Being Sad

It has been quite a while since I have reviewed anything and was becoming quite sad. Fortunately for me, due to a conversation on the Linux Outlaws forum, some custom crafted clay mugs, made by Brian, were sent to me for testing...

Sad Jezra is sad.

The Loot

These are the two mugs that I received a day before July 7. Both are very symmetric, solid in feel, and quite beautiful to look at. Within the mugs' packaging was a note apologizing for the discrepancy of the volume of the mugs. Well, I know what I'll be testing first.

The Volume Seems Fine to Me

Here is the larger of the mugs with an empty 16oz bottle of homebrewed pumpkin ginger ale. The mug itself is filled with the ginger ale.

Mmmm, that's good pumpkin ginger ale!

Pumpkin Ginger Ale
** Ingredients **

• 12oz ginger
• small sugar pumpkin
• 4 lb sugar
• 4 gallons of water
• crappy yeast

** Prepare **

1. put water in a big pot and apply heat
2. chop up the ginger and put it in the pot
3. bake the pumpkin and then put it in the pot
4. dissolve the sugar in the water
5. bring the water to a boil, then cover and remove from the heat
6. when the liquid has cooled, strain out the solids and add the yeast and liquid in a carboy.
7. ferment as usual

The Little Mug

For the little mug, I performed a very intricate test involving some ice and Mac-G (Clan MacGregor scotch). The mug passed the test admirably, however, the Mac-G still tasted like Mac-G
Note: If you don't like my choice of scotch, that is fine. However, if you choose to be vocal in your dislike and you don't offer any alternatives, and by "offer" I mean "you are buying me some scotch", then you can shut the hell up.

My Part of the Bargain

As I said in the original forum thread, if he sent me something, I would send Brian something to read, so I sent the Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy. To keep the books company on their trip, I included a few glow in the dark stars and a Yeungling bottle cap fridge magnet crafted by yours truly.

Ready to Send

Fold up that Natty Light box, wrap the corners with various adhesive tapes, and the new package is ready for shipping.

At the Petaluma Mail Depot, I was thoroughly chastised for my less than stellar packaging job. Pffftttt what do they know?

STOKED

What a wonderful test. So long sad days! I feel much better now.

Now quit reading and go make something, or send something to someone.... or both

In the beginning of 2010, I was fortunate enough to be able to review a rather crappy beer and in a recent bout of self loathing, I happened to find the perfect way to punish myself by going one step further.

Yes it gets worse

So what kind of beer is worse than Ed Hardy beer? Why, Ed Hardy light of course! While looking for cheap beer at my local Grocery Outlet, I was amazed to find this foul liquid for just over 60 cents.

Not the best in show

From left to right:

• a glass of water with lemon
• Ed Hardy Light
• The Silver Bullet: Coors Light

After sipping each of these beverages in turn, I poured out the Ed Hardy when the pints were half full. The Ed Hardy Light was a bit on the sour side and I just couldn't stomach it for long. What really surprised me was that the bottle was not a twist off. Really? Is anyone fooled by that?

Fortunately, I eventually moved beyond the self hatred and, having imbibed what I may consider the worst swill I've ever encountered, I will never go near that crap again.

Now quit reading and go drink something decent.

The Sylvania Net-Booklet; a Review

A friend of mine just purchased a Sylvania net-booklet and asked me to review the computer while they went to work. Upon their return from work, I am to give my friend a run down of my thoughts regarding the machine.

The Good

• Cheap: about $100
• Good battery life thanks to an ARM processor
• Very light and small

The Bad

• 128 Megs of RAM: don't expect to run more than one application at once
• 400MHz processor: don't expect to run those applications at a decent speed

The Ugly

• Windows CE: don't expect any decent or usable application

The Super Fugly

• Windows CE uses Internet Explorer 6: obviously Sylvania hates their customers

What my friend wanted

My friend has very specific needs/wants when it comes to a netbook. It must be small and light, it must be able to browse the web, access web based-email and allow for the viewing of videos and be able to play music. On all of these counts the device fails miserably. Trying to access Flash video or a javascript heavy page (like http://gmail.com) wasn't really possible due to the software limitations. Similarly, the sloppily added wireless configuration software was not very user-friendly and was much more difficult to use than it needed to be.

Who the hell puts Internet Explorer 6 on a new device? Whoever thought Windows CE and Internet Explorer 6 would be a good combination for this device should be punched in the mouth. repeatedly.

In a nutshell; this device is underpowered, runs an outdated operating system with one of the worst browsers ever made, and will never do a decent job of browsing the web.
Do not buy this device. If you have already bought this device and it is currently wrapped-up and under a tree, steal it back and return it to the retailer for a refund. Just in case you missed it the first time - do not buy this device.

My advice to my friend: It's a good thing you kept the receipt, this thing is going back as soon as possible.

Happy Holidays.

The Challenge

At work this week, the decision needed to be made as to what kind of coffee cups would be used for future promotional material. Not being one to miss the chance to test coffee cups, I took it upon myself to review the cups in order to determine what makes for the best coffee experience.

NOTE: the opinion expressed here is mine; and in no way represents the opinion of my employer or the coffee shop next to my work.

The Cups

There were a total of four cups to choose from:

• A. a 20 ounce behemoth
• B. a "diner" style
• C. a "chubby" cup
• D. the "rocket"

In a real comparative test, one might have a sliding scale of various parameters that, when added up, would determine which entrant was the best overall. Fortunately, this isn't that kind of review/test, so I get to do what I want.

The Coffee

For this test, which took place over two days, I used 64 ounces of Blues Breaker from Petaluma Coffee and Tea. As I've said many times before, I am not affiliated with Petaluma Coffee and Tea, I just really like their coffee and I like to support local business. Anyway, on with the review.

Oh who cares, let's just skip to the results (in reverse crapological order)

Cup C

There is no picture for this cup.
There was no coffee ever poured into this cup.
In fact, I never tested this cup. Why?, because I couldn't even get my fingers in the little handle. There is really no point is testing a cup I can't pick up.

Cup A

Although there is a picture of this cup, I didn't test it at work. I have two of these 20 oz beasts at home and I don't use them. Part of my coffee experience is the pouring of the coffee. A large cup reduces the number of refills and thus decreases the overall coffee experience.

Cup D

Look at that cup! It just looks so fast. For some reason, I can't help but think I'm a part of NASA mission control during the launch of Voyager 1 when I'm sipping off of this sweet cup.

I approve of this cup and would gladly add it to my collection.

Cup B

This cup is a time machine. With each sip, I am transported to my youth and all of the cups I sipped with friends at the local 24 hour diner. In a sense, this cup feels dainty due to the thumb and one finger grip that I use when lifting.

Hey co-workers, if this cup mysteriously vanishes, do not look in my cupboard.

Summary

For the most part, Cup D the "Rocket" and Cup B the "Diner" were in a fierce tie, which could easily have been decided definitively if I was allowed to complete my review of the cups. However, when I asked "hey, can I break these cups?", I was explicitly told "no".

Bummer...

In the real world, coffee cups get knocked off of desks all of the time, and I was hoping to emulate a typical fall in order to see if the cups would survive or not. Maybe next time.

Based upon it's weight and density, I think that Cup B is the most likely to survive a tumble from my desk, but I guess I'll never know. It is this perceived likelihood of surviving gravity's adverse effects, that allows me to declare The Diner the top cup of this review.

Now quit reading, and go sip coffee and break something.

Actually, you should quite reading and send me something to review, and by review I mean "test to see how far it can be dropped before it breaks".

For some reason, my porch, as of late, has been bereft of packages containing products so epic that they require a review. Although reviewed, the Ed Hardy beer was anything but epic, but that is beyond the point. Anyway, since no one is sending me crap to review, I thought I would take this time to spin a yarn about a semi-recent purchase of mine.....

Earlier this year, I was in need of a new computer for work. Since I would be using the computer both in the office and at home, I decided to get a laptop. All I needed was something with a decent processor, a bunch of RAM, cheap, and was Linux friendly. Well, three out of four isn't that bad.

Unfortunately, I missed the one day of the week that the local computer recycler was open so I had to buy a new machine. After driving far too many miles to a home electronics store, I purchased a Toshiba Satellite L455-S5000 on sale for about $160 below the suggested retail price.

What I like about the laptop:

• Cheap: the thing was just under $400 after taxes
• Decent enough processor: the 64 bit 2.0 GHz Celeron is adequate for my needs
• RAM: while others may scoff at 3GB, my old laptop had 256MB so this is a big improvement
• The Screen: a widescreen 15.6 inch display gives me plenty of viewable space
• Weight: this thing is surprisingly light for it's size

What is adequate about the laptop:

• installing Linux was simple: through no fault of Toshiba's the machines internals work well with Linux ( with a few exceptions I'll discuss later )
• The six cell battery has about 2 hours of life while sitting idle: actually, that's crap battery life.

The computer seems to be a glorified protable DVD player with web browsing capabilities. That's about the end of the nice things that I will say about the Toshiba.

Here is the laptop displayed with a standard sized CD and a US size 9.5 shoe. Look at the wear on that stinky shoe. Now look at the wear on the laptops trackpad and button. That is a year and a half on the shoe, and 3 months on the laptop. That stinks! The reason this laptop was so inexpensive is that, in my opinion, it is a cheap plastic machine.

What I don't like about the laptop:

• The casing and the trackpad have the same texture: by feel I can't tell the difference between the two without looking where my fingers are.
• The keyboard feels soft while typing: I would much prefer a more tactile response in a keyboard
• the lousy Phoenix bios is not Linux friendly and most of the Fn keys don't work

What I really don't like about this laptop has more to do with Toshiba than the actual hardware. For various reasons, I use Linux as my preferred operating system and while it is quite easy to purchase a Microsoft-free desktop system, it is nearly impossible to purchase a Microsoft-free laptop, and Toshiba laptops are no exception to this rule.

Here is the highlighted portion of the big sticker that was on the wrapping that the computer was packed with. The wording is clearly in regard to Toshiba's refusal to refund the Microsoft Tax. In light of this business model as well as flaws in the machine itself, I can not recommend this product to anyone unless they are in the market for a cheap plastic laptop that will run Windows.

Bonus?: Since Toshiba adheres to this policy and Toshiba also insists on advertising "Windows. Life without Walls. Toshiba recommends Windows 7." on all of their product pages, I can only assume that Google (with their No Windows policy) will no longer be considering Toshiba products when it comes time to purchase new hardware. To which I say a resounding "That's Awesome! But what are you selecting instead?"

The review in a nutshell: decent enough hardware (mostly), but complete crap when letting the customer decide which operating system to install.

Now quit reading, and find out what kind of non-apple laptops are Google approved ( and then send me one to review. Ha!)

It all started on the morning of Saturday the 13 of March with the following being posted to a social networking website:

Saturday Morning in 3 easy steps...
step 1: get scissors and a mirror
step 2: cut the hair on your head that can be seen in the mirror
step 3: enjoy the new mullet

In a fit of coffee fueled inspiration, I became a first time mullet wearer, and due to an abundance of procrastination, I have yet to remove the mullet. Believe me when I tell you that a mullet does not look good on me. To be honest, it is more of a mulletino-junior, but it should keep the sun off of my neck.

Normally, the story would end there ( or whenever I feel inspired enough to cut the mullet), but no; this story continues! It has been said that a person with friends is truly rich, and let me tell you, if that is the case then I'm a damn billionaire!

A few days after posting my mullet comment, a friend sent me a package containing Vibrant Mullet Shampoo and Sparkling Mullet Body Wash/Car Wash. AWESOME POSSUM! Obviously, I really need to test these things out.

Vibrant Mullet Shampoo(with New Muscle Car Scent)
After letting my mullet ferment for a few days, it was time to wash, so in the shower I go. Although I'm experienced in the use of shampoo, I find it to be quite prudent to read the direction (RTFM) of a new product.
"DIRECTIONS: Apply Vibrant Mullet Shampoo generously to wet mullet and top-hair (if any). Work into a rich full lather and rinse. Repeat if necessary. Reinstall baseball cap and PAARTY!!!!" OK, I can handle that. After following the directions, I can honestly say that my mullet and sweet sideburns are clean, soft, and smelling like my old '68 Barracuda.

Sparkling Mullet Body Wash/Car Wash
I decided to forego reading the directions for this product and just wash myself with it. Wow! They weren't lying when they described the product as having a "zesty spruce scent". Actually, I don't really know what the hell spruce smells like, but I'll assume that that is how I now smell. Booyah!

Obviously I would be doing an injustice and disservice to Sparkling Mullet and my readers if I didn't test the product on Gertie (my car).

Fortunately, Gertie had some engine work done last week and this resulted in some greasy crud on the rear fender. Is Sparking Mullet up to the challenge?

Wowwie wowzers! You should click the image and see the fullsize image.

Not only did Sparkling Mullet clean the crud, it left the fender spruce fresh, shiny, and silky smooth; just like my skin! Thank you Sparkling Mullet.

It should be noted that Sparkling Mullet does come with a warning that should not be taken lightly.
"Warning: After washing your body AND your car you may be too hot for some chicks. Partayyy!"

Well there you have. True to the marketing hype, Sparkling Mullet Body Wash/Car Wash will indeed clean both body and car, and will leave things zesty spruce fresh.

Now stop reading, and let your friends know how awesome they are!

On the evening of giftmas day, It was my pleasure to find a wrapped Beers of the World gift box containing 10 beers, on my porch! All of the beers in the box where self styled "premium" and I would call them all pales: pilsener, pale lager, pale ale. Actually, I would call all of them lawn mower beers, since they are the type of beer one would enjoy in the Summer while pushing a lawn mower (more thirst quencher than robust flavor). By far, my favorite of the bunch was the Radeberger followed by Kingfisher from India and Chang from Thailand.

All in all, it was a pleasant beer experience and the story could end there. However, there was one beer that I was saving for last..... It was the diamond in the rough.

Ed Hardy beer.
Did I say diamond? Sorry about that. I meant the other rare stone;coprolite. Damn it! The box said it contained the world's "finest beers". Liars. To be honest, it wasn't bad beer, meaning that it hadn't spoiled or tasted foul, but it certainly wasn't a good beer or a flavorful beer. It had a taste reminiscent of a corona (if the corona was mixed half and half with carbonated water and some lawn clippings got in there).

As nothing more than pure marketing tomfoolery at best, I highly suggest everyone stays away from this beer until it is on sale at Grocery Outlet for $3 a six-pack, and even that is a stretch. Wait a second; don't take my word for it. Go buy one, just one, and test it. If you like it, finish it. If you don't like it, cook with it.

Now stop reading, and go drink a crappy beer.

PS. All brewers are welcome to contact me in regards to reviewing your product. wink wink nudge nudge