KONY 2012... Pizza

So this pizza place opened up in Koreatown just one month after the whole KONY 2012 thing went viral (and then immediately imploded) and like… seriously, dudes? You stuck with this name? And put the logo on a similarly red background?

Kings of New York would ordinarily make for a cool acronym, but post Kony-gate, the number one association people will have with the name is either a notorious child murderer or a cringe-worthy internet marketing campaign that ended with some guy masturbating in public… and I'm not sure which of those is worse.

Rebrand, rebrand, rebrand!

Trans Fats

"When I heard about the trans fats ban, my first thought was, [whispers] 'I hope Chili's is okay.'"

- my roommate; Chili's #1 fan

Caterpillar

Poll: Am I dumber for mistaking a green bean for a caterpillar or for thinking that a caterpillar would somehow respond to my whistle?

Paul Walker Died, So I'm Telling

I'm 2 Slow, 2 Stoic to have seen any notable Paul Walker films, but that hasn't stopped me from getting caught up in news of his death, namely because of my ongoing obsession with people who died doing what they loved. In Paul's case: speeding in cars.

I tried to figure out if I've ever seen a Paul Walker movie and it turns out I have: Pleasantville, which he was good in; She's All That, which I don't remember him in; and The Skulls, which I'm almost too embarrassed to admit that I've seen.

More importantly, while looking at Paul's IMDB page, I came upon the most important factoid of all: he was a child contestant on I'm Telling!, a sort of Newlywed Game for siblings. My sister and I would watch it often as kids and dreamed of going on it, mainly for the toy spree at the end. We were [are] also really good at fighting with each other in front of other people, which is half the show.

"Don't let me down, YouTube!" I said aloud as I searched to see whether Paul's episode was there, and thankfully, it didn't disappoint. Nor did the episode. If you're feeling sentimental about Paul, or just nostalgic for 80s TV, you'll enjoy the uploaded episode (which includes bonus 80 kids commercials.) 

Part 2 of I'm Telling episode
Part 3 of I'm Telling episode

See Paul:

• bicker with his sister
• make a "funny" face
• discuss his drinking problem... (the drink being milk)
• not-so-modestly declare himself better looking than his sister
• when pressed to describe what animal his sister eats like, daftly say a "human being"

At this point, Paul had a long way to go as an actor, though, because he was clearly being upstaged by the third set of siblings. Their blend of social awkwardness, twitching, and over-explaining their answers made them the obvious stars.

I'm Telling! will have to suffice as my memorial for Paul. Surely it's no worse than Alyssa Milano's tweet, which the CNN obituary saw fit to quote in full:

Huh? You. #beauty #love #RIP

It's 3[:30]AM I Must Loony

I thought the crowd at the 24-hour taco place by my house at 2am after the bars let out was really weird… until I met the 3:30am crowd. Anyone scoring a burrito at that hour has been up to no good.

My friends and I were there, too, so admittedly we deserved to be categorized similarly. At least we had the good sense not to try to intermingle with the fellow riffraff, but all the other patrons were intent to chat us up anyway.

First, an older gentleman interrupted a couple of my female friends' conversation about their respective hairlines to give his input. He was a "comedian" but never really said anything funny. When my friend finally tried to excuse herself from a conversation the guy wouldn't take the hint needed to end, she told the slightly balding guy, "Okay, good luck with your hairline!"

Then there was a straight male ginger Latino fashion student (who knew?!) who was celebrating his 21st birthday. He claimed he had $4,700 on him that his father gave him to celebrate and kept offering to buy us stuff and take us places. He told us he had paid his friend to be a DD and that he was on his way to Vegas after eating and we could join him. Behind him, his friend shook his head no to indicate that was not going to happen. The ladies also declined to give him their phone numbers, despite his persistence. I'm not really sure whether he had all that money on him either, but he did wind up buying us an horchata.

Meanwhile, some woman a few feet away started screaming and slapping a guy after he told her he was leaving her at the taco place because he couldn't afford the gas to drive her home. She could have left before with Tito if he had mentioned that fact earlier!

Both the 21-year-old and the comedian were asking where we all lived, and one of my friends offered up the fact that I lived "right over there" and pointed. I leapt into action: "Yeah, but not right there… way way back. Like a few miles in that direction." Sorry, but we don't give my address to shady drunk people.

Speaking of shady drunk people, the creepiest dude of all never even talked to us. He was a young guy by himself carrying a 12-pack of Tecate in his arm. As he methodically made his way through his beers, he would flash a big smile and just wave at us every couple minutes or so. At first it seemed friendly, then it seemed like a condescending joke, and then it seemed like we might get murdered. At some point, the smiling and waving between strangers needs to stop, or people are going to start to think the worst. It's a shame, too, because it might have been nice to be friends with a guy unashamed enough to drink a 12-pack on a public street corner.

No more enchiladas at 3:30am.

Pocket Bacon

I just remembered that I've had bacon in my pocket for the last seven hours and so I ate it.

Man, it was delicious.

The story could end right there as far as I'm concerned, but you probably want to know why I had bacon in my pocket.

I ate a late breakfast (the hungover, 3pm kind) at a diner. I ordered a plate that said it would come with 3 strips of bacon, which was disappointing because you always want more bacon than that. Much to my delight, I was served about 10 strips of bacon.

I can't recall a time where I was like, "That's too much bacon!" but I legitimately reached a point in the meal where I could no longer stomach any more. It was too much of a good thing. Still, it was bacon, so I didn't want to leave it to go to waste or waste a whole to-go container for one strip. My solution was to wrap it in a napkin and put it in my pocket for later.

Maybe not seven hours later, but it was still great, so whatevs. You're just jealous you didn't think of pocket bacon first!

Sadly, there's precedent for this kind of odd behavior. I also once did a napkin-wrapped "pocket steak" in Las Vegas, but that didn't hold up nearly as well.

Serving Suggestions

Don't get me wrong: grilled salmon and lemon rice sounds great. However, this microwavable bag of green beans might want to taper its expectations for its customers. I am, after all, microwaving green beans, so let's not kid ourselves about "dotting" food with goat cheese and thyme.

Here's what the serving suggestion should really say: Buy some some fresh produce, you lazy fuck. 

Halloween Suicide

In 7th grade, my friend hung himself a couple of days before Halloween. I learned about it from a couple of crying girls the following morning outside of the junior high. At that age, half of everything you hear about someone else is mere gossip, so I kept watching the school buses, expecting to see him get off one and confirm that it was all a horrible rumor. With each bus that emptied without him, his death felt more real.

Halloween is an especially inopportune for a peer to take his life. Everywhere we looked, the morbid decorations were no longer playful, but yet another reminder of death.

I found it inopportune for another reason, too. We still went out trick-or-treating that year despite the somber mood. At some point in the trek between houses, someone referenced the topic we were all trying to avoid. I chimed in, "I don't get why he didn't at least wait until after trick-or-treating."

I cringe when I think back to that comment. I honestly wasn't trying to trivialize the matter, that was legitimately how I felt. If you're going to kill yourself, fine, but take advantage of the free candy first!

Really, though, the quip speaks to just how young we were. My number one concern then was maximizing the number of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups in my pillowcase… there's no way a 12-year-old was capable of making such a final decision about his own mortality.

Cashews

I know you've been waiting for an update on which things give me itchy hives, so allow me to finally put the speculation to rest:

I got the results of the test back: I definitely am allergic to cashews. (If you're not hearing me deliver that line like the breast cancer revelation from The Room, then you know me even less well than I knew I have a nut allergy.)


If you'll recall, at the beginning of the year, I had a horrible allergic reaction, which I suspected might be related to cashews but I was too afraid to confirm because a) I didn't want to test it and break out into a useless mess again and b) cashews are my favorite nut and I am not keen on the idea of giving them up. Well, this week I threw caution to the wind and bought a can of cashews and WABOOM, itchy red blotches on various parts of my body… but mainly around my crotch.

The damn thing is that I like cashews so much that I can't even promise I will never eat them again. Food allergies are new to me (other than the fact that maybe just about every food gives me diarrhea, but I digress), but I always thought people were repelled from foods they're allergic to. Is there some kind of bargain I can make where I give up almonds and pistachios and macadamias so that I can keep eating cashews safely? It might seem drastic, but I'll do it.

For now, though, no cashews for me, if only because they make the area around my butt hole itch. You don't know how difficult it is to be in public when all you really want to do is scratch vigorously in the vicinity of your butt crack.

Sandwiches

I'm obsessed with the 300 Sandwiches lady. Bless her desperate culinary efforts to get wifed up. I might even love her enough to marry her for fewer sandwiches. 117 sandwiches is my official bid - what do you say, sweetie?

Ashton Kutcher Plate

At the risk of boasting, check out this commemorative art that Ashton Kutcher commissioned of himself that I now own!

In 2005, Bernie Mac and Ashton Kutcher starred in the film Guess Who - a modern bastardization of the Sidney Poitier classic Guess Who's Coming to Dinner - where a white guy meets his girlfriend's black family and race-based hijinks ensue! I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that none of you have seen it. I certainly haven't seen it; heck, my friend worked on the movie, and I don't think even he's seen it.

It is because my friend worked on the film that I now have this fine art. As a sign of gratitude, Kutcher gave the cast and crew painted decorative plates. You might be thinking "How uncharacteristically awesome of Ashton Kutcher to give the crew a thank you keepsake!" Before you get carried away, take a closer look at the plate.

It's a spoof of the Last Supper and Kutcher has cast himself as Jesus Christ. The black cast, inoffensively obviously, surrounds Kutcher as his disciples. It takes a special kind of ego to deify oneself… and an even greater ego still to pass it off as a "gift" that the crew would have any interest in.

Apparently, it's been my friend's closet for years because what do you do with something like that? I guess just pass it off to someone you know that would find it ridiculous enough to appreciate.

And I do! I would actually eat off the plate, except that on the back it warns: "Food consumed from this vessel may be harmful." Mmmmmm, how deliciously toxic! Guess I'll just have to display it on my mantle instead.

The back of the plate also features Ashton's signature and the word "SHALOM." I googled that, and I guess that during filming, Kutcher improvised that his character was Jewish, but the director ultimately cut all references to that out. It's nice to know that this plate is not just a testament to Kutcher's egomania, but also his ill-conceived creative input.

One day I will sell this on eBay and make TENS of DOLLARS!

Eating with Cannibals

I'm currently watching a documentary called Eating with Cannibals on a friend's Netflix account because I apparently have little shame. In truth, I'm probably less embarrassed that I've given into morbid bloodlust-y curiosity than I am about the fact that the people who share the account are going to see that title as recently watched and exclaim "Kevin!" I can only imagine what Netflix will see fit to recommend to us after my interest in this flick.

The National Geographic host/narrator who is venturing into remote Papua New Guinea villages where cannibalism has occurred is so fucking smug. He can't help but be condescending and a little grossed out by it all. Like, dude, you came to these people specifically because you knew they'd tell you about incidents of cannibalism - don't act so shocked when they tell you exactly what you expected to hear. Also, would it kill him to spend some time asking them other questions about their culture before getting right into "So, how do humans taste?" It just seems a little rude.

Best fact I've learned so far: men and women taste the same.

Apparently, they only eat people they suspect to be sorcerers… and occasionally for revenge. But pretty much everyone says they haven't eaten a person in a long time. The host, meanwhile, is like LOL, yeah right, liars, I can smell it on your breath.

Oh great, now he's speculating that if missionaries hadn't come to the villages and spread Christian values, they'd probably just be eating each other left and right. If I had swallowed any human recently (and I've pretty much copped to the fact that I'd try it not too long ago), I'd be gagging on it right now.

The only way this documentary ends well is if these Papua New Guineans eat this nosy, judgmental host guy. It's not every day a hunk of white meat wanders into town and asks mouth-watering questions about how you would cook him, so seize the opportunity!

10 More Ridiculous Children's Books

My liberrian friend (by which I mean she works at a liberry, she's not Liberian - not that there's anything wrong with that! unless this were Back to the Future) continues to find and send me photos of some of the most ridiculous children's literature her liberry houses. Here are 10 of my favorites:

Inspired by the Everclear song "Father of Mine"

I think it's safe to assume it's also The Last Book of Salt.

Being a teenager is plenty hard, but I bet it only gets worse after your parents read this book.

Something tells me they'll regret giving a baby to Max.

Coooooooooooooooool!

The liberry needs more books of men punching kids in the face.

Forget kids: I'd scream in terror if any of these men spoke to me.

Most books have only moderate amounts of rot.

Don't sit on the bench with Alex! He has AIDS!

Oh dear.

Live It Up

If eating "lightly sweetened whole grain cereal" is considered living it up, then I am living my best life!

Woo! Have some healthy breakfast with just a touch of sugar! Live it up!

I showed this picture to Melissa and she said, "That's how you know you're almost 30." That really stung. Takes one to know one, Mel!

But it's true. I miss those days of Lucky Charms. Not so much the taste, but the general recklessness of it it all.

I don't know what my life is any more... but I'm pretty convinced that I'm not living it up.

Ultimate Weight Loss Challenge

You couldn't pay me to watch Dr. Phil, but I will always wear this thrift-store-find t-shirt. My hope is that strangers will assume that I was once morbidly obese so that even when I've put on a little weight, I'll still look fine by hypothetical comparison. "Look, he's still alive and not terribly fat eight years later, good for him!"

Creepy Crepes

My new favorite thing is calling people who like crepes "crepists."

Crepist:

Known crepist:


















Child crepist:


















Serial crepist:

Like, I'm so committed to this joke, I'm contemplating inviting people out for crepes just to deliver the punchline.

Fried Chicken

On my commute home today, I was starving. I hadn't eaten any solid food all day, but I had groceries in the car, so I was looking forward to having an early dinner. Then, as is usually the case in LA, there was a traffic jam. The cars were barely moving, inching forward at best, and my stomach wouldn't stop growling. So I reached over to the nearest grocery bag and grabbed hold of some fried chicken.

Can I eat fried chicken in the car? I wondered. It seemed a little unconventional, but my hunger pangs won out and I started gnawing on a drumstick. I was so caught up in finally eating food, I was initially oblivious to the fact that passengers in both the cars to my left and right were watching me. And it wasn't just like, "Oh, look at that guy eating fried chicken in his car." Their stares conveyed more of a "Oh my goodness, there is a guy eating fried chicken in his car!" I was suddenly the poster child of American obesity.

If I weren't so hungry, I probably would have felt too self-conscious to grab a wing and continue snacking. I wanted to roll down my window and ask, "Jealoussss?" but my mouth was full.

I felt intensely judged, but in that moment, I mostly felt relieved that I'm not a black person. As disgusting as they thought I was, you know that old white couple next to me would be calling their friends to say, "They can't even sit in traffic without eating fried chicken!"

Eating chicken on the freeway might be a trite example of my white privilege, but it is an example nonetheless.

Drug Abuse

If I'm healthy and ate a medicated cough drop because it was the closest thing I could find to a piece of candy, does that mean I just did a drug recreationally?

When Drunk People Help You Clean Up Your BBQ...

... it shouldn't surprise you to find the lighter fluid in your shower.

Human Meat

When you have a conversation about cannibalism, someone inevitably poses the hypothetical: Would you eat human meat?

• Everyone (initially): No! No! That'd be wrong. No.
• Everyone (a moment later): Although… I can't say I'm not curious. Like, if someone were to offer it to me now, then definitely no, but I can't honestly say never ever.
• Everyone (after another minute of deliberation): Fuck it, if someone had some right now, I would try it. I want to try it!