Bottomshelf Beer Reviews: Milwaukee's Best Ice

When I started this blog I thought it would be kind of cool to do a bottomshelf beer review.  Not too long after my review of Mickey’s, I was at my local grocery store and I saw Milwaukee’s Best Ice.  I remember kind of laughing to myself and thinking, “one day I might even have to review that shit.”  Little did I know it at the time, but the bottomshelf beer reviews would become far and away the most widely read section of this blog.  And so when I went to the grocery store to get taco fixin’s I saw Milwaukee’s Best Ice staring back at me from the shelf, and knew what I had to do.

Me and this guy have EVERYTHING in common!!!

There are plenty of beers I love that I haven’t had in a long time, like Three Floyds Alpha King or even a simple 30 pack of Lacrosse Lager.  On the other hand, I haven’t had Milwaukee’s Best or “The Beast” in years, This is no accident.  I don’t remember what “The Beast” tastes like, and since I turned 21 I honest to God can’t remember drinking it, even once.  I DO remember swearing it off for the rest of my life, like a Samurai Warrior that’s made a vow to God never to kill again.  But like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Commando, I was forced out of retirement.  Arnold had to fight a pudgy Australian in a chainmail shirt. I fought “The Beast” Ice AKA “The Yeti” for you, dear reader.

Milwaukee's Best Ice AKA The Beast Ice AKA The Yeti doing what it does best.

Everyone knows that Ice Beers are disgusting, whether it’s Gameday Ice or Asshouse (Icehouse,) but what makes an Ice Beer “Ice?”  Well, to answer that you have to understand that alcohol, for all intents and purposes, doesn’t freeze.  When they brew an Ice beer, they make it a little colder than usual, so some of the water and other stuff forms ice crystals.  They filter that shit out, and since the alcohol didn’t freeze what’s left has more alcohol and less water.  So whereas normal beer is like 5% alcohol; “The Yeti” is 5.9%.  Many Bothans died to bring us this information.

"Brewing Ice Beer is a delicate process..."

Scene from the Ice Beer Wars

The first Ice Beer was Molson Ice released in 1993, shortly thereafter the so-called “Ice-Beer wars” began.  Brewers competed to make the cheapest beer that had one or two percentage points more alcohol than the competition.   Millions died, and as was the case in Norse mythology, only a few of the Ice Beers or “Frost Giants” survived Ragnarok (the 1990’s.)  “The Yeti” is one of the grizzled survivors of this ghastly conflict; it’s outlived its usefulness, a relic of a forgotten era, like the Samurai after the collapse of the Shogunate.  So it just sits there, on the shelf, costing seven bucks for two six-packs.  Fuck, how bad could it be?

It’s…actually…not that bad.  I was expecting the worst.  It doesn’t have a lot of taste, but that’s a good thing.  It tastes like someone topped off a watery beer like Keystone Light with maybe a shot of Gameday.    Not good mind you, but not as evil tasting as Asshouse or Steel Reserve.  It has some of that disgusting copper taste you get with beers of this ilk, but it doesn’t taste like someone put a handful of pennies and rotten fruit in it when you weren’t looking.  I actually drank four cans of this stuff last night, and as long as it was cold I could barely tell they cut corners to make a cheapo beer.

That is, until I woke up today.  I had a motherfucking headache, and I don’t get headaches from drinking.  Despite what the Castro brothers will tell you, I am not the Superman of drinking.  That being said, I don’t really get hangovers.  If I get completely shitfaced I’ll wake up with cottonmouth or a queasy stomach.  But I sure as shit don’t wake up with a headache after four fucking beers.  I didn’t even get drunk last night.  What kind of shit are they putting in this stuff?  Turpentine? 

The secret ingredient

I can only recommend this beer to people that plan to die before they wake up the next day, and serious Prohibition Era history buffs.  Like the bathtub brewed swill of yesteryear, this shit is a liquid headache.  I won’t be surprised if I go blind.  Carrie Nation died too soon.

Carrie Nation is awfully fug, so here's a picture of Carrie Underwood where you can kinda see her nerps.

 

Childhood Stories: The Deep Sea Battle

Danny O'D age 8

This post is part of a series of my childhood stories.

Ahh a sequel, (to The Monk Battle) I bet you were all waiting with baited breath.  This story like the one before was written for extra credit in Mrs. Lynn’s second grade class.  Specifically it was written on May 1, 1991.  This story was also inspired by an illustration from The Great Waldo Search; however it has far less to do with the original illustration and bears little in common with the source material save for the fact that they both take place under the sea.  It is also shorter than the first story, because a paragraph at the time was defined as being ten sentences long and a paragraph was the minimum I had to write to gain the extra credit.  I could’ve written more…IF I WAS A SUCKER! Daaammnn!

Note the lack of any sort of battle.  I seem to be moving away from plagarism.

  THE DEEP SEA BATTLE

                      by Dan O'Dwyer

Once upon a time, in an ocean by where the monk battel was.  There where

a lot of things under the sea.  And the things that lived on land

where going to do plan X.  Who would know about good old plan X ?

The water things would(I would  write a Dum-Dee-Dum-Dum thing but,

I can't write music).  So the battel came around the sea.  No whon

could get in but,the person who was in power of the mane controll

broke a nail.  And scremed so loud she broke the controll.

                                              EEEEEEEEEEEE

TTTTTTTTT    HH       HH    EE

    T                  HH       HH    EE

    T                  HH       HH    EEEEEEEEEEEE

    T                  HHHHHHH   EE

    T                  HH       HH    EE

    T                  HH       HH    EEEEEEEEEEEE

    T                  HH       HH

                  END

Rereading this story now, the plotline is a little (read: a lot) incoherent.  In retrospect I should have written a few more sentences explaining what the hell was going on, but that would have diverted valuable cartoon watching time.  What is plan X?  How would it help the land creatures fight the sea creatures? 

As the author I wish I could shed some light on the subject, but I undoubtedly forgot before I was old enough to grow hair in “funny places.”  There’s also a strong possibility that I never actually had the details of Plan X figured out; however I can guarantee that if I did have it figured out it undoubtedly involved ninjas, M.C. Hammer, surfers, dinosaurs or some combination thereof.

Plan X?

This is also one of the only stories I’ve ever read that contained music within the narrative, which I think is a nice touch. Unlike the songs in the Lord of the Rings novels which were just fucking stupid.  The “music” in this short story is also superior to the music in the LOTR because it’s short, relevant to the story, and not about shoving an elf penis up a hobbit’s ass. 

Typical woman

The joke that women freak out when they break a nail seems a little sexist in today’s PC culture.  I have since seen the error of my ways and I would like to apologize for this stereotype.  Women don’t need to break a nail to flip out; they’ll flip out for any or no reason because they are insane.  Glad I could clear that up, but seriously she broke a nail! Get it?  Ho ho ho! I slay me.

The end of the story is spelled out quite literally in giant letters, although the reader can’t be quite sure exactly what happened in the story at least they know that the story came to a definite (and sexist) conclusion.  I do remember that writing the word “THE” took more time and planning than writing the actual story itself, leading me to give up on writing the word “END” in a similar fashion and instead simply typing the word out.

I wish I could tell you things have gotten a lot better since then, but I wrote this commentary on The Deep Sea Battle a few years ago.  Lazy, lazy, lazy. Granted I had a busy week at work, and I’ve got a cold.  It took a herculean effort just to post this.  I’ll have something brand new for next week.

Sorry for falling BEHIND!  I don't want to BUM you out! Also Jessica Alba has a nice ass.

Bottomshelf Beer Reviews: Coors Light

Coors was founded in 1873 by Adolph Coors.  They are now the third largest brewer in the United States, after Miller and Anheuser-Busch.   In 1873 America was largely racist, sexist, homophobic, and anti-union.  Things have changed a lot in America since 1873, and at Coors, well…at least they stopped having Klan rallies on company grounds.  In 1984 William Coors was talking to a group of blacks and said that, if they thought it was “unfair” that their “ancestors were dragged here in chains against their will…I would urge those of you who feel that way to go back to where your ancestors came from, and you will find out that probably the greatest favor that anybody ever did you was to drag your ancestors over here in chains, and I mean it."  Jesus Christ, that’s pretty fucking harsh.  In fairness to Coors, that was all the way back in 1984, and now the can says, “Do something cool. Recycle.”  Progress.

Tap the Rockies with Lindsey Vonn's boobies

Coors is not only America’s most progressive beer company.  They also make the biggest deal out of coldness.  If you go to their website it’s all icy peaks and ski lodges. They also talk a lot about how Coors Light is cold brewed and cold filtered and all their trucks are ice-cold.  I mean I like cold beer, but I don’t see the connection between beer brewed in an igloo and phenomenal taste.  It’d be kind of like if I had an instant coffee factory that I kept at a scalding 212 degrees.  Who cares?  And I got news for you, all lager is cold brewed, that’s what makes it a lager.  The can also has some mountains on it that turn dark blue when the beer is cold enough, which I think is actually kind of nice.  There’s nothing worse than warm beer, except Lo Pan.

Oh shit! It's fucking Lo Pan.

Catherine Bach as Daisy Duke.

Coors and Coors Light used to only be available west of the Mississippi, and were considered a delicacy in the Eastern half of the country.  This was the subject of the 1977 classic Smokey and the Bandit, which is probably my second favorite hillbilly movie, after 2,000 Maniacs.  In the movie Burt Reynolds and Jerry Reed are hired by two Boss Hogg-like brothers to smuggle a truckload of Coors from Texas to Georgia, and hijinks ensue.  The film’s only flaw is that Sally Field’s part should have been played by that chick from The Dukes of Hazzard.  Nowadays, Coors is available everywhere, and no one really cares that much.

Look, I don’t hate Coors Light, but I don’t really like it that much either.  Usually if Coors Light is available something I like better is also available at a cheaper price.  As far as light beers go it’s far from the worst.  It’s certainly better than Miller Lite, but as a general rule I don’t like light beer.  Light beer is like beer flavored Kool-Aid.  It tastes like beer in many ways, but you can tell something is missing.  Light beer compared to beer is like Major League II compared to the original.  When you’re flipping through channels you might get taken off guard for a second then you realize the jokes aren’t that funny, there’s no swearing, and what the hell happened to Wesley Snipes?  Light beer happened to Wesley Snipes (that and tax evasion.) 

Coors Light might not be the best beer in the world, but at least it’s drinkable.  It doesn’t taste like much, but at least it doesn’t taste bad.  And what it lacks in flavor it makes up for in racist right-wing ideology(?).  But my biggest gripe with Coors Lite is those fucking commercials where they take NFL press conferences out of context and have a couple of fucking idiots pretending to ask the coach questions about Coors Light.  They’re not funny and I usually see like ten of them during a typical game, which is ten too many.  Fuck your marketing department Coors Light.

Unless of course, your marketing department made this.

Childhood Stories: The Monk Battle

This entry is part of a series of my childhood stories.

I feel old, and kinda creepy

This is the first story I could find on my hard drive.  The file was last modified on April 22, 1991, meaning that I wrote this before Miley Cyrus was born.    The date would seem to indicate that this was written in the latter part of the school year, but I thought I started writing before Christmas.  I might have deleted some of my earlier work; in fact I seem to recall cleaning some things off the hard drive in the fourth-grade because my Doom mods were taking up too much space.  Whoops!  It’s also possible that I modified this story at a later date, although one could ask what revisions were made; I obviously didn’t fix the spelling.  In any case, this seems to be the first thing I wrote on a computer that still exists.         

                      The Monk Battle

                      by Dan O'Dwyer

    Once upon a time  some pople where  pigging out.  intill one day a

    wizard came to the land.  Althou he was a bad wizard who made

    tarer in the place, but his brother was a good wizard.

    Then is when the monk battle started.  They fought on rocks

    but, there were lots of holes in the ground.  Some of the holes

    were volcanos.  There were clifs, mountains, rivers, motes, and

    bridges,and reuins.  And the monks baddled for millions

    of years.  People got destroyed, I'm not going to tell

    how (you don't want to no how).  Anyway, the wizards

    had a BIG FIGHT and they all retreated because they got tired

    and hungrey.  The bad wizard made a  maze so good gys could not

    get in the casel.Not a good idea because he never put

    a brain in the beasts in the maze.He sent all of his

    men out with a lader he didn't want to waste his migic.

    The bad was winning intil the good used magic. The

    brother went in maze the other brother pland for him

    to get knocked dead, but he was a wizard, so he survived.

    Then they fought and the good brother won.  And the bad

    army melted.        THE END

This story was written for extra credit in Mrs. Lynn’s 2^nd grade class, as are many of the other stories in this collection.  Like many of the other stories I wrote for Mrs. Lynn’s class, this story is eerily similar to an illustration from Martin Hanford’s “Where’s Waldo?” series.  I would also like to point out that William Shakespeare only wrote two stories that were not based on history or legend.  I guess that makes me a pretentious dick, and a plagiarist.  Oh well, it wasn’t really my fault.  I got a Waldo book for Christmas in the first grade, and I would spend literally hours soaking in every nuance of the insanely detailed illustrations.  I guess I could’ve watched more TV, but we didn’t have cable because my parents were cheap.

Note bridge, river, rocks, holes in ground, and monks

My original copy, ruined by cookie stained hands

Now, the two wizard brothers were probably inspired by the 1977 animated film “Wizards,” which I remember being fucking awesome.  The reason I didn’t tell the reader how people got destroyed was…laziness.  Definitely laziness.  The armies getting “tired and hungrey” was no doubt inspired by the two biggest problems in my 8 year-old life.  Twenty years later you can add sobriety to the list. 

After the bad guys go into the maze with a “lader” the story gets a little choppy choppier.  You can still tell what happened, but there are absolutely no details.  This was probably because I’d already hit the minimum limit for the extra credit and decided to bail.  So the good wizard didn’t get knocked dead, and he defeated his evil brother (somehow.)  Then the bad army melted, which I would contend to this day is a pretty sweet ending.*

Not hot

*I was trying to find some babes to spruce up this article, so I searched for “sexy Waldo” expecting a bounty of hot chicks dressed as my favorite literary character in a low-cut candy cane striped sweater.  No such luck, apparently the only girls that dress as Waldo are really fucking nerdy.  I did find a sexy Waldo costume available for purchase.  I don’t know how sexy it is. I mean, it’s certainly a costume, I guess.  If you’re trying to dress as your Aunt for Halloween I guess it might work, provided you’re trying to have sex with your Uncle.  On the other hand, if you’re trying to get a nerd boyfriend, just dress as Princess Leia from Return of the Jedi.  

Now that's more like it.

Childhood Stories

A young writer and his brother, note the diaper

My blog is pretty young, but I’ve already gotten over 800 hits. (If you’re reading this thank you.)   As you may or may not know I’ve been involved with the comedy group Big Dog Eat Child for almost 8 years now, as a writer and a performer.  I started writing, creatively at least, when I was 8 years old.  Writing is something I’ve always enjoyed doing as long as I can remember, provided I could write creatively.  I never liked English class, except for the one or two assignments a year where they let me write about something other than my goddamn summer vacation.  The exception was the second grade.  I had Mrs. Lynn as a teacher, and she let me write creatively for extra credit.  To this day I remember her as the best teacher I ever had. 

Stony Creek, where I spent my formative years

Unlike most kids in 1992, my dad was a network engineer and I typed my assignments.  I have most of the stories I wrote to this day, and I’m going to start posting them on this blog.  It won’t always be pretty.  Some stories are better than others, and some are downright awful, but at least they’re all short.  All stories will be presented in their original misspelled glory.  I will provide commentary into my 8 year old self’s creative process, such as it was.  I mean, I’ve gone back and read all of these stories, and even I can’t always tell what I was the fuck I was trying to say. 

The first story posted will be “The Monk Battle” from April 22^nd, 1992.  Newer stories will be added in chronological order whenever possible.  I hope you get to see how my writing process progressed over the years; that is assuming my style has progressed over the last 18 years.  Over time I may add things that were written more recently, however it is doubtful that some of the stuff I wrote in high school will ever be less than soul destroyingly embarrassing.  (As a side note: One time my wife, back when she was my girlfriend, was going through the files on my computer and some of the ones written in Junior High with names like “diary” were password protected.  I’d like to take a moment and thank my fourteen-year-old self for thinking so far ahead.)    

Access Denied

Beer Name Game

This is the domestic beer name game.  It's in reference to the fact that most domestic beer's have similar sounding, generic names.  It was originally posted to make fun of Big Flats 1901, It's reposted by request, and since a lot of people seemed to like it I thought I'd make it it's own separate post. If you like this post be sure to check out the rest of my blog or at least my other bottomshelf beer reviews.0 

 

Beer Name Game

Here’s how the domestic beer name game works:

1. If you’re under the age of 30 use the word “Old” if you’re over 30 use the word “Olde”  If you are exactly 30 use the word “ol’.”

2. Take the first letter of your last name and find a town in Wisconsin with the same first letter. (unless your last name begins with M, Q,U, X, Y or Z then you just use Milwaukee.) Adding an apostrophe “S” is entirely optional.  See list blow:

A- Arcadia

B- Boscobel

C- Commonwealth

D- Deerfield

E- Eau Galle

F- Fort Winnebago

G- Germania

H- Helvetia

I- Ixonia

J- Jamestown

K- Kewaskum

L- La Follette

M- Milwaukee

N- Nelson

O- Ojibwa

P- Polar

Q- Milwaukee

R- Rhinelander

S- Sheboygan

T- Tomahawk

U- Milwaukee

V- Vinland

W- Wausaukee

Y Milwaukee

Z- Milwaukee

3.  Take the first letter or your first name and apply it to the chart below

A- Stone

B- Mountain

C- River

D- Stream

E- Original

F- Lager

G- Big

H- Flats

I- Lake

J- Ice

K- Special

L- National

M- Point

N- Natural

O- Export

P- Falls

Q- Genuine

R- Draft

S- Best

T- Own

U- Lite

V- Light

W- Plains

X- Forest

Y- Ale

Z- Fields

4.  Take your age and add it to 1850.

I’m 27 so I got “Old.”  My last name starts with an “O” so I took Ojibwa and my first name starts with a “D” so I got stream.  Old Ojibwa Stream 1877.  Wow, I could really go for a cold ’77 right now.

Katy Perry would be Old Polar Special 1876.

And Eazy-E would be Olde Eau Galle Original 1887

Katy Perry loves the beer name game!
Note: You have to click on the picture to get her tits to bounce.

Bottomshelf Beer Reviews: Game Day Ice

Game Day Ice

 “Are you ready for some football?!?!?!?!?!”  There’s no need to scream, Mr. Hank Williams Jr.  I am, as always, ready for some football.   My beloved Bears have clinched their division for the first time since 2006.  On a separate note, what the fuck’s with the song?  The song used to draw a line in the sand, to separate those ready for some football and those that decidedly weren’t.  Every year they add more dancers and newer, stupider lyrics.  Next year, I wouldn’t be surprised if the cast of Glee joins Hank Jr. singing a mashup of his 1990 intro and The Black Eyed Peas “I Gotta Feeling.”  It’s enough to make ol’ Hank Sr. turnover in his Redman stained grave.

Game Day Ice seems to promise a combination of two things I love: beer and football.  Is there anything that goes together better than beer and football?  Well, bourbon and morphine killed Hank Sr., so failing that I would say beer and football is probably about as good as it gets.  Since I love beer and football so much I should in theory love a beer that purports to combine these two things, right? Well, in theory communism works.

I ended up drinking Game Day Ice after someone left it at my house following our annual Christmas Eve-Eve Party.  One of my wife’s friends heard I reviewed crappy beer, and couldn’t resist bring some Game Day Ice over.  Makes me think I should have started a blog reviewing high-end single malt Scotch.  In any case I just watched the Saints clinch a playoff berth and cracked open an ice-cold Premium Brewed Game Day Ice.  According to the can, this beer is always traditionally brewed with only the freshest ingredients. 

Fancy talk from a can of 7-11 brand beer.  Calling your beer “Premium” doesn’t make it so, anymore than drawing a nipple on your butt cheek makes it a tit.  As was the case with Big Flats 1901, Game Day’s can makes a lot of promises and doesn’t deliver.   A word of advice: we live in the digital age, use technology to your advantage.  When you come across a macro-brew do a quick search on your smart phone.  If the beer doesn’t have an official website avoid it at all costs. Websites are a cheap an easy way to promote a product and sell crappy merch.  If the makers of the beer don’t feel the need to sell t-shirts and Styrofoam antenna balls you shouldn’t feel the need to drink it. 

A rose by any other name...

As for the beer itself: it smells kind of fruity, and not in a gay way.  It smells like you took a bowl of Apple Jacks and poured beer all over it.  It tastes okay at first, bubbley with a hint of appleness.  Almost like you mixed a hard cider like Magners with a domestic beer like Miller Lite.  Then the aftertaste hits.  The aftertaste is pretty similar to Steel Reserve or other high gravity malt beverages.  In other words, it’s disgusting.  If you’ve never had Steel Reserve, take a can of some watery flavorless beer like Keystone Light, and drop in a depth charge of the cheapest vodka you can find.  Your concoction should taste vaguely like beer with a bad chemical aftertaste.  That’s exactly what Game Day Ice tastes like, with maybe a few Johnny Apple Treats thrown in for good measure.  This wouldn’t be so bad, but Game Day’s alcohol content is only 5.5%, woefully short of Steel Reserve’s 8.1%.   That means you have to drink even more of this shit to get drunk.  I’ve been known to exaggerate a bit when reviewing a beer, but make no mistake; this shit is awful.   I think it’s one of the worst beers I’ve ever drank.  The half a can I’ve sucked down so far is not sitting well, at all.  Maybe I'm just hungy, but I feel kind of sick.  I’m actually debating whether or not to pour this shit down the drain.

I don’t know how well you know me, but I think you should know that I never ever pour cold beer down the drain.  This stuff is bad.  If you have to poison someone this beer would be a good candidate as it already tastes like poison.  This beer was a gift, so I didn’t pay for it; however I looked it up online and I guess it usually costs like $8.99 a twelver. That’s a goddamn ripoff.  Spend a few bucks more and get a case of Old Style, or better yet spend a few bucks less and get a couple 40’s of Mickey’s.  This shit is gross.

A picture says a thousand words

 Note:  I came up with half a dozen captions for that last picture.  Some of the highlights include:
"how the mighty have fallen" and "fuck you Game Day Ice."  The second one isn't very clever, but it describes my mood perfectly.

Cold Weather

It’s that time of year again.  When the days get shorter and the weather gets colder; winter.  There are obvious good things about winter: football, Lindsey Vonn, Christmas, and dogs with barrels of brandy around their necks.  Most people agree that those things are good, and many people will claim to like winter despite the cold weather.  I like winter because of the cold weather.

A reason for the season

Desolate as The Road

I feel like it makes me a little bit tougher than all those pussies in places like California.  They’ve never skidded on black ice across four lanes of traffic.  They’ve never walked down the streets of Chicago when it’s shitty out and you’re all alone, like a survivor of the nuclear holocaust.  They don’t know what it’s like when you absolutely have to be outside for an extended period of time when it’s freezing cold out.  It feels shitty, but you feel tough going where weaker men fear to tread.  Cold weather reminds me how my ancestors painted themselves blue and fought the Romans buck naked in the snow; the epic struggle of men fighting men, naked.  Well, this paragraph certainly took a turn for the gayest.  I mean jeez.  Ughh…it’s historical, look it up if you don’t believe me.  

Doesn't get straighter than this

Vice President: Of my pants!

Now, don’t get me wrong, I like complaining about cold weather as much as anyone.  I mean, bitching about the weather is at least as much of a winter sport as men’s figure skating.  It’s nice to have something really shitty to complain about.  Maybe that’s why there always bitching about bullshit out in Cali: third-hand smoke, the lack of high quality vegan restaurants, and Sarah Palin (no one else takes her seriously.)  We Midwesterners have real things to complain about: cold ass weather, a shitty economy and corrupt ass politicians.

But you know what I really like about cold weather: it kills the homeless.  I don’t mean that as callous as it sounds.  I think it thins the heard a little and leaves us with a heartier, tougher, crazier breed of bum.  Think about it, if you lost your job and for some reason you couldn’t get help from your family and friends, what would you do?  Personally I’d panhandle $40 and hop a train to LA.  You gotta be tough as nails and batshit crazy to live like Aqualung in a Chicago winter.  One time I was on the “L” and this homeless dude had his hands over his ears and he kept screaming that he needed to get to a fallout shelter.  Seriously. 

The proof is in the pudding.  Every slam poet I’ve ever met from California has been “homeless” for a little while, and the streets of LA are practically paved with homeless people.  In Chicago, if there’s a bum sleeping on Buckingham Fountain the police tell him to get his ass to a shelter.  In LA every beach, bench and tourist attraction is full of bums just laying out everywhere.  They all got funny signs, “need money for weed, at least I’m honest”  “Will work for booze.”  You know what happens to funny bums in Chicago?  They fucking die.

Thin the heard

In conclusion our bums could beat the shit out of LA bums, and if you want to fight poverty you should try to solve tough problems.  Stop closing mental hospitals and help fight substance abuse.  Don’t let hobos stink up Venice Beach.  Also, it’s fucking cold out and I gotta shovel.  Fuck.

Bottomshelf Beer Reviews: Big Flats 1901 Premium American Lager

If you don't feel like reading the whole review you can check out the video version here.

I know what you’re thinking, “Oh look at Mr. Rockstar with his fancy schmantzty Premium American Lager.  You use premium gas too?  Hey all us regular people fill our cars with unleaded or maybe midgrade on our birthdays.  Premium?  You must be related to the Pope or something.”

Big Flats in its natural habitat

Fear not ladies and gentlemen, I’m no sell-out.  Danny is still a man of the people.  I to was given pause when I saw the “Premium” printed on the label, even if it did cost $2.99 a six pack at the local Walgreens.  I assumed, quite correctly, that the “Premium” on the label was kind of like when High Life calls itself the champagne of beers.  The can also takes pains to call itself a “lager beer” and assure us that it’s “brewed from only the choicest hops.”  All this pomp and circumstance for three bucks a six pack at Walgreens.  The beer wasn’t even in the cooler, it was just piled in the middle of the store.    

Beer companies like to tout their rich history.  Pabst Blue Ribbon gets its namesake from winning “best beer in the world” in 1893.  Budweiser still has horses for some fucking reason.  Big Flats says 1901, this would seem to imply that the beer has been around since 1901.  This would be a goddamned lie.  Near as I can tell Big Flats is just the new Walgreens brand beer. It’s hard to say for sure though; they don’t even have a website.  Jesus, I have a website. 

Notice the lack of color. Also, not my kitchen.

As for the taste, well the can says “it’s the water that makes it.”  This is an apt description as it smells like water and tastes like water with a turd floating in it.  I’ve never drank the water that comes up the drain when the sink backs up, but I think I can now hazard a guess what it tastes like.  Okay, I’m being a little harsh.  I mean it’s not like I poured it down the drain.  I bought a six pack and I’m going to finish it.  It actually goes down pretty smooth, but it’s got a poo aftertaste similar to the one you get with Bud Select or MGD.  Honestly, it’s been a while since I had either of those beers, but I think the poo taste was worse with Big Flats.  The stuff is not good, but it was really cheap and convenient.  

And that's the bottom line: price and convenience.  In the Chicagoland area there’s a Walgreens on every block,  so if you have 3.50 in your pocket you’re never more than half a block away from a six pack of beer.  I like those odds.  It could be worse; there could be a picture of Hitler on the can.

Maybe a little too convenient.  Save some for the rest of us!

Beer Name Game

Here’s how the domestic beer name game works:

1. If you’re under the age of 30 use the word “Old” if you’re over 30 use the word “Olde”  If you are exactly 30 use the word “ol’.”

2. Take the first letter of your last name and find a town in Wisconsin with the same first letter. (unless your last name begins with M, Q,U, X, Y or Z then you just use Milwaukee.) Adding an apostrophe “S” is entirely optional.  See list blow:

A- Arcadia

B- Boscobel

C- Commonwealth

D- Deerfield

E- Eau Galle

F- Fort Winnebago

G- Germania

H- Helvetia

I- Ixonia

J- Jamestown

K- Kewaskum

L- La Follette

M- Milwaukee

N- Nelson

O- Ojibwa

P- Polar

Q- Milwaukee

R- Rhinelander

S- Sheboygan

T- Tomahawk

U- Milwaukee

V- Vinland

W- Wausaukee

Y Milwaukee

Z- Milwaukee

3.  Take the first letter or your first name and apply it to the chart below

A- Stone

B- Mountain

C- River

D- Stream

E- Original

F- Lager

G- Big

H- Flats

I- Lake

J- Ice

K- Special

L- National

M- Point

N- Natural

O- Export

P- Falls

Q- Genuine

R- Draft

S- Best

T- Own

U- Lite

V- Light

W- Plains

X- Forest

Y- Ale

Z- Fields

4.  Take your age and add it to 1850.

I’m 27 so I got “Old.”  My last name starts with an “O” so I took Ojibwa and my first name starts with a “D” so I got stream.  Old Ojibwa Stream 1877.  Wow, I could really go for a cold ’77 right now.

Katy Perry would be Old Polar Special 1876.

And Eazy-E would be Olde Eau Galle Original 1887

Katy Perry loves the beer name game!
Note: You have to click on the picture to get her tits to bounce. 

UPDATE 1-22-2013

Video Version: