Um, so what's up with that creepy baby?

On a recent adventure to Dallas, I decided to read the airline magazine to pass time while enroute. While flipping through the pages I saw the most disturbing image of the blinged out baby and seeing as it is the season of sharing, I wanted to pass that along to each and everyone of you. No need to thank me.

All in all, it was a pretty good haul this year. I need to take some pictures of some of my more interesting gifts, as words won't do them justice.

Stay tuned.

Happy Holidays!

Are you feeling tough?

24.

One superbad bullet dodged...

When the previews for superbad first started to play, I had virtually no interest in seeing the movie. However, as time passed, I began hearing all sorts of positive feedback from reputable and not-so-reputable sources alike. It got enough street cred among enough of my associates that I decided to give the movie a go, but I never had time while it was in the theaters. Recently it was released on DVD and I was so close to making a blind purchase since I had heard so much good stuff about it.

Thank what ever diety you worship I did not. I know I am going to catch flak from some folks, but that movie was straight up lame. It is not that the movie was bad. It just wasn't good. Kind of like a sub from subway. Except that the reasons subs from subway are tolerable is that they are fast, cheap, and healthy. There wasn't much to justify the lack of goodness I have been so eagerly expecting. Thank you netflix, from saving me from that purchase.

My purchase luck ran out there though.

This past weekend I attended a friend's holiday party and wanted to bring along a little bit of the seasonal Sam Adam's joy that is Old Fezziwig's Ale. That is a beer that is so tasty, it makes you want to slap Jim Koch's Mama. The kicker is, the only way to get Ole Fezzi, is to buy the holiday sampler for $16 and that only comes with 2 bottles, in theory.

Why "in theory?"

Well much to my dismay, my sampler only had 1 fezziwig. The other was mysteriously swapped with a scotch ale (which is also delicious, but much more widely available). And one of my cream stouts was switched with a brown ale. It was like a TJ maxx or Marhsall's case of beer, slightly irregular, and should have been clearly labelled and discounted as such. That makes me want to slap Jim Koch.

I sent their website an email, so we'll see where we go with that one.

Also, happy birthday Joshiebear.

Reason # 406 I loves the Internet...

While I am not certain why, I can only assume that the approaching holiday season triggered the memory of a toy I remember seeing as a much younger topic15. A toy I never owned, but wanted to for a long time.

I could not remember its name, but a quick google search on 1980s toys programmable vehicle revealed the one and only Big Trak.

Technically it was a toy of the late 1970's, but its futuristic style wore well into the early 1980's. Essentially it was a thinking man's remote control car.

It did not have an external remote, rather the top of the Big Trak contained a key pad which you could program a series of commands to tell the Big Trak what to do, Go forward 10 steps, turn left, reverse 2 steps, fire the proton cannon 200 times.

As a kid I wanted one of these (or at least I think I did). Now, being older and seeing a video of one in action, I would assume the capabilities did not justify whatever price it was sold at...

Stick to your knitting, Subway

Subway, we need to talk. Your latest efforts are going to confuse consumers. You can not position yourself as purveyor of healthy eats, and support fitness then throw a sandwich called "the feast" on your menu and have Quahog's favorite portly son promote it.

I love Family Guy, but Peter Griffen is not the face of healthly choices.

It's like when cadillac tried to get into the business of selling small cars. Nobody wants a small caddy and nobody goes to subway to pig out on delicious subs, because well, quite frankly there subs taste like shit.

Get ready to learn something new, Part II of II

For those of you who were interested in seeing the Suge Knight Christmas video and click on the link in the previous post.

Congrats!

You just got rick rolled!

Apparently, this has become the latest rage in online practical joking. The premise is as follows, you lure an unsuspecting mark to the site under false pretense of seeing some sort of amazing video or latebreaking news. As soon as the victim arrives at the site, they are bushwhacked, er, greeted by that damn Rick Astley video.

According to the stats on youtube, some 3 million folks have been rick rolled to date, and the number grows daily.

Get ready to learn something new Part I of II

Pandora recently started offering genre based channels and I figured I would explore their holiday channel to stream a little holiday joy through my computer speakers. After considering the different genre's of holiday fare, I opted for the R&B/Pop holiday station.



A few songs into the mix and I swear I heard Nate Dogg rockin the mic, holiday style. I clicked over to check the album and sho'nuff it was him, dropping his cut from Death Row record's Christmas Album, Christmas on the Row.

I kid you not. This album has Snoop rapping about Santa going str8 to tha Geto.

I did not know that such an album existed and chances are, neither did you.

Even less well known, is that there was a music video to go along with it, featuring Suge Knight as santa and that little guy from Friday as his elf.

You can see that video here.

Baggage Handler 1 - Ben's Bag 0

I just returned from a swank, long weekend, birthday trip to Dallas. The trip was great. There was much fun, discovery of a new favorite beverage, Scottish Ale, and enjoyment of a far more temperate climate.

Somewhere between DFW airport and IAD airport, some rogue baggage handler saw it fit to challenge my bag to a no-holds barred, hell in a cell, texas tornado, lumberjack, hardcore wrestling match. The handler won, largely due to the fact that he/she is a mobile sentient being and my bag is well, just a bag.

Normally I would allow, heck, even encourage this very sort of behavior.

Unfortunately, normally I don't cart around several large glass bottles of hot sauce and a bag of sumac.

As one could imagine the combination was take a brick to a gun fight ugly. As we drove from the airport I thought I caught a brief scent of vinegar coming from my bag. Once home, I opened the bag only to reveal a sight so horrifying, it might qualify for Saw 5. I really should have taken a picture as words can not do justice to the mix of broken glass and clothing all bathed in red.

Sigh.

AA baggage staff, ride it.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We normally don't make it a habit of telling people what to do, here at topic15, rather we prefer to offer recommendations.

That basic tenet is suspended for this post.

GO HERE NOW!

This, hands down, is the funniest damn thing I have seen in a good long while.

We can all thank the honorable Wehe for that one.

Well played sir, well played.

Social Experiments

I can't recall if I previously mentioned this, although if not I almost certainly should have, but a good friend of mine has this little experiment he runs out west in the foothills of Berkeley.

He drives around looking for people and when he finds just the right person, he points at them and blows a pink whistle and yells "who do you think you are?" And them blows the whistle and points some more.

Well I only brought that back up because I recently came into ownership of my very own pink whistle. The problem is, I can not, for the life of me, carry on the experiment. Not so much due to any moral conflict, but more so, because I can not contain my laughter while doing so.

Hmmm, maybe the cure is to take the whistle to costco.

In other examples of social experiments/absent mindedness, they other day I walked off with someone else's grocery cart and got 2 aisles away before they tracked me down. Now I realize that this resulted from a total mind fart, but it raises a good question and possible extension of the pink whistle experiment. Go into the grocery store, walk off with someones cart, wait for them to find you, they whistle away and run.

Who's with me?

Three little things...

1). Beowulf in 3-d is freaking awesome.

And even though comic book guy in row 6 would vehemently disagree it is certainly not because of Angelina Jolie's tig ole CG bitties. Rather it is makes good use of a long over looked medium, the CG is so good that there are points you forget you are not looking at real peeps and Beowulf throws a wicked good rabbit punch right in Grendle's freakish swollen external ear drum. Good stuff.

Some might ask, is the movie scary?

Yes.

But not so much for the Beowulf content as much as the previews which feature Brendan Frasier in 3-D. The world has yet to know such terror.

2). Why aren't plumbers in better shape?

In the last week I did the following:

A. Fixed the toilet

B. Removed all of the fallen leaves on our property with the B&D Bush Hog Vac

C. Ran for 45 minutes on the elliptical (ok technically it isn't running, but I don't think the word Elliping has been coined yet)

Which of these activities resulted in walking funny and wicked muscle soreness?

The toilet repair.

Christ I felt like I ran a marathon the next day. So why are plumbers all stereotypical chunky monkeys? They should be freaking Hulk Hogans if that is what they do on a daily basis.

3) Saving the best (*or possibly worst) for last...

Seeing as my birthday is right around the corner, presents have already started to arrive.

If you wonder what kinds of things T-15 gets as presents, today is your lucky day. Before we get to the gift, let's start with the paper.

What in the world kind of early birthday present for a 32 year old comes wrapped in paper like this?

According to my mother, one that matches the tone of the gift it hides, more in terms of how disturbing it is, than its colorfulness.

As I peeled back the clown jack-in-the-box laden paper, much to my surprise and delight, I found this...

Yessiree, The Terror of Tiny Town DVD, an all little person western starring Jed Buell's midgets...

Look, I swear I am not making this up.

Even better is the blurb on the back of the box....

The Terror of Tiny Town was produced by Jed Buell after the success of his 1937 novely/exploitation picture, Harlem on the Range, the first all-black western.

A sequel little-person western, Hang 'em Not so High was announced but sadly abandoned before it was ever put to cameras.

Hot damn!

If this is any indication how year 32 goes down in the book of T-15, I am not gonna complain.

Do what now?

Another installment in cultural enlightenment, this chapter of T-15 will feature a special cat fish fishing technique known as noodling (AKA Hogging AKA Catfisting AKA Grabbing AKA Graveling AKA Tickling AKA Dogging AKA Stumping AKA DO WHUT?)

The technique works as follows...

1) Go to a muddy river



2) Get in and look for a stump

3) Jam your beater into the stump and hope a cat fish chomps down on your finger

4) Yank it out



5) Drink a Coors Light in celebration of catching a fish and not encountering a snapping turtle, beaver or Julia Roberts in the stump.

That newscaster is going to h-e-double hockey sticks...

I promise, I had nothing to do with the editing of that tape....

Who wants to go to Britt Iowa Next August?

why?

The national Hobo convention.

Yes, after a quick visit to hobo.com to answer all of my burning hobo questions, I discovered that hobos have their own convention, hoboweek, a hobo code, hobo kings and queens, and even hobo court.

I kid you not.

Hobo.com

go there and see for yourself.

Dear Santa...

Please send me one of these...

In case you are wondering, that contraption is the love child of an arcade cabinet and a kegerator. Who needs dave and buster's?

Other items of interest I've seen round the net include...

The Back-up, a bed mounted gun rack for your shotgun which is positioned as the last line of defense. One only wonders how long it will be before Onyx gets on board with their own version, the Bacdafucup rack for your twin desert eagles with hollow points.

A yodelling pickle.

Well that's it. What can I say, I am but a simple man with simple tastes.

It's like a 40 pack of road rage...

Ok, time to get topic15 back on track and if topic15 is good for anything, it is highly-concentrated acerbic complaining.

Yessirree, no half-steppin, limp-wristed constructive criticism here, but rather, a plethora of restaurant quality hatin'.

Topic of the day? Costco.

Perhaps no other establishment can be the source of such pain and joy at the same time.

As much as I love their products and prices, I can not stand 99.9% of the other members. It is almost as bad as the intersection of the post-Rodney King LA riots and a South Carolina Piggly Wiggly after a devastating 1 inch snow storm is about to hit.

Let's review a sampling of the worst offenders...

The free sample C-blocker
You can find this prick monopolizing the free sample table. While I don't have a problem with repeat samplers, I do have a problem when you block the box and strike up a fake conversation with the worker to hide the fact that you are going to eat 8 pounds of alpine lace swiss cheese. C'mon! Get your sample and get your fat ass out of the way. Other people came to Costco for a free lunch too ya know?


The Absent Minded Carter
This piece of work is virtually impossible to miss, as they seem to have a fever and the only prescription is to slowly wander aimlessly right in front of you only to ditch their cart exactly in the middle of the aisle, at a cockeyed angle, so there is no getting around.

Look, I am not a criminal on the run and you are not a cop who parks their cruiser sideways on the road to block it. But, if you insist, I will play ball and ram right the heck through, I have 12 pounds of red peppers to buy for $5.


The Cardless Member
You typically encounter this person at the two biggest choke points, the entry and checkout. More often female than not, they tend to wait till they get carded at the door to start searching through their duffle-bag sized purse for their membership card, effectively cutting off entry for all subsequent members. 2 hours later, when the line wraps around the door, they realize their card is in their other purse.

Good Grief!

The worst part is that is does not end there. Some actually do manage to find their cards, only to lose them in that freaky purse abyss sometime between entry and checkout, thus requiring the entire process to happen again at check out. Adding insult to injury, they often pay by check as well. It is a good thing the cases of socks and the cases of soap are on opposite sides of the store, cause if not, I think I would be smelling a blanket party cooking.


I can't afford a Baby-sitter, so I just take the kids to Costco
Pretty self-explanatory, these wanks let their kids run loose in Costco like it is some sort of kid nation. Unfortunately without the mistaking of bleach for lemonade. You know that cage where they lock up electronics? Costco needs to start locking up unaccompanied kids there to resell them to Bradgelina or Madonna types.


Honestly,I think Costco is too liberal with their membership. It should be a privilege, not a right, and you should be required to take a test to qualify for membership.

In the news today...Coincidence?

Did anyone else notice this on CNN's website today?

Just another item to throw in the bushel basket of things that make you go hmmmmmm.

So as I logged in, I was rather shocked by the fact that my last post was 10/20 -- 18 days ago, and I don't even have a superfly rap song to show for it.

Good grief.

Either I am become extra-ordinarily lazy with my bloggage, I am too boring to find stuff to blog about, or perhaps time is moving faster.

Yes, that's it. It must be. In fact I do recall seeing a blurb on the news about a slight change in the earth's rotational speed. I was utterly shocked at the nonchalant manner in which the news caster glossed over that fact to get to a really important story, so important I don't remember what it was about, but seem to believe it was about whether or not Tom the Turkey would be ready for the thanksgiving day parade. Yes, that certainly trumps the earth deciding that it wants to change speed.

I can't blame channel 5 news, they are simply catering to the interests of their viewers. And let's face it, people are becoming increasingly less intelligent. It is only a matter of time before machines take over. Or have they already started? I recently read an article in Wired magazine, my latest un-guilty pleasure about the electronic devices becoming our outboard brains. Quick tell me you parent's phone number. Heck, tell me your phone number. Many people immediately grab for the cell phone for such information nowadays, quite frankly because there is far more information available to process now than ever before, and our cabeza's only have some much capacity, unless your name is Ken Jennings.

So, if recall of facts is no longer a reliable marker of intelligence, what is? Could it be the ability to gather facts (as opposed to storing them) and place them in the appropriate context?

Bo Darvill might suggest precisely so. He once said something to the effect of the intelligence of what you know depends on where you are. Very moving. Who, you might ask is Bo Darville? The bandit, i.e. Burt Reynolds from Smokey and the Bandit. I've tried searching all over online for the exact quote, but my search turned up as fruitless as Sheriff Buford T. Justices.

So where am I going with all this?

You'll see, we are almost there.

What has long separated man from machine, intelligence-wise, is the ability to tease out context and apply it to facts. And for this we can sleep safe at night.

Then I found this. A mere toy, an electronic game, a modern rendition of a classic pastime, 20 questions?

Ha! It is the first shot in the man vs computer wars!

Let me tell you while not 100% accurate, it comes disturbingly close. And that is the home version (which is non-learning). The online version continues to grow in intelligence with every game played.

Oh Snap, somebody call Sarah Connors STAT!

Cliff Wagner & The Old # 7

Van Damn! I wasn't expecting much from the American Idol spin-off, the Next Great American Band, but gotta sucka punched by its premier last night.

Among the usual tool bags on the audition show were a few gems. Most surprisingly, for me, was the strong presence of bluegrass bands and standing at the front of the pack is Cliff Wagner & the Old #7.

I happened to stumble across one of his video's on youtube which pretty much erased any inkling of a question as to whether or not I am a fan.

My nana had that same IH Cub Cadet tractor, I have been known to enjoy a C-45 tall boy from time to time, and I own a remarkable similar suit. The real deal sealer, however is the ever so brief cameo of the luchador.

Genius. Pure unfiltered genius.

Remember that rap song I wrote a while back?

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