knows is, South Park is still good after 17 years.

Rating: It's a clean 17-sided Heptadecagon, no doubt about it. Each point of the Heptadecagon intersects geodesically with each other point at roughly 60 degree angles. Yes, South Park is undoubtedly a 60-degree intersecting well-made Heptadecagon. 

 60-Degree Intersecting Heptadecagon

Yes, yes it is. Oh and, since South Park has had 17 good seasons and The Simpsons has only had 9...

17 - 9 = 8

South Park is 8 units better than The Simpson mathematically. South Park is thus quantifiably Octahedronically better than The Simpsons.

Family Guy

It's becoming hip to rag on poor old Family Guy, but I want the record to show that I've never really been huge on this show and I'm not one of these band-wagonning anti-Family Guy genres of people. I believe Family Guy jumped the shark and began being pretty crappy at this juncture...

Yeah, Okay, he hurt his knee. What a cute joke. Okay, okay...good for fucking him. These types of jokes are the core of the show which is shrouded in an impenetrable wall of stolen bits. That basically is what Family Guy is. It was bad from the first season, right from the get-go, and will always be bad. There's no blips in the wavelength of shit...just shit...forever and ever.

Its geodesic shape is that of actual inertia. A straight line of never-ending/never-altering crap.

"Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its motion (including a change in direction). In other words, it is the tendency of objects to keep moving in a straight line at constant linear velocity, or to keep still." (wiki) 

Family Guy is a straight unchangeable line. What's more is they gave this show TWO clones of itself...American Dad and Cleveland. Meaning this straight line has two identical clones of it in its universe.

Rating: What do three straight identical measuring and angled lines give us?

Equilateral Triangle

Family Guy (and Family Guy ' and Family Guy '') are an equilateral triangle....of crap. Okay, it's not that bad, it can be funny sometimes but I think this rating variable really fits snug-like-a-glove in this case.

Conclusion

We have successfully concluded our geometric ranking of Edge/Boundary Pushing Cartoon shows and I believe it went well. Maybe I should go back to rating things with numbers or letters though.

I wanted to include good shows like Futurama and Ren and Stimpy (I think Ren and Stimpy has a big place in history honestly)...but these two are not omni-popular like the Big 4 Edge-Pushers are. Only 4 cartoons have had massive appeal.

Thank you and good night.

What's up with those Montreal Expos Baseball Fans? Seems like They Want that Baseball Back or somethin'...

I've wrote somewhat extensively on the Montreal Expos Renaissance Movement.

January, 8 of 2013: Speculations and/or Prognostications on Phase II of Montreal Baseball Project

April 4, of 2012:  After 34 years the Serious Heart Attack Fires still Burn Strong

In the prognosticative piece we delved into Warren Cromartie's Manifesto ("Montreal is a Five Tool City") on the return of the Expos...or I guess it's more of a Cro-Mafesto. Within the Cro-Mafesto we focused on the 4th point of the pentagon-pointed five-tools which make up this wonderful baseball city in my heavily speculative article.

Today we shall look into another piece of the pentagonal "5 Tools" (as such). We shall be looking into the "Passionate Fan Base" tool.

The other sports fan bases in this city we already know about. Not one person hasn't heard of the Montreal Canadiens hockey club. The Montreal Canadiens fans look at their city's hockey team as the life and essence of the city itself almost.

We wish to focus on the rabid fan base of baseball fans only.

Take this story:

http://www.ctvnews.ca/sports/expos-fans-pack-bleachers-at-toronto-game-hoping-to-lure-a-team-to-montreal-1.1375970

A contingent of 1,000 Expos fans comprised of hardcore fans, who never stopped believing in their team, dawned Expos gear and showed their colors at a Toronto Blue Jays game. Now granted 1,000 is not a huge number but it's only the tip of the ice berg of the rabid base that lies underneath the surface.

Last week, the New York Mets and Toronto Bluejays announced two exhibition games will be hosted at Montreal's Olympic Stadium. Within a week they have sold over 80,000 tickets for these games. Montreal wants baseball back. That's 80K tickets purchased by Montreal's fan base for exhibition (not even regular season) games. It seems they are serious about getting a team back.

That's how it starts...

A guy like Cromartie convinces everyone it's possible...The "baby steps" have been set in motion.

The ball gets rollin' and 1,000 people are convinced it's possible and crash a game in full Expos regalia...The Kool-Aid starts gettin' stirred up quick.

Then 80,000 people catch the Baseball Fever...Something's brewin' that's what it's doin'.

The wheels are now in motion...will 4 million people in the greater Montreal area catch the Fever? My guess is...Yes, it is most likely.

Memories of the Greatest

On a related note, Vladimir Guerrero has announced his official retirement from the game:

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/23645316/vladimir-guerrero-makes-retirement-official

Vlad was "The Last Mohican" of the Expos...or maybe Vlad was the "Last Samurai"...No, Vlad was the "Last Dragon..."

You aaaaaaare the Last Draaaaaaagon!

Out of all the Heroes, Legends, and Diamond Kings...Vladimir was Montreal's last Diamond King, our Last Dragon.

When many of the Montreal's Diamond Kings careers came to a close they ventured back here to receive their curtain call. Take the dearly departed, but still awesome in all our hearts, Gary Carter...

1992 Double Video

Or who could forget Tim Raines' triumphant return in 2001?

Rock 2001 Return

Yet, with the Expos no longer around...there will be no curtain call for our Last Dragon. Vladimir Guerrero won't get to double over Andre Dawson's head in right, or draw a walk while 55,000 fans stand and cheer during his entire at-bat like they did for Raines. If the Expos were still here Vlad would have been on the 2013 roster and he would have had an unforgettable curtain call at Olympic Stadium.

I will say this...Vlad was the most electrifying athlete who EVER played in this city. His talent was unfathomable.

The rumored story of how Vlad ended up here was that Tommy Lasorda kicked him off the Dodgers because Vladdy showed up with two different pairs of moldy old shoes and Tommy judged the book by the cover and assumed he was a bum. Felipe Alou recognized the diamond in the rough and invited the skinny awkard lanky kid to spring training.

He was the strong silent type. Never ever speaking. The only time anyone heard him speak was at the last game he played in an Expos uniform when he took a microphone onto the field and simply stated...

"Merci Beaucoups"

Everything had to epic like that with this guy.

Happy trails Vladdy, it is too bad that you didn't get a send off. If anyone deserved one it was you.



Like the seasons, love will come and go
If it's right, you'll automatically know
The world of mystery exists only in your head
When you become one with yourself
The wall will fall

There's a power deep inside you, an inner strength
You'll find in time of need.

You had the power. You had the glow, bro. 

You were the Expos' Last Dragon...

Why the Scientific Community is Concerned about Climate Change...

...and why you shouldn't hate on them.

Recently, it appears that a few tabloid articles from tabloid news agencies (Daily Mail (UK) was the first I believe to run it), have claimed to prove that climate change is a hoax.

I do not personally 100% agree with the articles of late that claim to have proven climate change to be a scam..but...there's some factors of it that I do agree with. I hate the climate change apocalyptic prognosticators as much as anyone, I think Al Gore is a sheister/buffoon, and I do not believe we will see immediate disastrous effects out of our backyard windows in the next few years.

Yet, that is not to say that because the apocalyptic prognostication faction has been slow to show us any awesome apocalypses, we can officially demote climate science to junk science.

The following are the reasons I believe climate change is occurring and why it can be very dangerous.

1. Humans evolved with their environments in a similar fashion throughout the entire planet. Humans are far and foremost a coastal sea-faring species. The percentage of humans still living in coastal regions vary from source to source yet a general estimate of 40-50% seems like the mean figure.

http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/es/papers/Coastal_Zone_Pop_Method.pdf

2. A 2006 study carried out by Church and White found that global sea levels are rising. They have concluded that sea levels have risen at a steady rate and will keep rising. Any proceeding study into sea levels supported the results of this study.

http://naturescapebroward.com/NaturalResources/ClimateChange/Documents/GRL_Church_White_2006_024826.pdf

So...if half of the humans on earth live on the coast and global sea levels are rising, could all these cities eventually be submerged? The answer is yes but it will not be tomorrow or next month. This is a gradual process. The cities can be submerged in 2100, 2300, 2500, 3100...we don't know. The possibility of this coastal submerging occurring is definite yet due to the time frame, me and you won't have to worry about it. Your great great grandchildren? Yes, probably.

3. Global sea/ocean temperatures are going up at an incredible rate. As water heats it expands (through convection) causing the density of the liquid to drop but the mass to increase. This only explains a portion of why water levels are rising. The other factor is that glaciers, ice shelves, and other blocks of solid liquid are also losing density and increasing in overall mass (melting).

The ant-arctic ice is staying stagnant and even growing (to the glee of climate change opponents) yet we have lost millions of square kilometers of ice in the opposite pole. Millions of square kilometers of ice in the north pole is becoming liquid.

(See: https://climate.nasa.gov/)

That's how they derive their statistics.

4. Why are global waters getting hotter? Why are they melting ice? What is causing this? Some speculate that it is only natural. Others speculate that a dense covering of gas is trapping heat within the planet, the oceans then absorb this heat and convect. The proof they cite is that they have measured the acidity of the water and it is increasing at a gradual rate as well.

http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/co2/story/What+is+Ocean+Acidification%3F

This is the theory which gets everyone excited and worried because it is the one that links human-made pollution to the rising temperature of global waters.

2 Things to Remember...

Firstly, Tabloids are not very educational. Sadly, all news outlets are of the tabloid variety because it is the only profitable method to sell news. The definition of "tabloid" is as follows (as per wikipedia):

"Tabloid journalism tends to emphasize topics such as sensational crime stories, astrology, gossip columns about the personal lives of celebrities and sports stars, and junk food news. Such journalism is commonly associated with tabloid sized newspapers like the National Enquirer, Globe, [Fox], or the The Sun and the former News of the World."

This is not the place to get your understanding of the world and how it operates. This style of journalism is designed to run stories that make readers mad/happy/sad (i.e. generate some sort of immediate emotional response) it is not designed to be educational. The Daily Mail (UK) column this story initially surfaced from is a tabloid...nothing more and nothing less.

If you would like to verse yourself in scientific journals and have a broader opinion on the matters at hand then by all means do so. Getting your info from scientific journals is going to give you far more credible information than a tabloid source.

Secondly, scientists understand the sands of human time in the scope of the god damned universe. Here to try and explain it is my home-slice, the deceased but still awesome Carl Sagan, and he's rappin' 'bout how short human history has been:

He's trying to explain it with calendar-esque day/hour/minute/second metrics that most of us are used to judging time in. We've only been here but for a moment, we really have. To the cosmos billions of years is nothing. Things take a long time, forces such as the erosion of rocks, the forming of continents, or the evolution of species are forces that alter the planet very GRADUALLY. You have to understand that it's not a bang-bang one-two punch. It takes a long time.

Yes, the average human only lives for about 75 years but your life is just one moment in the grand scheme of human existence. Theoretically, we can carry on the human game we're playing for billions of years right to the end (when the sun peters out), we can carry on the human game for a coupla hundred more years (by killing ourselves)...or we could even possibly harness technology, save ourselves, and fly out to settle other space rocks heated by other damned suns and play the human game infinitely.

The sensational tabloids will report the matter on either polarized perspective of climate change as if it will or will not kill us right now. People who are interested in science don't tend to think of the right now all the time, they know gradual processes take immense amounts of time.

Nuclear war will kill us all right-here-right-now and it is the only immediate apocalyptic event...but the destruction of our life-support system on earth through natural forces and/or man made pollution is a gradual process that may take thousands or hundreds of years.

Conclusion

Yes, climate change is occurring. No, it is not a hoax (my opinion anyway). Should we worry about it? Not in the immediate future.

In the case that you are a future-thinking dude/chick and wonder what the lives your great great great ancestors will be like....then yeah, you should worry.


Note (added Sept. 25/2013): I mentioned nuclear war as being the only event that will instantaneously assure our mutual destruction but I was not correct with that statement. There are many ways we can go extinct from natural causes. A good read on the subject of how we may all die is the 5th section of Neil DeGrasse Tyson's excellent book..."Death by Black Hole and other cosmic quandaries."

Hard Hitting Straight Truth: Fast Food Review

Food review blogs get good hits, I'm gonna try to lure some of those hits here with some big-time tags like "MacDonald's" or "Burger King."

I am going to review the fast food chains which operate in my living area. Obviously, since these are franchises and one store might be a lot different from another one, they will differ but in general it should be mostly one and the same (that's the point of a franchise). So just two things to establish first:

A) Chains with market share and popularity in my area may not be the same in your area. For instance, there's no White Castles or In & Outs where I am...and I have chains in this area like Dagwood's and various poutine/hotdog ones that are not apparent elsewhere.

B) Franchises in terms of speed of service vary GREATLY. In big cities it's usually bang-bang, but in smaller cities the speed of service is reduced amazingly in some locations. I was in the tiny villa of Cornwall, Ontario this one time and waited almost 1 hour for fast food. When rating speed of service in fast food take into account that some far-off locales can be very understaffed and/or staffed by the Cornwall bumpkins.

Alright so here's the metrics I will be using to formulate and tally overall ratings. The following four metrics will variate from A (best) to F (worst).

1. Taste
2. Health (nutrition of the food, not the condition of the restaurant)
3. Speed
4. Price

(Weight: Taste 4, Health 2, Speed 2, Price 2...to form a total of 10 points)

The following metrics will variate only between Y and N (yes or no).

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products?
2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea?
3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers?

(any Y variables in these fields will give a penalty of 4 points to the overall score)

We shall break down the review into the following sections...

1. Burger Joints
2. Sandwich Joints
3. Hotdog/Poutine Joints
4. Donut/Coffee Joints
5. Arabic Joints
6. Mexican Joints
7. Asian Joints
8. Fried Chicken Joints

Also before hearing my opinions take note of my credentials...

1. I love eating, it is my passion in life.
2. In the vein of Sy Sperling...I not only eat at these locations but have worked at many of them.
3. I have a degree in Culinary Arts and am a licensed Sommelier. I know how to taste things right.

Okay, Let's Go

Okie Dokie, let's get started now.

I pledge allegiance to Macdonald's...

--Burger Joints--

The fast food realm of MacDicks, Burger Slut, Burger Chef's,
Burger King, Burger Man, 5 Guys. It is the iconic fast food outlet. The icon of "model efficiency" using cheap produce, cheap "meat", cheap labor and trying to maximize dollars by selling burgers. These vary in terms of all the variables but a common thread looks like this...






Taste: B+

Burgers, shakes, and fries do taste good. No doubt. Positive ratings throughout the burger realm. A lot of additives are used to give it the "savory" flavor as the food industry refers to it.

Health: F

Burgers, shakes, and fries are not good for you. Even the alternative items on the menu are not good for you. Don't fool yourself because you got a salad instead of fries that you're eating right.

Speed: A

Very fast...but when long lines form and only some cashes are open you will see massive slow-down very quickly.

Price: B+

Cheap meals. Though they are raising quite a bit...I remember when a trio would be like 6 bucks now I think it's close to 11.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y

Most if not all of these burger joints use bi-product like ears, tails, and eyes smashed together into a pink slime and then re-constituted into a oblong shaped burger disk.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? Maybe

It is  designed to be chewed easily and make you not feeling filled...but there is a possibility MacDonald's will come out of your ass weird. (only -2 not -4 for the penalty)

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? Y


As to why? According to this,

"Tips are not accepted as McDonald's restaurants have a team environment which is not about rewarding individuals."

Working at McShits or Burger Dump is a pretty crappy job and tips left by customers to the workers would work out on average to about 10-20 bucks extra income for employees per day at busy locations. It's so cheap and dumb to disallow what every other fucking restaurant allows. A big -4 penalty for this.

Burger Joint's Overall Score: -7/10
McDonkey's and the rest of the ilk didn't even manage to crack a ZERO. Not off to a good start.

--Sandwich Joints--

Led in market share by Subway, we see others occasionally. I mentioned Dagwood's which is a very local franchise where I live but has a good dose of locations.

Subway is headed by their face-man, Jarred, who has lots of aides.



Taste: B

Less tasty then grease-pit food but it's still very good.

Health: B


Don't let Jarred fool you...eating at Subway's regularly is by no means a healthy diet. Unless your getting some gimmicky "Healthy Veggie Mini-Cal Low-Blah-Blah-Blah" then yeah, but that will seriously handicap the taste score which is being taken from eating the good subs not the lame ones.

Speed: B


Making the food right in front of the customer doesn't let the worker cut corners to get it done faster (not that this is a bad thing mind you). Them not being able to do the things employees do behind the scenes to makes things faster reduces overall speed output.

Price: B

Not bad. It is just sandwich meat though...so it's not getting an A for making people pay like 12 bucks for a trio when it's just sandwich meat. I can make a sandwich myself at home (or in a sack lunch) pretty damn fast and well, dropping 12 bucks for these trios for something you can make yourself isn't a wise budget move. Not deserving of an A.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y


They use the crappy cold cuts like you buy at the grocery store. It's all pink slime. Does that chunk of whatever it is they cut in front of you (ham, turkey, etc.) look like an animal? No. It's reconstituted into a chunk of bi-product.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? N


Barring a bad strain of something this food shouldn't give you weird shits. Maybe people with virgin palettes could have difficulty digesting the hot peppers but it's not a big deal.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N

Yes, it is legal for an employee to have a "tip jar", "tip cup", "tip container" or just flash some extra change near the cash to show that the customer can leave a tip. There's times I do see it at Subway and there's times I don't. It hasn't caught on too hard at this chain.

If customers even leave the really small change behind (any money piece less than a quarter), you're talking about minimum of an extra dollar or two dollars per hour worked.

Sandwich Joint's Overall Score: 1/10
They cracked zero which is a plus. It looks good compared to Burger Joints anyway.

Get the trio, guy. All Dressed.

--Hotdog/Poutine Joints--

This is very regional to my region and many aren't familiar with this variation of fast food restaurant. It is basically a grease pit which serves hot dogs and a Quebec regional culture item known as poutine. "Belle Province" leads in the market share and many competitors even use a similar name and logo (La Belle, Belle P, etc.). Another big name is Lafleur's which is a good prototypical example as well.


Taste: A

Not the hot dogs...but poutines are good. It's fries with gravy and cheese curds. The cheese curds melt with the gravy and make these cool squeaky sounds when you eat them. It's fucking good.

Sometimes cheaper places will use regular mozzerrealla and the wrong gravy. It's okay, it lowers the taste score by a grade but still acceptable. What is not acceptable is that one time at the Buffalo Bill's fast food chain...where motherfuckers put kraft processed singles in my poutine. That's retarded, yo.

For the record most of these have smoke meat available too, which is tasty, but most of the best smoke meat restaurants are sit down restaurants.

Health: F

Yo, fried and salted potato strips smothered in gravy and sprinkled with a healthy dose of big fat curd cheese is not good for you. No one needs that spelled out as to why.

Speed:  *S* ( Super caliber. bonus points for above A)

Fuck, son. I remember a time at many Lafleur's where they had a timer next to the cash and you'd never see it go over like 20 seconds. Getting into 30 and you'd be like..."what the fuck that's slow." Seriously, you get your hot dogs and poutine almost instantaneously at Lafleur's and variants.

Price: A

Hot dogs are like under a buck sometimes. Poutines vary greatly in price though...but for the most part eating at hd/p places is cheaper than burger joints.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y

Hot dog meat is like the furthest thing from being legit meat.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? Maybe

I've been eatin' poutines since I was a little kid so my gut is used to dealing with the digestion of them. If you are new to it then maybe it will fuck your stomach up. (half penalty)

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N

It's common if not universal in this fast food realm to see tip receptacles of all manners. There's a good receptacle at the one up nears wheres I lives. They cut a hole into the counter so the tips fall and cascade into a secret untouchable receptacle...where punks and bandits cannot swipe them whilst the cashier has momentarily diverted attention. Good idea to minimize tip theft.

Hotdog/Poutine Joint's Overall Score: 3/10 
A somewhat low final tally. Though keep in mind it is still 300% better than Sandwich Joints.

Oh Tim Hortons, my home and...

--Donut/Coffee Joints--

Americans know this realm of fast food as Dunkin Dern Dern's but in my region the market share is not even a close race. Tim Whoreton's has the god damned monopoly in this domain.

It's weird too. It's like a Canadian thing. They had this corny commercial once where like this wussy dude is traveling across Europe and they see his Canadian flag on his backpack and then everyone loves him. If you want to see the definition of sappy then search for Tim Horton's commercials and try and watch them without poking your eyes out.

The campaigns work too. You can't say bad things about this company in Canada, it's like treason. Even though it is incorporated in Delaware and had it's most growth whilst being owned by the Wendy's chain, it is still a taboo in Canada to say bad things about Tim Horton's. Why? I dunno, because it's named after a hockey player or maybe because Canadians grasp at any straw imaginable to pretend they have an identity.

Political photo ops for politicians in Tim Horton's are too common. They make Canadian voters all wet too. There's nothing more appealing to Canadian voters for a politician than getting a photo of yourself drinking Tim Horton's coffee.

MacDonald's is trying to muscle into their retail coffee market share by getting nice brown paper coffee cups and lowering it's price of coffee to as cheap as free...but you cannot wrestle away market share from Tim Horton's in Canada. It is literally ingrained into customers minds that eating at Tim Whoreton's makes you a Canadian citizen (as retarded as that sounds).

So the main thread for the ratings are taken from Tim Horton's for the following review, though most readers would probably relate better to Dunkin' Donuts (both are very similar though). It shouldn't change much in the data.

Taste: C

Very bland. There was a time when Dough Knots at Tim Whoreton's were made in a big fryer and the baker flipped them with this cool stick...now they come to the franchise frozen and it is heated by a kid in a conventional oven. They are cheap as fuck. The donuts are literally bread rolls with icing on them. You can buy better donuts at the grocery store by the the dozen for much less.

Health: C

Donuts are not a well balanced diet.

Speed: B

It's average speed.

Price: F

Look, the big morning seller while I worked at Tim Sluttons was the toast and coffee special. You can almost buy a whole loaf of bread and a whole fucking tin of coffee for the same price as this "special." In the morning before I go to work I can make coffee and toast in literally like a minute (make the coffee first, then make the toast while it brews, they should both be complete at the same time). How can anybody wait in line with their vehicle at the fucking drive-thru...as cars line up all the way into the fucking street..BLOCKING FUCKING TRAFFIC FROM USING THE ROAD...just to get their morning toast and coffee? You people are fucking retarded. Lazy lazy lazy fucking people.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y

They use like Maple Leaf "chicken" and grocery store sandwich meat for the sandwiches...but it should also be noted like above that they cut so many corners to save money that they should get a Y just for those cheap-ass frozen bread rolls they pour chocolate on and call donuts. 

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? N

Coffee speeds up your shits. But not necessarily in a bad way...usually in a good way. I'll give it a N variable here.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N

It is universally not only accepted but encouraged to tip Tim Horton's employees. You can get decent tips too if you work overnight shift because you are alone and don't need to split them up with others...and because drunk guys come in with chicks and are so used to impressing them at the bar they were just at by flashing good tips that they continue the process of impressing her while getting food after. They buy like a bagel and look at the chick...and then tip the cashier like a twenty...and the chick's all like..."wow, you're so rich and shit." Working overnight at a Whoreton's near a popular bar is decent for tips.

Donut/Coffee Joint's Overall Score: -2/10
Uh oh. Back into the negatives. That's no good. I was going to give it bonus points for making people feel Canadian...but then I thought maybe they should actually lose points for making people think a Deleware owned fast food donut shop is a reason to have civic pride in their nation.

Shish Tah Ook

--Arabic Joints--

I was surprised to see that this is also pretty regional to my area. Amir's and Basha (especially Amir's) is found almost everywhere in Montreal. I thought they were other places too but I guess not.

They make Shish-Taouk and Shwarmas. (pronounced: Shish Ta Ook and Sha-War-Mah) It's similar to gyros, souflaki, or donairs (I've seen these pita sandwiches refferred to as "donairs" in both Pittsburgh and Calgary).


Taste: A

Tastes good. They use cool vegetables too like pickled pink turnips and nice tasty sauces like garlic sauce and hummus. Hummus is like a meal in itself and it's freakin' good for you too.

They got bak-lava for desert which is a sugar delight.

Health: A


Meat, vegetables, and pita in the main unit. The sides are garlic potatoes, salad, or rice. It's not really super healthy but for fast food it's a really good choice. Vegetarians can eat falafel instead of meat here which is like bean bread balls...they are fried though.

Speed: B+

Bang-Bang...but not like a Lafleur's, they prepare the food in front of you not in the back (but again that's NOT a bad thing just it does reduce speed by a fraction)

Price: C+

If you get a sandwich, one side, and drink trio it's the same as MacDick's or anywhere else. Gettin' plates gets expensive for fast food though...but those plates are stacked man. You will be very full after getting a full Shish Taouk or Shwharma plate.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? N

Yo this meat is on a spit surrounded by fire and they cut it off and you smell it...yo. It's so real guy, you can't fake that smell. So good.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? N


They got rice as a side and rice binds you. You won't have to worry about pooping your pants while stuck in traffic if you had rice instead of fries.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N


You can tip at Amir's or Basha's...no problem. No manager is going to come and tell you it's illegal like at burger joints.

Arabic Joint's Overall Score: 9/10
The Arab fast food gets the first green positive rating of 9. It's good, fast, and pretty healthy.

Even in the ads it looks gross...

--Mexican Joints--

I really shouldn't even label this as Mexican. Real Mexican food is goood. Like some Mexican sit-downs in my region are amazing. This is only concerning fast food and you know the one big name in this realm is...Taco Bell.

...and Taco Bell is fucking gross.


Taste: F

Maybe it's just the franchises I've been to but I always get sloppy dirty "meat" in a stale corn thing. It's fucking no-joke disgusting.

Health: F


Insert-Mexican-Sounding-Word-SUPREME. YA! Burrito-SUPREME. Taco-SUPREME! Chalupa-SUPREME! Yeah, tie a feeding bag around your face like a horse and eat this slop until you die-SUPREME!

Speed: B+

It's fast food. It's fast. Obviously.

Price: A

You can get a taco for like a buck at Taco Bell. Cheap.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y

People think ground beef is hard to fake or something. It's ground...it means it can be from anything. Color additives can give ground beef that nice brown texture though. 

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? Y(x2)


Okay, this isn't even a joke. It's getting a stacked double infraction on this variable. That's a -8 on it's total final tally. This shit will fuck up your shits.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? Y


I'm not sure if it's officially in the Taco Bell business doctrine but I've never seen a jar of any sort there.

"Mexican" Joint's Overall Score: -14/10
According to my formulaes...Taco Bell is two times worse than Macdonald's. That's terrible.



--Asian Joints--

Asian fast food is growing. Though it's still mainly a master of the sit-down and buffet restaurant genres, Chinese and other Asian cuisines is making it's way into the fast food market and some of these joints are good.

I've seen Chinese, Thai, Indian (tandoori chicken) fast food outlets in malls and other locations and many of them are good. One that is making a good killing is Thai Express which is fast, good, and let's you put FREE crushed peanuts on top of anything you order at your discretion by placing a big bowl of crushed peanuts next to the cash. I know 5 Guys Burgers has shelled peanuts for you to eat while you wait for your burger but that's not comparable to this. Thai Express let's you put crushed peanuts (as much as you want) on top of any dish you order. It's bad ass.

It's hard to lump them all into one category but the main driving force behind these scores are Chinese style (noodles, rice, meats, etc.) ones.

Taste: A

Chinese can cook, man. Fuck.

Health: B+

Everything is fried. General Tao's chicken is like 1 part chicken to like 9 parts batter. Even if you get vegetables that stuff will be fried somehow. It's not like a grease-pit menu but it's not at all healthy.

With all the rice and steamed foods options, you can make a good nutritional meal at Chinese fast food. Go for steamed rice instead of fried too if you're like a health nut.

The use of meat in Asian cooking is interesting. You never see big slabs of meat on a plate. Meat is used in most dishes but not in the same quantity as western diets use.

Speed: B

They have a little more work to do to prepare meals but they are fast. And it's cool because like at Teriyaki Express they chop all that stuff up and throw it on a scalding metal counter right in front of you and you can smell it burning and all the juices coming together. 

Price: B

Getting plates of stuff is going to add a bit more like at the Arabic places, but it's not expensive by any means really.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? N

Maybe some do...but I think the Asians care more about food than we do and don't cut corners. Though, you read fucking horror stories sometimes of like cats and dogs and shit being used but they are usually not true. Man, I read a story like that about KFC one time too so it's not only Chinese places accused of using alternative meats.

I read this cool chinese book once where like some guy named Zhang "The Gardener" Qing and his wife Sun "The Demon" Erniang ran an out-of-the-way inn, and when people came to eat and drink wine there, they would poison the meal and knock the customer out. Then, they would chop the customer up into pieces and serve him/her in dumplings to the next customer that came. They were heroes in the book too not even villains. Fuck, Chinese culture can be pretty cool sometimes.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? N

They work with rice a lot too...so it should bind your shits up.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N


Only retarded restaurants pull stuff like that. You can always drop some coins here and there if you feel like it.

Asian Joints Overall Score: 7.5/10 
A nice round 7.5 outta 10. That's pretty good.

Roy Roger's Bones n' Bread.

--Fried Chicken Joints--

KFC. Haha, where I live they either want to market to french folks better or the retarded government of Quebec made them change the abbreviation to PFK (Poulet Frit Kentucky).

I never got that. Like the word KFC isn't french enough? It's not even a fucking word. Changing it to PFK makes it sounds more french? I don't see how that works. A lot of retarded shit happens where I live. Making things backwards is really common...like a store can't be Home Hardware it has to by law be called Hardware Home, or Wal Mart cannot be called that they have to legally change it to Mart Wal to operate in Quebec. One funny one was Price Club...it was changed to (can you guess?) Club Price. It's silly, but, whatever. I think sometimes the companies do the name change tongue-in-cheek style just to make fun of the Quebec law makers. They be all like..."Oh we can't be called Radio Shack? Well, then what about Shack Radio...does that come off more french sounding"?

Taste: A

Like General Tao, the Colonel knows the recipe to make chicken taste good. You take 1 part chicken to 9 parts batter. Ohhhh...that batter taste good. It's a moist fatty coating of breaded brown goodness.

Health: F


It's just fat...bones...and a bit of chicken. Fuck, one time I ate at a Roy Rogers in the States and it was literally bones covered in batter they didn't even put the fucking chicken in.

Speed: B+

Regular fast food.

Price: D

Two pieces of bones and batter is not worth what they charge.

The worst I ever got expensive bones wasn't even a KFC or a Roy Rogers it was a fast food chain called Bofinger. They charged me like 12 bucks for ribs thanks to that deceptive "choose your sides" thing. You think you're getting a trio discount % applied but it's not like that with that sides maze. I felt like that movie "I'm Gunna Git You Sucka" where like Chris Rock orders 1 rib off of Isaac Hayes and Jim Brown...but obviously that was comedy because it's a ludicrous situation. For real though (in real life), I ordered the "small" rack at Bofinger and they gave me 2 ribs! Fuck that shit. Bones 'aint a trio.

1. Do they use pink slime / re-constituted meat bi-products? Y

These are real chickens. (Not the chicken burgers or nugget things though)

I should have phrased this question better,  maybe..."do they cut all corners to get you the cheapest shit imaginable" because that's what I mean with this question basically. Yeah, KFC has the all time leading amount of horror stories surrounding it, I don't know if any of them are true but they, for sure, have the whackiest ones. You get headlines on the web like "Dude Finds Deep Fried Brain in his KFC" and loads of silliness. They might be all urban myths but there's something about the image of KFC that lets people have no trouble accepting these as true.

KFC stinks and smells too. If you live near one you'll know what I'm saying.

2. Will this food give you fucking diarrhea? Maybe

Maybe. You could get diarrhetic off this. It's possible.

3. Do they ban their minimum wage employees from receiving tips from costumers? N

I dunno. I don't think it's popular if it is. I gave the Y to Taco Bell but I don't know. I think I'll give the N to KFC. It's in the grey area where you can tip but I doubt anyone ever does.

Fried Chicken Joints Overall Score: -1/10 
Negative 1. Not bad, considering.

Conclusion

Looks like Arabic fast food wins. It's as fast as regular fast food but healthier, realer, and more better. Specifically I think it's Lebanese cuisine but it is similar to other Arabic and close to Greek cuisine too (baklava). These are in every strip mall in Montreal too. Lebanese fast food is good.


General tips to leave you with...

1. Don't supersize...there's no way you need that many calories. It's all empty garbage calories.

2. Save a lot of monies by avoiding the trio. They give you the sandwich for like 3 bucks but with the fries and coke it becomes like 10 bucks. If you want to save money to buy beer at night then just skip the trio, guy.

3. Diarrhea means your body is purging EVERYTHING you put in it. It's in a hyper alert mode of expulsion of the garbage you just put in your body. It's perfectly natural and you shouldn't be ashamed if you get diahrreactic. To avoid, don't eat garbage food.

Do You Mother Fuckers Know....

....that it's exactly two months until Oil Can's Day?

October 6th is designated to celebrate the birth of the Can. It's a global pseudo-holiday celebrated by anyone who's tough and cool and not a stupid idiot.

Shit. I only honestly celebrate two actual calendar holidays...and by "honestly" I mean that I have fun celebrating them....and by "fun" I mean I get really really hammered and fucked up. I don't even celebrate my own fucking birthday (mostly due to the fact that I was born from a stone egg on a mountain top a really long time ago and I don't even really know exactly what "day" it was).

The only calendar feast days I work with are Saint Patrick's Day (March 17) and Oil Can's Day (October 6th). I like these holidays because you celebrate them by getting fucked up. On SPD you go downtown and drink in the street (legally!) until you go crazy and even puke. On OCD you get a pack of oil cans, get yourselfs well-oiled, and get buck wild.

Yo, on Oil Can's Day you are supposed to drink until you get the gout.

Bad as Can

Okay,

The first time I ever celebrated Oil Can's Day was in Calgary, Alberta after I had discovered a rare book on the shelves of a GoodWill near Marlborough Mall (circa 2007). I was looking at the used books selection and came upon...

"Gettin' Oiled: The Life of the Can"

I never knew that Oil Can even wrote a book so I was pretty taken by this here tome whence I first laid eyes on it. I assume due to the reason the Can was only super popular from about 1985 until 1992, that this book might have sold a few tens of thousands of copies in that span, and by 1993 it was out of print...meaning this book was not only bad-ass but it was extremely rare too.

The price tag was a yellow sticker which had "$1" written on it in blue pen ink. This really was a case of "one dude's garbage is another dude's treasure" because I couldn't wait to get home and the read the absolute shit out of this book.

I don't want to spoil it for anyone who has never read it because that would be really rotten of me. For that reason I do not think it is a good idea to break into an impromptu book review. Then again, this being out of print and all, maybe many baseball enthusiasts (and any other enthusiast for that matter) might be interested in a brief glimpse as to what is contained in the pages of "Gettin' Oiled: The Life of the Can" and what mysterious-misadventures and/or zany yarns the Can spins within it.

Alright, here's a brief (not full) impromptu Oil Can book review...

Impromptu Book Review

It mainly details Can's journey from the Mississippi streets to Diamond King Glory. I have a feeling Can was fairly Oiled while writing this. There's a good chance Can was dictating yarns into a tape recorder and these yarns were later unraveled into text format by the immaculate (yet refreshingly refined) Donald Metzner.

Some of the shit Can says he did in this book is FUCKING MENTAL. If you're sitting here reading this and are confident that you are a primo party animal...you better think twice dude. Plus, I have a feeling the yarns printed in this book are the ones the compiler was allowed to print and the crazier completely buck wild ones were left out for legal reasons. These yarns could possibly be just the tip of the yarn iceberg which is Can's life.

Can invented a martial-arts style known as "Can-Fu" and opened a dojo in Union Station, Meridian where he taught bad-ass moves to local dojo-goers.

Satchel Paige

Apparently, this one time he met Satchel Paige who graciously took Can for top secret pitching training in the arctic where he was instructed to launch baseballs blindfolded unto snow-capped mountains until avalanches erupted. That's fucked up and awesome. Even if this yarn is not entirely true, the mental image of Satchel Paige and Oil Can Boyd in a snowy landscape whipping baseballs at mountain ranges and creating waves and waves of wicked unstoppable avalanches is really cool.

For the record, last year (2012), Can released a second book which is good too...it's in print and can be bought on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/They-Call-Me-Oil-Can/dp/B00AZ9FIYE, so if you're looking for in-print Can material that's a good way to go.

As for "Gettin' Oiled: The Life of the Can," I'm probably the only person on earth who has a copy of this...which makes me the Lord of the Can...I guess.

Not sellin' it either.

Celebratin'

In order to properly celebrate the upcoming Oil Can's Day weekend you should note the following...

On Saturday October 5th, or Oil Can's Day Eve, you should leave your bed room door slightly ajar in hopes that Oil Can sneaks in your bedroom late at night and hides cold bottles of beer under your pillow.

How does the Oil Can get beer to all the good little guys and gals of the planet? His van is fast, fool.

On the 6th, it is customary to call all your friends over and get fucked up. You have to remember to get oiled in moderation though...a lot of people (especially chicks) cannot handle it. If you can't handle it then don't drink...it's literally that simple.

Once you're good and oiled you hafta get a pack of six dozen baseballs and whip them at snowy snow-capped mountains to commemorate that one time I made up that Oil Can Boyd did that.

Conclusion

October 6th is only 2 months away now and it is going to be great fun for all like it always is.

(if your birthday happens to be this day...then you shouldn't double-celebrate but instead move your dumb birthday to a less cool day).

 

HAPPY 2 MONTHS 'TIL OIL CAN'S DAY

Rating some Kook/Conspiracy shows I saw on TV

My good computer is broken. It was so awesome....it was really useful for entertainment. Like, it was fast enough to do more than one thing at once, you know? I used to get so many windows going on that thing, I'd play like 3 different SNES games at the same time, while watching some Hey Vern! It's Ernest! on another window, chat on Skype on another window, and read an online book in the bottom right part of the screen...all simultaneously. Now that's an entertainment device. Wow, a good computer is the king of entertainment devices. A good computer is like the Henny Youngman of entertainment devices...versatile.

My computer has been broken for almost a week, and I've been watching T.V. Shows in the meantime.

Having to watch T.V. Shows this last week, I've come to realize that T.V. sucks, man. How can I look at one thing for a half of one full hour? It's hard. I should be watching one of these shows on a small window on the bottom left of my screen while I do 25 other things. Watching T.V. Shows full-screen and without side dishes is soooooo hard.

I noticed there's a lot of kook shows on the air right now. What you'd used to only find on Art Bell's Coast to Coast radio show is now pretty mainstream. I like crazy folks, it's not that I ever believe what they say, but it's usually very entertaining and (very rarely) edifying to listen to the opinions they wish to present.

Alright, so here's my take on two kooky shows that I saw.

First though, I want to present some kook 101 terminology beforehand so it's not always in parenthesis after the statement (which is out of place and dumb looking). The following are terms I use to refer to certain kooks:

Class A: Person who says the most insane nonsense for the sole reason of drawing attention to themselves and gaining money from the strange things they say/write. This person DOES NOT believe anything they say, they do it simply for the exposure, fame, and profit.

Class AA: Person who claims to be an investigative journalist who is exposing strange things. They, like single-A, DO NOT believe what they say and the "investigations" are a farce. Good examples of these are big foot trackers, ghost hunters, conspiracy investigators (exposers of the "truth" so to speak).

Class B: Person who says the most insane nonsense...but truly and honestly believes what they are saying.

Class BB: Person who is legitimately and certifiably delusional and/or totally fucking kooked-out crazy. These people are hopefully in institutions and not allowed in public due to them being a violent danger to themselves or others.  

Alright, so with that terminology out of the way...let's begin the pending review.

Jesse Ventura - Conspiracy Theory

I didn't know what to make of "The Body" after I found out he went full-blown into the conspiracy investigation field. He's from a pretty legit background...he's an ex-marine, ex-governor, and of course ex-pro wrestler. He's been in the political field and actually knows a thing or two about it, so it's interesting to hear his views on certain matters.

Jesse is a witty and interesting guy. I always listen to the Stern show when Jesse comes on it but only recently saw his Conspiracy show. Jesse seems to want to come across as an investigative journalist, but does he pull it off or does he devolve into a total Class AA kook?

First of all, the word "Conspiracy" itself is a bad way to go. Real investigative journalists avoid this word and don't use it. When they investigate something they will refer to it as a "fraud", a "scam", or a really big organized scam as "collusion." The word "Conspiracy" is a really loaded word...as soon as you say it to someone they start to think about martians, voo doos, and bigfoots.

The music, camera effects, and overall direction of the show tends to try and milk that word for all its worth. You almost half expect a bigfoot to be hiding behind some corridor or tree when he walks by it. He was in that movie "Predator" and that's what I think the director is going for with this show. The music and camera angles make you think a predator monster is gonna jump out and maul Jesse at any given time.

Despite the obvious sensationalism of the show, he retains his wit and still comes off as being intelligent and interesting. He even flashes signs of skepticism in some cases, reminding the viewer that he hasn't gone off the deep end (right at moments where you think he might have). When faced with asinine and extremely silly conspiracies he's not afraid to go full skeptic on someone. My favorite instance being when he calls out that dope David Icke for being a total Class A kook, he even straight out asks him how many books he's sold due to the crap he says.

It's odd in this genre of programming to flash skepticism on the audience because you might lose viewers. His target audience is not the type to want to hear him tell them that there's no aliens in area 51 or lizard men running society like David Icke tells them. Don't worry though, Jesse does enough to placate to his target audience to make up for the occasional bursts of rationality. The most annoying thing he does to placate to his target demographic is invite that Alex Jones on the show all the time.

Jones is a hybrid of Class A and Class AA (with a splash of Class B). I think he displays some interesting critiques of government and society at times but it is lost between tirade after tirade of inane yelling and invective. The thing that I dislike most about him is his fans, they think that listening to him or reading prison planet/info wars makes them know-it-alls. He's kind of like the Insane Clown Posse, that band is kind of interesting but when you see the legions of fans behind them (juggaloes) you are instantly turned off to ICP due to the immense retardation of their fans. Same for Jones, his legions of retarded fans make him unbearable.

.

Oh man. You thought the comparison of Alex Jones to Insane Clown Posse was a bit of a stretch? Well, what do you think of that above video then? Honestly, his shtick is so un-entertaining, I mean he's either yelling like a fool or acting like a clown (sometimes even literally), there's times where you think he's actually a genuine Class-B kook.

All in all, I think Jesse is above the morass when it comes to Class-AA "investigators" and I think he's a really smart and interesting fellow but ultimately his sensationalized presentation and usage of Alex Jones makes this show a lot less palatable. Obviously to make money he needs to placate to a certain target market, I understand that, but just for me personally this show is pretty bad.

Weird or What?

Another show I happened upon this week whilst my good computer was broken was William Shatner's "Weird or What?" program.

Shatner presents some phenomena that invokes wonder and then proceeds to try and figure out what the heck caused this. Where have I seen this premise before? Hmmm....It seems similar in nature to Charles Fort's excellent 1919 text...The Book of the Damned.

Charles Fort's book written in 1919 is a very good read because it has a very strange formula to it. Fort basically states a strange phenomena that he collected from a newspaper/other source and then proceeds to basically try and rationalize what happened to cause the phenomena. It's strange in the sense that he at some point (not always off the bat and not always right at the end) will always present the most rational, logical, and simple explanation. Yet he wraps the logical explanation around paragraphs and paragraphs of imaginative theories, utter nonsense, philosophy, views on life, and a myriad of questions.

I have a bunch of quotes of his to show his writing style but I'm gonna try and emulate his style instead (just for fun). The following is me trying to write in the style of one Charles Hoy Fort....

In American Science Journal v.1 pp26-29, a man in Hartford, Ct. was struck in the head by a golden cicada roach which he states fell from alarming heights onto his head whilst he was cleaning his rag wheel.

Golden cicadas are not a known native species of Connecticut, making this particular datum highly intriguing. Was the man a collector of foreign insect specimena? Surely not, do not jest. He stated to the inquirer that he loathes bugs of all sorts.

Could a dimensional portal to lands unknown be the culprit to this conundrum? How could a foreign bug have landed on his head had it not been from at not least countries unknown if not from worlds unknown? How do we know that when roaches die they do not pass through some temporary vortex into the atmosphere to disintegrate their worldly tissues? Would it be commendable to recommend to the esteemed investigator of this phenomena that the cicada may have been an insect who existed millions of years in the past?

Seemingly some may think the species came upon ships trading goods from the orient yet how would that explain the bug's inter-dimensional time traveling?

Perhaps the investigator failed to figure that a wind tunnel formed above the farmer's property whilst he was cleaning his rag wheel and that wind tunnel just happened to have caught a cicada who was blown away in a terrible hurricane who's origin may or may not have been the Mei Goren Sino kingdom of modern China?

Here today gone the next. Wind is a funny thing is it not? Blowing around all sorts of dusts of life and golden bugs. Wind is a very transient affair I must say. Whipping up vicious storms in all corners of the world over. Blowing everything around from humans and trees just like dust and bugs or even golden cicadas.

Ok, that was my best Charles Fort impression. Now back to my original point, if you'll notice...the most logical explanation is mentioned, that the bug likely came to Connecticut via a cargo vessel from the orient, yet that simple (and BORING) explanation is buried under a myriad of highly imaginative suppositions and some fun philosophy is thrown in at the end.

Fort says in the Book of the Damned that the simplest and right answer is quite boring, and all the imaginative things that collective human minds have come up with, even though wrong, should be recorded into history for what I'd assume is for entertainment purposes. Fort calls these imaginative yet erroneous thoughts, the "Ghosts of the Mind," and refers to Ghost of The Mind datum as something worth collecting. Hey, some people collect stamps, some people collect shoes, some people collect baseball cards....and then there's guys like Fort who collect erroneous datum (or Ghosts of the Mind).

Fort once stated,

"I believe nothing of my own that I have ever written." -Charles Fort

That's where the real entertainment value is. Art Bell (the host of Coast to Coast) understood this too, Art let his guests express the most asinine and ludicrous explanations and theories on his radio program...yet he never ever actually said he believed what they were saying. Art would have the kookiest dudes on to talk about aliens, lizards, and 5th dimensions...but he never ever said implicitly that he agreed with any of the guests opinions. He just liked having some Ghosts of the Mind statements travel over the airwaves to people's ears, I guess.

Anyway, that was a long Fortean interlude was it not? Back to Shatner's show...

The Weird or What? program always gives you the most logical and sound answer to the phenomena but they wrap it around a myriad of questions (asked in Shatner's iconic voice) and slap on some highly imaginative anecdotal theories.

For instance I saw an episode where the phenomena was sunspot activity and they interviewed a NASA scientist who explained the most rational reason as to why sunspot activity has decreased in recent years...but they also let some whacko express his opinion that (if I remember correctly) alien spacecrafts were crashing at right-angles into the sun and through some kooked-out silliness these marooned vessels were disrupting sunspot activity...

...Yeah. All the while Shatner is asking questions like "could it be aliens?" in perfect feigned Fortean foolishness.

I like this show because the producers/writers/director/host seem to have the Fort Formula down to a tee and really get it. It is the most intelligent, entertaining, and least sensational way to present high weirdness by teevee.

Conclusion

In honor of the late Roger Ebert, I'm gonna give the shows thumbs.

A regrettable thumbs down to Jesse Ventura's Conspiracy Theory. Mostly due to his association with Alex Jones (who has minimal to zero entertainment value).

A thumbs up to Weird or What? for presenting the Fort Formula so well, and big ups and props to the Shat for asking the Fortean questions in the proper ham style (great casting).





End Note: That Henny Youngman joke in the opener paragraph is not really current or topical by any means. He was a stand-up who also played violin so when I was thinking of what to compare a multi-tasking entertainment device to...I naturally thought of Henny Youngman but I'm not sure if it was the right way to go in retrospect. Maybe a more current multi-talented fellow that should have been used as the comparison may have been someone along the lines of a Dolph Lundgren maybe.

Maybe I should go back and change the Henny Youngman joke to Dolf Lungren. Naw, eff it...you people have internet so you can look up Henny Youngman....no big deal.