Apparently meth turns yuppies into enormous faggots

Choice snippets from the Denver News article "72-Hour Party People". I guess this article is like four years old at this point, but whatever -- the point remains the same:

In the next room are Marcus, a custom interior house painter, and his wife, Heather, who works in marketing for a popular brand of whiskey. The happy couple is viewing a bootlegged DVD of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers on a big-screen TV while frantically flipping through a leather-bound edition of J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy classic of the same name, trying to match the text to the movie. Whenever a line of dialogue is altered, a scene cut or a plot point relocated in the film, Marcus and Heather call it out to Sasha, a dreadlocked artist who's drawing a huge, elaborate pen-and-ink diagram on a sheet of butcher paper. The diagram's title is "Two Towers: Film vs. Book, a Deconstruction."

Aha, Heather exclaims, her voice charged with the thrill of discovery. "The Wold Riders never dragged Aragorn over the cliff on their way to Helm's Deep. That is total fucking Hollywood bullshit! Sasha, you got it?"

In the living room, Nick is seated across a marble chess set from Jason, a landscape architect wearing orange-tinted sunglasses. Surrounded by computer printouts, the pair have been playing for hours, re-creating 1997's epic seven-game rematch between world chess champion Garry Kasparov and the IBM computer Deep Blue move for move, playing each game all the way through, precisely as it was played by man against machine.

"This is so intense," declares Jason. "It's like I know what the computer was thinking."

For three hours now, Marcus and Nick have taken turns mixing records behind the set of dual turntables in the parlor. Their selections have proven quite eclectic: Michael Jackson mashed with Iron Maiden, Jamaican dancehall fading into French hip-hop, recordings of 1960s Black Panther rallies laid over "Sweet Home Alabama."

They talk over and across each other constantly, their conversations cross-pollinating, topics bursting into side topics and tangents: Malcolm X, Andy Warhol, West Nile virus, Alaskan salmon, cruise ships, Rastafarians, back-in-the-day MTV videos, Schoolhouse Rock cartoons, drug laws, gun laws, cop shootings, the Ten Commandments, the Seven Deadly Sins. It goes on and on, ever-changing, devoid of weight. It is chitchat mania, right up until the discussion turns to why they're doing this, why they're sitting in a candlelit room on a workday morning, geeked out of their skulls.

Faced with this question, they fall silent for a few seconds, then take turns.

"I do it to feel like a kid again, to feel new again," says Emile, eliciting nods.

"Because I like to live fast and full," offers Sasha, who is licking her lips unconsciously and constantly.

Heather: "I guess I do it mostly because I get bored, and because of the extremeness of it, because I don't have to work today, and because fucking my husband when were both like this is godhead."

Ike: "Because I have really low self-esteem."

The room blows up in laughter.

Ike again: "No, seriously, I do it because I love to get high, pure and simple. I love to get high. I've got the gene. I just say yes."

"I have a poem I want everyone to hear," Marcus says, fishing a fresh bulb from the cardboard box of four General Electric 60-watts purchased earlier on the Strip. "It's about a moth and a lightbulb. I've memorized it for just this sort of five-star occasion."

His voice changes to that of a bereted poet giving a dramatic reading.

"I was talking to a moth the other evening," Marcus begins, thrusting the lightbulb up and away, then pondering it like Hamlet pondering a dagger. "He was trying to break into an electric lightbulb and fry himself on the wires."

Marcus pulls the lightbulb back, walks over to a dresser, and then, with one quick hammering motion, snaps off the bulb's aluminum screw-in plug. It falls to the carpet and he stares it for a second, then at the teardrop-shaped piece of glass in his hand, which now has a jagged hole at the fat end.

"I forget the next part," he says, weaving on his feet and staring into the bulb's hole like a drunken pirate staring through a spyglass. "But the guy who's talking the poem asks the moth why the fuck he's trying to fry himself on the light, and the moth says..."

And here Marcus goes into the voice of the moth, rendered high and reedy, as if he had just inhaled helium: "‘We get bored with routine and crave beauty and excitement. Fire is beautiful, and we know that if we get too close it will kill us, but what does that matter? It is better to be happy for a moment and burned up with beauty than to live a long time and be bored all the while."

"Hell, yeah!" Bonnie says emphatically.

Marcus picks through the shards of Shabu on the dresser, chooses one the size of an almond sliver and drops it into the hole in the bulb. He asks for a lighter. Then he continues the poem, again in the voice of the moth.

"We wad all our life up into one little roll, and then we shoot the roll. It is better to be a part of beauty for one instant and then cease to exist than it is to exist forever and never be a part of beauty. We are like human beings used to be before they became too civilized to enjoy themselves."

"No, wait, I fucked up."

He dances the flame of the lighter over the bulb. The Shabu inside bubbles, and smoke collects in the chamber of the bulb.

"I can only remember the last line, but before that, the moth flies into a lighter and dies, and the last line of the poem is the guy thinking to himself, ‘I wish there was something I wanted as badly as the moth wanted to fry himself.'"

Marcus inhales the smoke from the hole in the lightbulb. Moments pass in silence. He exhales sickly sweet.

Bonnie: "Wait, are you saying we're all moths?"

Remember when...

R. Kelly pissed all over that fourteen year old, fucked her, and then filmed the whole thing like an idiot? And then white people freaked out and black people were all like, "HE'S INNOCENT! IT WAS CGI/SHE WAS JUST A GOLD DIGGER!" Eventually the dude was cleared of all charges and was able to continue making the worst music known to man and pissing all over underage groupies. Black people celebrated their biggest victory since OJ Simpson and white people began enjoying his work ironically.

Now white people find themselves in an interesting position as Roman Polanski is finally being extradited back to the United States from France, which is where he slinked off to after drugging and raping (including anally) a thirteen year old in 1977 (back when he was forty-four years old). What a pussy.

Granted the dude made some good movies, but we as white people need to show a little backbone and some fucking consistency here. By forcing ourselves (myself not included since I'm not a yo-yo) to adopt some of these stupid excuses for the guy, we're not only showing the same sort of misguided loyalty we all anonymously made fun of black people for on the Internet, but we're also robbing ourselves of the chance to continue making R. Kelly/Little Man jokes (seriously, if you haven't seen this, stop reading this stupid shit immediately and check it out).

C'mon, white people; get your shit together.

FINDING MISS DAISY

Nobody likes Jessica Simpson, and why would they? Has she even done anything since that piece of shit movie with Dane Cook? Does she even sing anymore? It seems like she exists only to get dumped by celebrities who actually do things. I realize she's got giant tits and hey, that's great, but so do millions of other people that don't have flat asses, fat thighs, butt chins, and mangled noses.

As awful as this woman is, it was still a shock to hear that even nature turned on her after a coyote ran off with her maltipoo -- that's a real thing, by the way --"Daisy" late last week. Jessica, ever the optimist (read: idiot), remains hopeful that her dog is still alive and well and has launched a major rescue operation which she (read: her idiot dad and manager, Joe Simpson) has so cleverly dubbed "finding Miss Daisy."

Now I love dogs and I hate making light of a situation such as this, but what are the odds that this really happened? Jessica has rightfully been getting shit on by the tabloids, Tony Romo, John Mayer, and so on for so long, that if she can't drum up any sort of positive press by actually doing something people would appreciate, the least she can do is make people feel sorry for her. With that said, what're the odds that this coyote was actually Joe Simpson hiding under a bearskin rug?

Other countries make the best sodas

Well, sort of. I was in Atlanta last year to see Tom Waits live, and even though I forgot my official Cool Guy Tom Waits Hat (otherwise known as pork pie hats, I believe), I had a magical evening. Earlier in the day, before the show, my companion and I visited the World of Coca-Cola. It's probably really fucking great if you're an avid Coca-Cola fan -- and inexplicably those people exist -- but otherwise it's the only way you can get into their tasting area, where you're invited to taste test a shitload of sodas from around the world, arranged geographically.

In the end, I think my total international soda count was at thirty-three sodas, and I continued to feel the ill effects for the remainder of the day. I swear to God that at one point I was hallucinating. Anyway, in addition to discovering that it's a terrible idea to consume that much soda in one day, I also learned that other parts of the world -- particularly Africa and Europe -- apparently love disgusting soda flavors.

Brazil and Thailand are two notable exceptions as they've produced two of the best sodas I've ever had in my life: Antarctica Guarana and Mirinda Green Cream, respectively. I'm not going to prattle on and on for five or six paragraphs about how they taste like some dickhead food blogger, especially it can be summed up by reading the fucking can, but I'm going to suggest that you do whatever it is you need to do to your hands on them and help you on your journey by posting extremely helpful photos of their cans.

The picture of the Mirinda can was taken by me, and the picture of the Antarctica can was stolen from the Internet (I'd never rock a fake marble countertop).

Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros

I'm a miserable, old sack of shit, and this song even makes me uncontrollably happy.

The ultimate fat girl car

Runner-up:

iPhone users are about to get a whole lot more awful

As if that were even possible.

The day after the original iPhone was released, I was standing in line at the bagel shop next door to my gym when this middle-aged cocksucker -- and he had an air of cocksuckery to begin with -- whips out his brand new iPhone, hoists it above his head like it was the fucking triforce, and begins poking and shaking and twisting it around in order to read the New York Times. Nobody in line really gave a fuck, and hopefully it totally ruined this asshole's entire day.

Fast forward to maybe a year or so ago, and I'm sitting at North 3rd in Philadelphia, enjoying brunch (yeah, I eat brunch), when this yuppie piece of shit whips out his stupid iPhone, shakes it around or whatever until it launches that terminally stupid Star Wars lightsaber app and then proceeds to play with it at full volume for ten minutes while his idiot friends guffaw and high five their dicks. I was so busy grimacing and grinding my teeth in anger that my stuffed french toast went cold.

Fast forward again to a few months ago when my boss here at the office -- who is a grown-ass man -- seriously pays for and begins to frequently use one of those iPhone fart simulators. Now please don't get the wrong idea; I'm a man who has no problem laughing at a good fart. But these aren't farts, rather they are very poor simulations that an adult paid money for. The most embarrassing aspect of this is the fact that he would be sitting alone in his office, and you would hear these synthetic farts coming from his direction. There was never anyone sitting in his office with him to partake in the iHilarity; just one lonely man using a trendy PDA to generate faux flatulence.

But all of this sounds downright pleasant compared to the Hell that is about to be ruthlessly unleashed upon the world: the I Am T-Pain iPhone app which allows any piece of shit with an iPhone to run their voice through auto-tune and annoy everyone within a thirty foot radius that doesn't regularly tweet Chuck Norris jokes.

Ready to sell your shit, buy a typewriter and move out into the middle of the woods like Ted Kaczynski ? Then watch this!

100 cocktails you must try

Some bar in Houston named Anvil that I've never been to (mostly because I've never been to Houston) has drawn up a list of one hundred cocktails that everyone needs to try before they die. Since most people have no idea when they're going to die, everyone better get crackin'.

I'm going to do my best to hit all of these myself. I'll keep everyone updated on my status. I'LL SELL YOU THE WHOLE SEAT, BUT YOU'LL ONLY NEED THE EDGE.

Let's start by posting the list and then crossing off the cocktails I've already tried. I've never heard of half of these, to be completely honest, and I doubt that the bartenders at my favorite bars have either. Oh, and a lot of them sound kind of gross. Either way:

Absinthe Drip – absinthe, water, sugar
Air Mail – rhum, lime, honey, champagne
Alexander – spirit, creme de cacao, cream
Algonquin – rye, french vermouth, pineapple
Americano – campari, italian vermouth, soda
Aperol Spritz – aperol, sparkling wine
Aviation – gin, lemon, maraschino, creme de violette
Bijou – gin, italian vermouth, green chartreuse, orange bitters
Blackthorn – irish whiskey, french vermouth, absinthe, angostura bitters
Blinker – rye, grapefruit, raspberry syrup
Blood & Sand – scotch, orange juice, italian vermouth, cherry heering
Bramble – gin, lemon, creme de mure
Brandy Crusta – cognac, cointreau, lemon, maraschino, peychaud’s bitters
Caipirinha – cachaca, sugar, lime
Champagne Cocktail – brut, sugar, angostura bitters
Champs Elysees – cognac, lemon, sugar, yellow chartreuse, angostura bitters
Chrysanthemum – french vermouth, absinthe, benedictine
Cocktail a la Louisiane – rye, benedictine, italian vermouth, absinthe, peychaud’s bitters
Coffee Cocktail – cognac, ruby port, egg
Collins – spirit, lemon, sugar, soda
Corn ‘N Oil – blackstrap rum, falernum, angostura bitters
Corpse Reviver #2 – gin, lemon, cointreau, lillet blanc, absinthe
Cuba Libre – rum, coca cola, lime
Daiquiri – rum, lime, sugar
Daisy – bourbon, yellow chartreuse, lemon, lime
the Darb – gin, french vermouth, lemon, apricot brandy
Death in the Afternoon – champagne, absinthe
Dulchin – pisco, apricot brandy, curacao, lime, grenadine
East India Cocktail – cognac, curacao, pineapple gomme, maraschino, angostura bitters
El Diablo – tequila, creme de cassis, lime, ginger beer
Fernet-Branca – it’s a shot of fernet-branca
Fourth Degree – gin, french & italian vermouth, absinthe
French 75 – gin, lemon, sugar, brut champagne
Gimlet – gin, lime, turbinado
Gin & Tonic – gin, tonic water, lime
Gin Gin Mule – gin, lime, ginger beer, mint
Gin Rickey – gin, lime, soda
Hemingway Daiquiri – rum, lime, grapefruit, maraschino
Hot Buttered Rum – rum, butter, sugar, water
Improved Cocktail – spirit, maraschino, peychaud’s & angostura bitters
Jack Rose – applejack, lemon, grenadine
Japanese – brandy, orgeat, angostura bitters
Jasmine – gin, cointreau, campari, lemon
Knickerbocker – rum, raspberry syrup, curacao, lime
Last Word – gin, lime, green chartreuse, maraschino
Mai Tai – rum, curacao, lime, orgeat
Maiden’s Prayer – gin, cointreau, orange, lemon
Manhattan – rye, italian vermouth, angostura
Maple Leaf – bourbon, lemon, maple syrup
Margarita – tequila, lime, cointreau
Martinez – italian vermouth, gin, maraschino, orange bitters
Martini – gin, french vermouth, orange bitters
Metropole – cognac, french vermouth, peychaud’s & angostura bitters
Milk Punch – spirit, sugar, milk
Mint Julep – bourbon, mint, sugar
Mojito – rum, lime, mint, turbinado, soda
Monkey Gland – gin, orange, grenadine, absinthe
Monte Carlo – rye, benedictine, angostura bitters
Morning Glory – scotch, lemon, egg white, absinthe
Navy Grog – rum, honey, lime
Negroni – gin, campari, italian vermouth
Old Fashioned – spirit, sugar, angostura bitters
Old Pal – rye, campari, french vermouth
Opera – gin, dubonnet, maraschino
Oriental – rye, italian vermouth, curacao, lime
Paradise – gin, apricot brady, orange, lemon
Pegu Club – gin, curacao, lime, angostura & orange bitters
Pimm’s Cup – pimm’s no. 1, gin, lemon, soda, cucumber
Pink Gin – gin, angostura bitters
Pink Lady – gin, applejack, lemon, grenadine, egg white
Pisco Punch – pisco, pineapple gomme, lemon
Pisco Sour – piso, lemon, egg white
Port Flip – ruby port, sugar, whole egg
Punch – jerry thomas’ special punch recipe
Ramos Gin Fizz – gin, cream, lemon, lime, egg white, soda, orange flower water
Red Hook – rye, punt e mes, maraschino, angostura & orange bitters
Rum Swizzle – rum, lime, falernum
Rusty Nail – scotch, drambuie
Satan’s Whiskers – gin, french vermouth, italian vermouth, curacao, orange, orange bitters
Sazerac – rye, absinthe, peychaud’s bitters
Scofflaw – rye, french vermouth, lemon, grenadine, orange bitters
Seelbach – bourbon, cointreau, champagne, bitters
Sherry Cobbler – sherry, sugar, fruit, soda
Sidecar – cognac, cointreau, lemon
Silver Fizz – spirit, lemon, sugar, egg white, soda
Singapore Sling – gin, cherry heering, lime, pineapple, cointreau, benedictine, grenadine, angostura bitters
Smash – spirits, sugar, water, mint
Stinger – cognac, creme de menthe
Suffering Bastard – bourbon, gin, lemon, ginger beer, angostura bitters
Tailspin – gin, italian vermouth, green chartreause, campari
‘Ti Punch – rhum agricole, lime, sugar
Toddy – spirit, sugar, hot water
Tom & Jerry – rum, brandy, egg, nutmeg
Twentieth Century Cocktail – gin, lemon, creme de cacao, lillet blanc
Vesper – gin, vodka, lillet
Vieux Carre – cognac, rye, italian vermouth, benedictine, angostura & peychaud’s bitters
Whiskey Skin – scotch, lemon, hot water
White Lady – gin, cointreau, lemon
Widow’s Kiss – calvados, benedictine, yellow chartreause, angostura bitters
Zombie – jamaican rum, lime, lemon, pineapple, passion fruit syrup, brown sugar, angostura bitters

They could spare a few

Did anyone else briefly think that Jaycee Lee Dugard, the girl that was abducted from her driveway in California eighteen years ago and then held as a sex slave in some dude's backyard, was actually one of the Duggars? And did anyone else think, "What's the big deal? They have like eighteen more of them." until they finally figured out what was really going on?

No? Just me?