Reviews VIII

Review of Mike’s Hard Lemonade Seasonal Pick Wild Berry: Well, I’m not mad. I’m disappointed. This beverage had so much potential. Lemonade. Berries. How can you fuck that up? Well, by making this beverage, that’s how.  This beverage is the equivalent of going to Fazoli’s hoping for a decent lasagna and being served the Encore microwave dinner version of lasagna. It tastes well enough that you can choke it down along with your tears of failure and a deep sense of shame that you will never ever get your parents’ approval, but leaves you with a sense of abject disappointment in yourself similar to when you find out your new lover has a getting wedgies kink and you go along with it but end up deeply unsatisfied. 

Reviews VII

 Review of Corona Hard Seltzer Spicy Pineapple: Well, the name is half right. Tastes like carbonated pineapple juice. Very much has notes of being so close but not achieving.  As disappointing as you are to your uber religious grandparents. But overall a solid alcoholic summer alcoholic beverage. 

Review of Corona Hard Seltzer Citrus Lime:  Well, this one’s name is not a lie at least.  A light citrus beverage reminiscent of childhood beverages with citrus flavoring of some sort. Pairs well with BBQ foods and s’mores. 

Review of Corona Hard Seltzer Watermelon Lime: Also tastes as advertised. Notes of trailer parks, Daisy Dukes, and cheap menthol slims. Strong end notes of watermelon and lower middle class grit. Pairs well with Achy Breaky Heart and anything by Travis Tritt. 

Review of Corona Hard Seltzer Mandarin Starfruit: This drink is good but tries to pretend it’s high class, similarly to Tara Reid at the Four Seasons.  Makes you acknowledge that you actually kinda like Nickleback and the McRib. Pairs well with Nickleback and the McRib.

Reviews VI

Review of Smirnoff Hard Seltzer Peach Lemonade: OK first off, WTF is up with all these peach-flavored seltzers?  I’m feeling some type of way about the peach directly related to my days of drinking at Bowling Green with my sister as a young impressionable teenager.  This may or may not have involved the better part of a bottle of peach schnapps.

This is a mediocre peach-flavored beverage. In fact, it is so mediocre that its mediocrity is mediocre. I drank it and immediately started to judge myself in a way similar to how I used to judge people who came into Friendly’s when I worked there (for five agonizing years) and ordered a well-done steak and then tipped 10%.  This pairs well with literally nothing and has a strong finish of John at the bar, who gives you your drinks for free and is sure he could be a movie star if he could get out of this place. 10/10 would recommend for someone that you don’t exactly hate but aren’t particularly fond of either.

Review of Smirnoff Hard Seltzer Pineapple Lemonade: It tastes like pineapple, with end notes of coconut, which automatically makes this terrible because coconut is the devil food.  Why does pineapple-flavored stuff have to have that?  Pineapple is delicious.  Stop fucking with it.  I will add that to my list of things that contributed to the downfall of society, along with the different flavors of Oreos and switching the M&M's shoes.  I am also not getting any kind of hint of lemonade, which is disappointing.  See?  COCONUT RUINS EVERYTHING!  My next imaginary political campaign will have the platform of keeping pineapple pure.  Hell, if the teabaggers  tea partiers/MAGA crowd can try to keep their bloodlines pure of influences such as black people and the gays and critical thinking, I can demand pure pineapple-flavored lemonade.

Review of Smirnoff Hard Seltzer Pink Lemonade: Well, finally.  We hit lemonade.  Continuing with the theme of mediocrity, this is not any particularly special form of alcoholic canned lemonade.  Would I drink it again if it was free?  Yes.  Would I purchase it again? No. For some reason, this beverage reminds me of my mid to late 20's.  As that was a very stressful time in my life, I prefer to consume beverages that do not remind me of said stressful times.  Again, if it were free, sure.  But even then I might just opt for a bottle of water, some ibuprofen because something is surely aching nowadays, and a phone call to my therapist.

Review of Smirnoff Hard Seltzer Blue Raspberry Lemonade: This is a copy of a copy of blue raspberry.  It's a disconcerting combination of unnatural phenomena: blue raspberry, carbonated lemonade, and alcohol that is a low enough percentage for a college sophomore to ask, why bother?  It's not awful in the same way that Tootsie Rolls aren't awful, but one would certainly not assert that it is a raspberry lemonade any more than one would assert that a Tootsie Roll is a delicious chocolate candy bar.  Pairs well with anything that you know is going to be disappointing, but you eat anyways.  Hot pockets, Cheese Whiz, and pizza rolls come to mind here.  End notes of regretting having adult money wherein you can purchase alcoholic beverages to review and end up stuck with 3/4 of a case of drinks you don't like.  If I were in my 20's, I would say party at my house, but a.) I'm old as fuck and hate most people, so that won't fly, and b.) if I were in my 20's, I'd likely be too poor to even consider experimenting with a new alcoholic beverage so it would be a moot point I suppose.

Reviews V

Review of Truly Hard Seltzer Punch Mix Pack:

 Tropical punch: A delightful tropical drink that, most importantly, does not have any trace of the tropical Devil food coconut. Lovely notes of pineapple and trailer trash class with an aftertaste of generic punch.

 Berry Punch: A textured blend of berries and, again, generic punch but also Kool-Aid. Tastes vaguely like adolescence and getting to third base for the first time. Pairs well with slightly burnt cookout food and s’mores.

 Citrus Punch: Definite nose of grapefruit with a smooth blend of other citrus fruit. Best consumed with super carb-y breakfast foods after a night on the town with your Besties.

 Fruit Punch: Remember that red punch sold in gallon jugs that you would have at elementary school holiday parties? Yeah, they’ve taken that, slightly carbonated it, and given it 5% alcohol by volume. Pairs well with the ice cream cups with the wooden spoon and sugar cookies with the colored sugar corresponding to the color scheme for the holiday.

 

Review IV

Review of Barefoot Hard Seltzers, Black Cherry and Cranberry:

Generic fruit taste that is carbonated. Notes of mediocrity and “I coulda been famous if I didn’t get knocked up at prom”. You drink them because you bought them and you feel you should bear the consequences of poor life choices. #neveragain

 

Review of Corona Hard Seltzer, Blueberry Açaí:

Take a gas station blueberry muffin. Carbonate it, then make it get slightly flat but somehow also still carbonated. Drink it and feel the confusion grow. Pairs well with off-brand potato chips eaten directly from the bag and the crusts cut off a three year old’s PB&J whilst laughing your ass off at the innuendo in Barbie: Life in the Dreamhouse.

  

Review of Mike’s Hard Pink Freeze: Take Sprite. Add a dash of lemonade and pink. Put it in a tall skinny seltzer can, call it Pink Freeze, and put dire warnings all over the box to NOT freeze it. The taste is as unoriginal as the name and strangely symbolic of the giving up most Xennials have done. Pairs well with emotional eating and watching My Girl whilst sobbing because goddammit she TOLD you not to mess with the bees, Thomas J.

  

Review of Pabst Blue Ribbon Hard Coffee: I am so confused. Horribly confused. Tastes like chocolate milk somehow. How can the beer of your youth taste like an even earlier time in your youth? Pairs well with frosted animal crackers and Dunkaroos. Must be consumed whilst watching Full House re-runs and primal screaming into the abyss because you’ve realized this is what your life is now.

 

Reviews III

Review of Bud Light Seltzer: Retro Summer Cherry Limeade

Tastes like the cheap cherry limeade popsicles. Notes of childhood playing in the dirt, drinking from the hose, and catching lightning bugs. Pairs well with cheese balls, Kid Cuisine, and Dunkaroos.

 

Review of Bud Light Retro Summer: Blazin Blue Raspberry

Tastes of a blue raspberry sucker: it wants to be raspberry, but also wants to be unnaturally blue. Together, it’s a tasty chemical bomb of a flavor that will yank you back to childhood, but with the added benefit of alcohol to make you forget the suck of post-pandemic life and lack of student loans forgiveness. Pairs well with despair and nostalgia and a cheap charcuterie board.

Costco

So I have been told, by my brother's girlfriend and my sisters, that Costco is a magical place full of wonder and delight and cheap rotisserie chickens and bulk packages of Poise pads.  I have never experienced this beacon of wonderment and delight, so they decided to take me here.  On a Saturday.  Before Mother's Day.  With Charlie, my child who freely acknowledges that she should not have access to adult money because it would not end well.  I imagine you can imagine how this went.

First off, the line to get into the fucking place was of Cedar Point length.  For those of you who don't know, Cedar Point is a local-ish (45 minutes away; pre-marriage I would have been like WTF that is a total day trip away and now it's like, oh I drive that far to go to the grocery store that's not Walmart) amusement park that is a big fucking deal when it comes to amusement parks.  Meaning, the lines are redonkulous.  I manage to somehow get a relatively close parking spot, which, I guess, like, yay me but why can't that luck extend to winning the jackpot in the lottery?  We get out and go inside to an entryway that is guarded more closely than Fort Knox.  Like, God forbid someone comes in without someone having that magical Costco card.  Which, Charlie was all like, "This place is a scam, you have to pay to get in and then pay for the stuff you buy?"  And I'm all like, welcome to adulthood in America.  Get some student loan debt and you are solidly middle-class, child.

Anyways, I'm waiting for Elizabeth to come in as she did not have the luck to get a super close spot.  I spot Faith, my brother's girlfriend, waiting for us inside the store where she has already completed most of her shopping.  I surreptitiously take a picture of her and then text it to her with the caption of "I can see you" because I am an asshole like that and should probably not be allowed technology unsupervised.  Anyways, we meet up and she is all relieved that it was just me and not some creepy ass ex texting her (sorry for unknowingly triggering past traumas there!) and we start shopping.

I will start off by saying, Charles had mentioned getting some laundry baskets because our all appear to have started to crumble worse than infrastructure in a red state.  I will say, we did not get laundry baskets.  Mostly because I did not want to spend the time looking for them because holy fucking shit, this place was packed tighter than a Taylor Swift concert.  I did get this two-pack of little trash cans with a flip lid, one for the bathroom because the one we currently have harbors more nastiness than a high school boy's gym bag, one for Charlie's room because she very suddenly became concerned about the lack of a trash can in her room.  We won't talk about the CONDITION of her room, however...

Anyways, we move on to the food section.  It is crazy.  Like, people just everywhere.  Gallon containers of everything from Liquid IV to rotisserie chicken that has been removed from the carcass already.  My already short attention span is going haywire.  Plus, dear sweet mother of God, there is like some kind of old person convention going on wherein they leave their fucking carts in the middle of the goddamned aisles.  I have a sudden urge to ram my cart into people. (Side note: on the way there, Charlie was talking about her one classmate who apparently has asked if anyone ever considers jumping off of the barn loft and also broke all of the bones in the chicken he dissected and asked to bring them home.  Charlie expressed concern (rightfully so) about this kid, but also coined the phrase "What in the Jeffrey Dahmer is that?" so I will forgive her for future sins.)

We start to encounter samples.  I don't know if it was just the day or what, but they were meh.  I will say Charlie tried this smoked salmon that she liked so I promptly got it because if my children ever express a liking for something remotely healthy I'm all over that like Charlie Sheen on a bowl of coke.  I also purchased some ravioli she liked, some Lacroix (despite me trying to talk Charlie into buying the Kirkland brand...I did give her a lesson on the difference between total price and price per unit, but since it was not her money to spend, we got the Lacroix).  I also got Liquid IV, because summer is coming and my husband works in a sweat shop (well not literally but it gets pretty goddamn hot) and will need the rehydration.  Elizabeth bought some energy drinks whilst ignoring my statement about how bad they are for you.  Apparently, I cannot guilt her into better life choices anymore, so yay for growing up?  I guess it's better than her sharing the bowl of coke so I will take the W however I can.

Then we go to checkout.  Being a newbie, I assume that I cannot do so without my sister who has the magical Costco card, so I follow her to self-checkout.  I promptly get scolded by the checkout babysitter.  Apparently I am a "fire hazard".  Well, I have been told by Alexis before that just because humans are flammable does not mean we should light them on fire (solid advice there, I believe.  I'm counting it as a parenting win) so I accept this but I continue to get passive-aggressively scolded by said checkout babysitter until I find an open checkout.  Then I get scolded by the scanner because I did not put said trash cans in the checkout area.  When did technology get in the business of shaming people?

When all is said and done...I was meh.  It was not a place full of wonderment and delight.  It was a place where my imaginary prescription for Xanax would have come in handy.  Would I go back?  Not on a Saturday.  Maybe like a Tuesday early in the morning, but I'm a night owl and the nearest Costco is 45 minutes away so that won't happen. (That time frame only applies when it is a place I can tolerate unmedicated.)  Do I consider the trip a success?  Yeah, I got a semi-healthy food for Charlie and some new trash cans. I didn't kill anyone.  I got a new catchphrase. I got to hang with my family. I did not use the catchphrase "What in the Jeffrey Dahmer is that?"

Reviews II

Starting from the very beginning…

So I made the mistake today, much to my family’s delight, of going grocery shopping hungry. Among the things that I bought was the new Bud Light Seltzers. I figured since I have nothing else to do this evening, I would try each flavor and leave you a review. Idk if I will get to all four flavors today, but I promise that I will review all of them at some point. So here goes...

Black Cherry. Vaguely reminiscent of Zima plus cherry Jolly Rancher but with a wannabe hipster twist. Tastes like ironic usage of “bae” with undertones of crippling student loan debt and the scent of your parents’ basement.  Pairs well with avocado toast.

Mango: Tastes like mango that has been seltzered.  Brings up dreams of tropical vacations to escape the dreary drudge that is your day to day existence. Reality soon smacks you in the face as you realize that it only has 5% ABV and you will, in fact, not get drunk off this as your tolerance skyrocketed in your early 20’s due to said student loan debt and sundry poor life choices you are drinking to forget.  Focus on the mango. Grab ahold of it with both hands because Dear God, this is your life now.

Strawberry: Flavored similarly to Bonne Belle Lipsmackers. Makes you feel slightly uncomfortable to drink something that’s alcoholic yet tastes like childhood. End notes are a weird mix of college walk of shame and Teletubbies. At the same time.

Lemon lime: Strong notes of lemon Windex with a lot of hell the fuck no aftertaste. Could possibly be used to freshen up the garbage disposal or dispose of someone you despise. Tastes like affliction, lamentation, and self-reproach. Don’t drink unless you enjoy cleaning products. Seriously, Windex.

Reviews I

I have been doing reviews of beverages on Facebook for a while, and Elizabeth’s boyfriend suggested I start posting them here as well so I will start moving them all over soon because why not?  May as well keep all the crazy in one place….

This beverage review brought to you courtesy of Dave and Faith, who purchased these for me to review to celebrate Cinco de Mayo:

Review of Mamitas Tequila and Soda Seltzer, Pineapple flavor: Well holy hell. This is a delicious, light beverage. No taste of tequila at all, which was a bit disappointing since, ya know, it’s in the fucking name and all. End notes of pineapple, which was not disappointing, since, ya know, it’s in the fucking name and all.  It’s gluten free which is good because people need something to blame for society’s sins and what better way to do this than to villainize sweet, sweet, delicious carbs instead of acknowledging that things started to go downhill when they started fucking with the flavor of Oreos and changed the freecreditreport.com band.  Pairs well with the false hope a 60° day in early May in Ohio gives you. 

Review of Mamacita Tequila and Soda, Paloma Flavor:

Ok, first off I had to Google WTF Paloma is because the closest thing to a cocktail I get is actual 7-Up in my whiskey with the good ice and an actual lime because I am not Fancy like Applebees and the only times I’ve ever consumed tequila is in a margarita or when I was in college in shot form. And I guess these Mamacita beverages now. And contrary to any rumors the fuckbois I dissed in college started because I was not DTF in a dorm room that stunk of ball sweat and Cheetos, I don’t put just anything in my mouth. Therefore, I cannot comment on if this thing tastes like an actual Paloma or not. Maybe?  I don’t know?  Anyways, this is also a delicious beverage. We will call it Paloma-esque. Palomish maybe?  Sure. Pairs well with a reminder to my ride and dies (you know who you are) to delete my Internet browsing history when I die, especially if it’s under mysterious circumstances. Because maybe I’ve now pissed off Paloma aficionados and I have a bounty on my head. Actually, no matter how I die, can we just say it was that?  And also, a flash mob and good snacks at my funeral would be great. Serve Palomas, too. 

Kitchenaid

 Did you know that you are supposed to grease your Kitchenaid stand mixer's insides occasionally?

I did not, until I got The Tok.  There I discovered a man called Mr. Mixer, who basically just works on Kitchenaid's and he sells all the shit to do this, and has videos on it that you can follow along.  So, in my completely oblivious, overly optimistic way, I decided this afternoon to jump right in and do this because I was bored and had nothing else I wanted to do and I wasn't about to fold laundry because that goes against our attachment laundering practices (meaning my lazy ass pretends that the laundry WANTS to hang out in the baskets unfolded.  I'm trying to reduce the trauma on the laundry caused by separating them and storing them in dark drawers and closets.  Because if you did that to a child, CPS would be knocking on your door and talking to you about parenting, right?)  I thought about live-tweeting it, but since Twitter is a mess either due to Elon's gross incompetence/arrogance, or his carefully orchestrated elimination of ways to get news to the masses (which theory I ascribe to in a day depends on how much tinfoil I have to fashion a hat), I decided against that.  Then I remembered I have this blog, and that it is my duty to share my crazy with the world because it will make you feel better about your own.  So here we go!

1:00 PM I get all my supplies ready.  Some paper towels, a rag, the little kit that I purchased, a Phillips and flathead screw driver, a hammer.  I am all pumped up and ready to GO!  I take a sip of my water and turn on the video.

1:03 PM OK, I'm taking this bitch apart and I am stuck on this one pin.  It. Will. Not. Pop. Out.  I try hitting it.  I put the mixer up against the steps to brace it as I beat on the punches with the rubber mallet that was included in the kit.  It's not coming out, despite the ease with which Mr. Mixer popped his out.

1:45 PM I decide to go ahead and watch the video to see if he talks about ways to get this fucking pin out because it is still not moving.  Very next part of the video, he talks about flipping it on it's side and using a hammer instead of the mallet.  I try it and this works.  Success!

2:00 PM I had been able to get the drip ring off successfully using the mallet and a flathead screw driver.  It is disgustingly caked with baking debris on the inside. I decide to clean it.  As I am wiping it with a paper towel, I manage to slice my pointer finger a bit because of course I am going to injure myself doing this.  I grab a bandage from the bathroom and carry on.

2:30 PM I now am being told that I need a Robertson S1 square bit.  What. The. Fuck. Mr. Mixer? This was NOT in the initial instructions.  I go into Charles's toolbox and find one, still a little salty about this situation.  I get the planetary off as well as the top off of the mixer.  The grease is disgusting.  It's supposed to be white.  It is gray and a sickly yellow.  I start to scrape this off using the little plastic putty knife included in the kit.  I rapidly realize that the 4 paper towels I grabbed is not enough.  In fact, I would end up using the equivalent of a half a roll of paper towels.  So much grease.  Just...so much.

This was *after* I scraped a lot of it off.  It was like rubber.

So. Much. Grease.

2:45 PM Now Mr. Mixer wants me to remove the pin from the planetary shaft.  He says, just pop it right out!  I say, that motherfucker is NOT coming out easily.  Having learned my lesson from the first pin's refusal to budge, I watched ahead a moment to see if it would come out easier with a trick he has.  There was no trick.  I spend the next 15 minutes fucking around with that thing.

3:00 PM Now I'm using my 10th paper towel to get the grease off of the pieces I have already removed.  My bandage is completely falling off from the grease, so I have to break to wash my hands and get a new one.  Upon returning, I am informed by the video that there is a third fucking pin to remove from the worm gear shaft.  So not only do I have to figure out how to remove this fucking thing, I have to figure out how to keep this worm gear from turning (you know, the very thing it was designed to do...) so I can get the fucking pin out.  Then he talks about another punch.  A smaller one.  THAT WAS NOT INCLUDED IN THE KIT.  WTF?  Now, to be fair, in the beginning he did show two of those punches...but one of them was included with the kit and one was not.  Da fuck?  I go rummaging through the tools again in the hopes of coming up with something to get this fucking thing out as it was not budging.  I came up with this random tool that I should probably know what it is called but I don't so my brothers are all gonna have their heads explode over this I am sure, and some old nails.

Seriously, WTF is this plaque-scraper looking thing called?

3:30 PM I get the pin out between the tool and the nails.  I'm on my third bandage at this point, and eventually abandon them as they just keep getting saturated with grease.  Now Mr. Mixer says to go in with more paper towels and clean up.  This takes longer than your bank does to refund money owed to you.  He also says to use some rubbing alcohol to help with cleaning up the grease.  I forget that I have an open wound on my pointer finger, and attempt to take a towel soaked in rubbing alcohol and get into those grooves to get them cleaned. My soul immediately shrivels up and dies from the burning in my one finger.

3:35 PM I abandon cleaning the parts for a minute and return to the bottom of the machine.  "Remove the hub gear", says Mr. Mixer.  "It slides right out."  Lies.  It does not slide right out.  I have to beat it out.  Mr. Mixer must have hands like vice grips.

3:50 PM Back to cleaning the parts.  So many paper towels.  So many gear teeth to clean.  So much burning from the rubbing alcohol.  At this point, I'm just rolling with it like it's some sort of weird Kitchenaid Kink thing.  He warns that there are sharp parts in the upper housing.  I fucking already KNOW, Mr. Mixer.  I've already cut myself.

4:15 I remember that I have a couple of parts that I need to add onto the mixer, a spring and what he is calling an Everdime.  I quickly find the video telling how to install, and do so.  This part goes smoothly so I get cocky.

4:30 I am now re-greasing everything with this bright white grease that looks like frosting.  So.  Much.  Grease.  So. Many. Towels.  I get everything reassembled.  I call Charles to help with the Everdime, as you essentially have to screw a screw into a rubber gasket, and we've already established that I do not have vice grip hands.

5:00 I am starting to put everything back together.  It goes fairly smoothly, and I get it all set back up on my counter and turn it on.  It works!  I am woman, hear me roar!  

5:01 I put all of my attachments and paddles into my glass bowl for the mixer, and start to push it back on my counter out of the way.  The bowl is not locked, which causes the attachments to hit against the side of the glass bowl.  It cracks evenly, and a large chunk starts to fall.  Before my brain registers it, I am grabbing for the chunk.  It slices my fingers. Three additional cuts.  One, is bad enough for stitches.

This looks way more dramatic than it actually is.  But notice the original injury, on the tip of the index finger, is not even bandaged  In fact, I may have burned off my fingerprints with rubbing alcohol.

So moral of the story?  This is just proof that laundry is the devil.  If I was not trying to avoid it, I would not have injured myself and required medical attention.  Also, 36 minutes of videos somehow turned into 4 hours and a small forest of trees in paper towels, so don't believe everything on the Internet and/or The Tok.

But I am woman.  RAAAAWWWRRR!