Go Ahead, Drink the Haterade

Haterade isn't a real product. You can't buy it in stores or even purchase it online. As much as the word Haterade is thrown around these days, it's a surprise and a shame that it's not an actual drink. You would think some eccentric person with money to blow would take a chance on this gimmick and start mass producing some delicious Haterade for the world to enjoy -- or maybe to hate. Maybe it's just that no one has thought up a solid assortment of Haterade flavors. That's where I come in. Here are some of my ideas for Haterade flavors:

Sour Grape
Passion-Aggressive Fruit
All Lemon, No Lime
Orange Crushed Spirit
Pink Gripefruit
On Mountain Blast
Melondrama 
Fruit Punch (some things don't change)

That's a good start, but what sports drink is complete without famous athlete endorsements? Gatorade boasts well-liked athletes like Michael Jordan and Peyton Manning to advertise their products. Haterade should go in the opposite direction -- special flavors endorsed by the most hated athletes in all of sports:

Lance Armstrong's Blood Orange Transfusion
Ray Lewis' I'm a Changed Mango
Metta World Peach
Brett Favre's Trouser Dragonfruit
OJ Simpson's Guilt-Tea
Alex Rodriguez's Lifetime Banana
Tiger Woods' Apricot With Your Pants Down
Mike Tyson's Tropical Punch
Manti Te'o's Lemon Lie
Kobe Bryant's Alleged Grape

I wonder which of those flavors would sell the best. Certainly not Brett Favre's Trouser Dragonfruit.

Black History Month Great Black Person #12 of 28

Black History Month Great Black Person #12 of 28:

Soul Food

Food was pretty good already, but it got even better with the addition of soul. The history of soul food and southern cooking is pretty interesting if you ever get a chance to read into it; it's very much tied into slavery and plantation life. Soul food staples such as okra, rice, and turnips all originated in Africa and other soul food dishes such as collards, cornbread, and hushpuppies were all perfected by slaves who had little else to work with in the kitchen. Fun fact: Many historians rank hushpuppies as the third most important thing to come out of the Civil War, right behind the Emancipation Proclamation and the Gettysburg Address. I would argue that they should be second because, unlike the Gettysburg Address, I never had to memorize hushpuppies in high school. Call me crazy, but I think soul food goes a long way in helping bringing the races together in the South. You can't argue about the President, politics, or social issues with your mouth full of sweet potato pie. So thank you, Soul Food, for all that you've done and all that you've taught me: that gravy is its own food group, that macaroni and cheese is a vegetable, and that chicken and waffles DO go together.

Odds and Ends

Vegetarian

Whenever I hear that someone's a vegetarian, I automatically feel bad for them. I picture them eating celery and lettuce all day every day. I bet that's not the case though. I bet vegetarians eat a ton of candy. I bet it's like, "I can't have a hamburger for dinner, sooooo I'll just have 18 bags of skittles instead!" I bet all the characters from Candyland are vegetarians.

Tolerant advice-giver

There's a commercial sponsored by the NBA, starring NBA players, that urges viewers not to use the word "gay" in a negative light. The commercial shows kids playing basketball and trash-talking, with the first three lines going something like, "the last time you blocked somebody was online" or something dumb like that. Then the fourth line says something like, "your moves are gay," then the NBA players step in and scold the gay comment. I'm fine with trying to get people to not use gay in that way. It probably is hurtful to some people. What I'm not fine with is the NBA telling me not to say it. Really? The NBA? Where the players can't go five minutes without swearing, fighting, and getting arrested? Where the season started a month late because its members are all greedy? THAT NBA is telling me what to say? Right. I'll refrain from calling things gay because it can hurt feelings, not because of your ridiculously lame, hypocritical commercial. Quit calling others out and call some travelling.

Is that you, Ev?

I'm 90% sure the waitress at the Village Cafe in Clayton is Ev from the Real World. To be certain, next time I go, I'm not gonna be polite and see if she starts getting real.

Totally deserves it.

How did the hand-dryer come about? Was the inventor like: "Ugh, these paper towels are getting my hands way too dry. I just gotta invent something that leaves them inconveniently wet so my hands are all drippy like they're meant to be."? I guess they're more eco-friendly, but I'm willing to kill some trees for dry hands. Forests are overrated. And we only have to kill the bad trees, like the one that eats Charlie Brown's kite or the evil one from Lord of the Rings or maybe the Whomping Willow if need be.

Toast on drums

How come rappers hardly ever form bands? It's always like T.I. featuring Drake/Lil Wayne/Snoop Dogg/Kid Cudi/Vanilla Ice/Rick Ross/Young Jeezy/50 Cent/The Game. Just form a band. It's like breakfast. They call it breakfast, not Pancakes featuring Eggs/Bacon/Toast/Grits/Applesauce/Milk.

The key to a woman's heart

I think if I could somehow combine Pinterest, the Bachelor, and Ryan Gosling, I could control 95% of the women of the world.

Indie Music Ice Cream Truck

There's an ice cream truck that drives throughout my neighborhood every day, blaring Pop Goes the Weasel and If You're Happy and You Know It in an effort to attract the kiddies. The only problem is, there aren't that many kids in my neighborhood. There are a lot of young adults though. Maybe the ice cream man should think about shutting off the kiddie music and playing some Vampire Weekend or something instead. Ooh, indie music ice cream truck!

Flavors:

• Death Cone for Cutie
• Chunky Arctic Monkey
• Passion Pit-stachio
• The Marzipan Volta
• Miike Snowcone
• Pavement Chocolate Chip
• Sticky Lykke Li
• Sigur-Free Ros
• Neutral Milkshake Hotel
• MmmGMT

Oh man, I would love this... at least at first, until other people started liking it. Nevermind... all the indie ice cream would end up selling out anyway.

Taste the Rainbow

  

The food pyramid is no more. It's gone. I had no idea. Was it even sick? I would have sent flowers had I known. Poor food Egyptians. Anyway, the food pyramid is no longer the go-to reference for youngsters looking to make healthy food choices. (All one of them.) Its replacement? MyPlate. Instead of the tried and true triangle diagram, it's a circle with different sized wedges. Whatevs. I guess that's fine. No big deal, right? WRONG.

You see, it's not just the shape that's changed. My mom, who teaches 2nd grade and has to share the new MyPlate with her students, tells me that the biggest change is the focus on color. In an effort to simplify things for the kiddies, children are now told to simply try to make their plates colorful. A healthy plate is one with lots of different colors.

Now, I know what they're getting at. Most veggies are green. Grains are brown and white. Dairy is yellow or white. Fruits are red, orange, purple, blue. Meat is red or brown. You could construct a pretty healthy meal by going with the color idea. But if I'm a kid and I know I'm supposed to fill my plate with different colors, here's what my diet would look like:

Dinner is served?

BREAKFAST: Jolly Ranchers

LUNCH: Rainbow Sherbet w/ Sprinkles

DINNER: Fun Dip

And remember, these are kids. Kids put all kinds of things in their mouths. I could easily see MyPlate backfire into this diet:

BREAKFAST: Crayons

LUNCH: Glitter

DINNER: An Eric Carle book

Maybe I don't give kids enough credit, but I don't think the whole color thing is a good idea. And what if the kid's colorblind? Can you say eating disorder? I say bring back the pyramid. And while we're bringing back things from my youth, how bout Legends of the Hidden Temple? Now there's something that promotes healthy living. Challenging physical activities, brain-stimulating quizzes, teamwork, blue barracudas... the show had it all. Surely there's room on TV for a show with that much to offer. Do we really need another "cycle" of America's Next Top Model? Haven't we had enough trips down Project Runway? Would anyone miss the Lifetime channel?

Rules For Riding In My Car

Car, girls, and flags pictured may or may not actually be mine

1. No smoking.

2. If you're a hot girl, disregard Rule #1. Do whatever you want.

3. If Hey Ya is on, don't change the station.

4. Don't open the glove compartment. Everything will fall out.

5. Don't put your feet on the dashboard.

6. If you're a hot girl, disregard Rule #5. Do whatever you want.

7. Always wear a seat belt.

8. Never wear socks with sandals.

9. No country music.

10. You can eat, but make sure the food gets in your mouth. Also, if you're eating fries, every fifth one goes to me.

11. If they're Checkers fries, every third one goes to me.

12. If you're a hot girl, Rule #11 still applies. You can't possibly think you can just do whatever you want.

13. If we stop at a gas station, you're not obligated to buy me anything from inside, but I sure do like watermelon Slush Puppies.

14. Don't scream if I'm about to hit an animal unless it's a cat or a dog or something that could mess up my car. I don't want to swerve and kill myself over a chipmunk.

15. Don't scream if I'm about to hit a Justin Bieber. I don't want to swerve and kill myself over a Justin Bieber.

16. Black people have to ride in the back.

17. Totally kidding.

18. Don't throw trash out the window. The wind could catch it and it could fly back in and hit a black person sitting in the back.

19. Totally kidding again. Not about the trash. Don't litter.

20. No Nickelback.

21. Don't break up with your boyfriend while I'm driving you to his house. (This actually happened once.)

22. If you're a hot girl, disregard Rule #21.

23. On road trips, check to make sure I'm paying attention. I'll drive 100 miles in the wrong direction without noticing.

24. Seriously, I was 100% kidding about Rule #16.

25. Seriously, I was 100% not kidding about Rule #20.

Odds and Ends

• I love Words With Friends, but I wonder if Words With Enemies isn't a better idea. Sure, beating your friends is cool, but how bout dropping QUARTZ on a triple word score on someone you've hated your whole life?

• Kraft needs to create some sort of Adult-Style Mac & Cheese. Instead of dinosaur shapes, there can be little briefcases, ties, bills, reading glasses, etc. This way, I get all the enjoyment of eating cheesy shapes with none of the judgmental glances from the cashiers at publix.

•  I wonder if the temperature is always 98 degrees at Nick Lachey's house. His girlfriend is over and is sweating and dying of heat exhaustion and is all begging Nick to turn the air on and he just won't do it and she's all like 'you don't cherish me' and he's like 'I do cherish you' and then he laughs cuz he realizes the inadvertent pun and she passes out and he misses Jessica Simpson a little.
  

• Anything with pumpkin in it is good... pumpkin pie, pumpkins muffins, pumpkins lattes... the list goes on and on. Yes, I think I'd eat anything with pumpkin in front of it. Now am I saying I'd eat pumpkin poop? No. But I'm not gonna just rule it out. Depends how poop-heavy the dish is.
  

• Check out the old and new Hawaiian Punch mascots:

       Thoughts on the updated version:
       Pros: He's wearing pants.
       Cons: Everything else.


       What a terrible change.

       (Did you ever think the red hat on the original was his hair? I did.)

Fun With Potato Famine

I saw a special on the History Channel about the Irish Potato Famine where the narrator asked the viewer to imagine what it would have been like to live during that trying time. It's long been my policy to do exactly what the good people on television tell me to do, so I imagined what life might be like during the Great Irish Famine of the 1840s. Turns out, it wasn't so bad. This is due in most part to me imagining myself in the United States and not Ireland, as the narrator did not specify location. Sure there were no iPhones or internet, but there was plenty to eat and no Justin Bieber ... a pleasant era indeed. But what of my Irish brethren across the Atlantic? What was it like? What if someone I knew was Irish and lived during the Potato Famine? Then it hit me. I do know someone Irish. The band U2. Omg, what if U2 had lived in Ireland during the potato famine?! Why it could have changed the very course of rock and roll!

Songwriters tend to write about what's going on around them. Dylan wrote about counterculture, Lennon wrote about social activism, Ke$ha writes about glitter*... it would make sense that if U2 were around back then that they would have written about the Potato Famine. With hunger as the driving force behind their music, the starving artists would have probably released some slightly different singles. Here's a quick look at what might have been:

• Sunday Bloody Sunday --->
  Sunday Hungry Sunday
• With Or Without You --->
  With Or Without Food
• I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For --->
  I Still Haven't Found Something On My Fork
• One --->
  None
• Hold Me, Kill Me, Kiss Me, Thrill Me --->
  Feed Me, Feed Me, Feed Me, Feed Me
• One Tree Hill --->
  One Wee Meal
• Elevation --->
  Malnutrition
• If God Would Send His Angels --->
  If God Would Send Some Pringles

Who knows what other ways the Potato Famine could have changed U2 and the rock and roll landscape? Would they have been able to practice and master their craft while near the Edge of starvation? Reduced to skin and Bonos, would they have had the strength to play at all? Lucky for the band and their fans, these questions are irrelevant. Personally, I'd be way more upset if Snow Patrol was the Irish band that had to endure the Potato Famine... wouldn't U2?


* This is the 2nd dig I've taken at Ke$ha on this blog in as many months, but let it be known that TKAA has always been and always will be Pro-Ke$ha. In fact, I would like to extend a formal invitation to Miss, um, whatever Ke$ha's last name is, to be the official celebrity ambassador for the blog... unless Katy Perry is available.

Odds and Ends

• Why do oatmeal cookies always have to have raisins in them? It's like, "Hey David, want a delicious oatmeal cookie? Well, prove it by eating around these shriveled up grapes."

• After enjoying a purple Gatorade, I saw on the bottle that the flavor was called "Fierce Grape." I wonder if the "Fierce" is necessary. Like do people go to the store and catch a glimpse of a purple sports drink, excitedly pick it up, then put it back in disgust when they discover the bottle of grape fluid is devoid of ferocity?

• You know how when someone says, "It's hot in here," somebody else inevitably quips, "Okay, I'll leave."? How come that person never leaves?

• Almost every promo for a show about football has the analysts standing around holding, twirling, spinning, or tossing a football. Is the football necessary? It must be... I challenge you to find a promo that doesn't have a guy with a handful of pigskin. That was a terrible way to put that.

• I feel like there are way too many songs telling me to put my hands in the air. Kanye West, Taio Cruz, Chris Brown, Miley Cyrus, Flo Rida... I'll put my hands in the air when I'm good and ready... and don't even think about telling me that they should stay there, DJ Khaled... that's my decision too.

Beginner's Luck

Should I start this blog off with a question? Ha ha... ha. Sorry. You'll have to excuse me, I'm quite nervous. You see, this is my first post on this blog and there's a lot of pressure to make a good first impression. I have big plans for this thing. Start out small, build a following, word spreads, and bam... I'm famous and loved by all. Nah. Truth is, I just like to write. Most of the time it's stuff that only I think is funny, but sometimes other people seem to enjoy it too. I've even had a few people tell me I should start a blog. Check it out:

"Hey man, you should totally start a blog." - Anonymous

Encouraging. And you never know... that anonymous person could be a super-talented, influential individual. Nah, it's Ke$ha. (That's for kicking me to the curb for not looking like Mick Jagger, jerk.) Anyway, I want this blog thing to go well, so I figured it's probably a good idea to start out with a little luck on my side... and what's luckier than a bowl of lucky charms? Nothing. (Once you take out the nasty non-marshmallows.) So let's hope these hearts, stars, horseshoes, clovers, blue moons, pots of gold, rainbows, and red balloons I'm eating right now bring me and this blog some luck... and not adult-onset diabetes.


P.S. - I get horseshoes, clovers, and even blue moons, but how are red balloons lucky? I guess 'rabbit's foot' just doesn't rhyme.