Watch What you Eat: The World's Greatest Restaurant

As my closest friends well know one of my life goals is to open the world's most successful pop culture inspired restaurant. As you all now know, I don't do a very good job of setting reasonable/productive/rational goals.

In order to bring me one step closer towards having my only idea of any reasonable value stolen, I have compiled a preliminary menu for the world's greatest restaurant of the future: "Watch What You Eat."

(In the interest of not having the entirety of my idea stolen, I have provided a list of Alternate Names that you can feel free to steal for your own pop culture restaurant: New Grill, Wok And Roll/Hard Wok Cafe, Once Upon a Tyme In Mexico. Hey Food, A-Nom Maniacs.)

This menu is not to be confused with the food offerings at my future world famous seafood restaurant located in Steveston: "The Seaward."

Breakfast Menu: 

Game of Scones: Choose your favorite scones from a massively complex and difficult to differentiate cast.

Perks of Being a Waffle Hour

Planet of the Crepes: "It was really delicious all along!"

Lox, Stock and Two Smoking Bagels



Act Fast! There is No Telling How Long These Scones Will Last Before They're Brutally Murdered.

Appetizers:

Lord Of the Onion Rings:
Fowlty Tower of Chicken Wings: Much better than anything american tv has to offer.
B for Baguette-a: Served with "Certified Fresh" tomato juice and jam from local strawberry field "Forever."
Butterfly Shrimpsons

I Bet This Gets Your Appetite Going

Sandwiches:

Heroes Sandwhich: The First Bite is Delicious, but things get a bit confusing after that.
The AV-Club: "We Give This Sandwhich a B-"

Hail to the Beef
Steak Me Home Tonight Sandwich: Credit to Dave

Asian:

Of Rice and Men

Sesame Street Chicken: Brought to you by the letter D, for delicious. (Not Actually Street Chicken.)

Pad Thai-tanic
Citizen (Chow) Mein: (Editor's Note: This is a bit of a stretch.)
Ong Bak Choy

Happy Endings (Desserts):

The Walking Bread Pudding: Suprisingly enjoyable despite it's lack of consistency.
Pie Hard
The Piano Flan
Sun Tsu's Tart of War: Great to eat, or to leave on your desk so that people think you are an intense strategic thinker.
Undeclaired
Almost Famousse
C.R.E.A.M. Puffs: Protect ya Neck from sub-par snacks.

"Move swift as the Wind and closely-formed As The Wood. Attack like the Fire and be still as the Mountain."

Spirited Away

Port-landia: Put a Bird on It with this Pacific Northwest favourite.

True Blood-y Mary

Wish you were Beer

Coffee Anan
Pineapple Espresso
Young Juicetice
Clockwork Orange Juice

Pub Fare:

Mariah Curry (With Nicholas Sage)

Silence of the Lamb Chops (Served with Rick Rolls)

Bangers and M*A*S*H

Vegetarian Options

Weeds: An upper middle class single green salad with a dark secret. Also, no discernable plot.

Soy Story
My Big Fat Greek Salad

"30 Days Without An Accident" -- An Abstract

TWD-04-01//10-13-2013-80%

This episode was commissioned in order to provide a table setting, macro-lens analysis of the West Georgia Correctional Facility (hitherto referred to as “The Prison”) in the months following the conclusion of the third season of The Walking Dead. In addition, this episode endeavours to jointly examine the complex psychological state of main character Rick Grimes as well as offer a brief short story outlining the desperation of those who exist outside of stable communities during a zombie apocalypse. This episode will analyze these themes primarily through an isolated B-plot vignette and a CGI-buoyed physics-defying zombie battle.

Gimple et al. endeavour to introduce complex themes of community, alienation, emotional detachment and kick-assitude of zombie smashing that, with any luck, will prove as pervading themes throughout at least the first half of this season.

Also, Rick Starts a Gun Farm

This new episode will work on the assumption that a television program about the dangers of a zombie apocalypse stagnates in an eco-system bereft of “cannon fodder” and recognize the rapidly stagnating nature of previously examined themes such as “humanity is the real enemy” and “sitting on a farm for an entire god-damn year is boring.”

In order to examine the complex and multi-dimensional impact of “community” this episode will provide the following points of analysis:

-          The desensitization and loss of innocence in the youth community in a violent and unstable post apocalyptic environment as evidenced by the seeming emotional callousness of that cute blonde girl to her boyfriend getting chomped.

Looks Legit

-          A comparison of the effects of loss and bereavement on the psyche of the individual between a square-jawed immaculately bearded former sheriff living within a community setting and a dirty swamp-monster ladie living without.

-          The fragile nature (and indeed added dangers) of human communities as analyzed through the lens of a crazy eye-bleeding mega-ebola virus.

-          Daryl is a universally beloved badass. Just...he is. It’s science.

-          Renouncing alcohol will almost certainly be the death of you.

"30 Days Without An Accident" is necessary in order to provide a narrative foundation upon which new showrunner Scott Gimple can introduce us to the world of The Walking Dead as he envisions it. Each new season demands an original driving force in order to propel the series’ cardboard cutouts masquerading as characters between seemingly random instances of horrible violence. In addition, this episode provides brief nods to the stylistic changes he intends to bring to the series including Michonne learning to smile, vaguely meta nods to the breakaway stardom of Norman Reedus and even more nonsensical action sequences.  

Providing a generally positive foundation for future drama, this episode provides no small amount of hope for cautiously optimistic viewers of the breakaway hit. Whether this episode will stand as another example of Lucy pulling the proverbial football out from under our stupid, stupid legs is yet to be seen but there is certainly reason to have faith moving forward. 

Still Not Sure Who (Or Why) This Guy is Though

Sauron, Base Master of Treachery, Furious at Depictions of Torture in "Fellowship Of the Ring."

Describing the film as misleading and "grossly inaccurate"  a representative of Sauron, The Necromancer, Lord of Barad-dûr and Base Master of Treachery has lashed out at the producers of the controversial film, "The Lord of The Rings: Fellowship of The Ring." 

The All Seeing Evil Eye of Sauron,
Furious at allegations it endorses torture

The spokesperson, known only as "The Mouth of Sauron" wanted to vocalize the extreme outrage of the forces of the Dark Lord at depictions of torture presented in the film. They're concerned that viewers across Middle Earth will believe  a series of extended scenes  featuring the torture of one "Gollum" to be fact. In the scenes, torture of Gollum leads to the discovery of the One Ring of Power which had been hidden in "The Shire" a remote hilly region in the west of Middle-Earth. 

Executive Director of the Armies of The Dread Abomination, and Cheftain of the Ring-wraiths, The Witch-King of Angmar has insisted that the torture of Gollum provided no information that was crucial in the discovery in the One Ring of Power. When asked for comment he responded: "In fact, it provided no information whatsoever. We were mostly just bored, and wanted to see how long he could hold his breath." 

Pictured: Peter Jackson,
the Controversial Director

In a letter to the Council of Elrond, The Nameless Enemy said that the "use of torture in the pursuit of The One Ring of Power did severe damage to the reputation of The Legions  of The Abhorred Dread that cannot be expunged. The film-makers and production studio responsible for this are perpetrating a morally reprehensible myth that torture is an effective means of extracting information and advancing the agenda of the Dark Lord. In truth, torture is merely an auxiliary tool for the extraction of information, often used as a tertiary mechanism for destroying the spirits of our enemies. In truth, the brutal occupation and systematic decimation of the local populations and rapine exploitation of its resources are our preferred method of making a population malleable."

Debate has been swirling of late about the responsibilities, or lack thereof, that are incumbent in being a storyteller. Many critics have pointed to the evident depiction of the efficacy of torture in the expedition of the discovery of the powerful artefact in the history of Middle-Earth. One film critic for the Barad-dûr Gazette  responded that "It just, makes us feel uncomfortable. There was a decade where nearly 80 percent of our population were vocal supporters of torture and the brutal annexation of our enemies. It makes us sad to think about that, so we would rather not see it all. If we do see it, it it would make our consciences feel much better if the storyteller changed history and presented it in a way that made it look like we were critically questioning the morality of our actions." 

Sorry, Wrong Movie

The producer of the film has remained quiet in the face of controversy only recently providing a statement: "I...but, you tortured him. Whether he said 'Bilbo,' 'Shire,' is surely non-substantive to that fact? Isn't it? Surely you aren't just using these complaints as a chance to absolve your guilt over a decade that resulted in the near complete moral and ethical degradation of Mordor? Because that would be a pretty shitty thing to do."

Rohan, or some other place. I can't keep track of this
metaphor any more. 

I Volunteer As Tribute: An Open Application to Mars One

Did you know that humanity is currently looking for volunteers, nay applicants, nay tributes to be our very first space colonists? That's right friends, the next frontier is upon us and I want to go to there.

Mars One, a company based in the Netherlands, has set up a very specific plans for humanities first Colony on our big red neighbour. They want 4 volunteers to engage in an arduous decade long training exercise/reality television show to prepare them for the settling of a land named after the Roman God of  War in September of 2022. Before The Situation, Kanye West, Hilary Clinton and Neil Degrasse Tyson call dibs on this opportunity to help shape human history I want to throw my name into the ring for formal consideration. I think that my family heritage, impeccable personal qualifications and general sunny demeanour would make me an exceptional candidate to help take the next giant leap for mankind.

A very little known fact about me is that my lucky number is actually September, 2022. When you're looking to put together a one way suicide mission to colonize a barren, nearly oxygenless, wasteland has to count for something.

But there is more to consider in my application than a simple numerological miracle. As a Canadian I come from a nation with a unique combination of frontier ruggedness and a lack of American "revolt against the motherland" history. Europeans have been softened by a millennia of living in real cities. Americans might have a colonial history but carry with them a certain innate proclivity for revolt. Both bring traits that could jeopardize the mission. Canadians are a unique mixture of frontier adaptability and resilience combined with a political herd mentality and almost puppy like obedience to confusing and often arbitrary governmental authority.

It might be reasonable to point out that I lack formal training in the sciences of medicine, engineering, aviation, geology, chemistry, physics, transfiguration or horticulture. I might point out that I also lack the liver damage that traditionally comes with an engineering degree, I'm not as boring as a geology or physics major, transfiguration is probably not even a real thing and doctors are overrated on a suicide mission. When we're all clearly going to die from an explosion, or all of our oxygen being sucked out of our space age hobbit holes, what use is someone trained in preventing infection or mending broken bones? For this mission we need people with a single minded passion for personal glory and nothing to lose, it's the kind of job that the Politics major was made for.

Much in the spirit of the above point, popular culture has taught us many invaluable lessons about the value of having a plucky, wildly under-qualified underdog play an important role in what would appear to be an impossible mission. When NASA sent Homer Simpson to space it was initially an ill considered publicity grab designed to secure enough funding to maintain a space program capable of making genuine advances in the eternal pursuit of knowledge. In the end, it was this wildly irresponsible, poorly trained moron that saved the mission from inevitable failure. What caused the problem he was forced to fix? We may never know, but if NASA had failed to send along the hero we never expected, but so sorely needed, who knows what kind of catastrophe could have befallen the crew? In short, I will take humanity to Mars, though I do not know the way.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I don't really have anything else on the go. Community, Happy Endings, and New Girl don't look like they're going to make it, Louie isn't on TV for the foreseeable future. Baby Boomers are currently squatting on all the good jobs, and I'm not handsome or gregarious enough to have any legitimate dating prospects in the near future. On the plus side, I'm just entertaining enough to make Mars One some spare cash by starring in their bizzaro "Survivor: Mars" reality show and I'm crazy enough to put my life in the hands of people who are willing to base their mission to launch humanity into the next stage of civilization by ripping off the plot of a Simpsons episode.

Also, if you let me go on this mission I will recreate this scene... IN SPACE:

The Never Going to Hunger Games

My funemployed status affords me the exceptional opportunity to consider some of the great issues of the day. I rarely consider them thoroughly, and even when I do I wouldn’t go as far as to say that I consider them well, but I certainly do consider them. As you’re all well aware, the issue du jour is the royal fetus, or more specifically, the possibility of there being royal fetuses.

Some folks have taken this opportunity to debate issues of trifling significance like the symbolic nature of a monarchy in what is nominally a meritocratic society . While I suppose the minor minds of our time can entertain themselves with questions of a strictly academic value I can’t help but feel that this question really missing the boat on what should be an issue of fundamental importance to all Canadians, what do we do if there are twins? More specifically, how excellently would that opportunity allow us to address the anti-meritocratic nature of constitutional monarchies?

I’ve heard rumour that in the instance of there being two royal fetuses that eventually become two royal babies the official heir would be the one that is born first. How much more arbitrary can we make the directing of God’s divine will than by depriving a potential monarch of their birthright over a few mere seconds?  I think that allowing a first past the cervix approach to the inheritance of entire British Empire is a sub-par method for choosing God’s chosen. In lieu of this antiquated method I have a perfectly reasonable—and undeniably meritocratic—ways to determine the future heir to the crown of Great Britain and its Commonwealth. 

The Hunger Games Method

Having recently watched the movie with my family, however, I can safely say that I am a PhD level mind in the universe of…whatever universe the Hunger Games is in. With that in mind, I feel like I am most ably positioned to provide guidance in the uniquely challenging instance of the royal uterus “doubling down” on the whole provision on an heir thing.

In essence, method one is built around the notion that the monarch most able to guide the British Empire back to prominence is the one willing to fight for it, literally. Before you turn up your nose I would point out that we basically use the royal family as a multinational reality television show already, and NFL/UFC/Vice-Presidential Debate ratings more or less disprove your “violence is bad and socially unacceptable” objection. As we all know, might is right and popularity is tantamount to moral legitimacy, that’s why Kanye West and Drake are more or less the modern day Popes.

My proposal is that in year 2031—assuming the world isn’t a nuclear wasteland where we have kids fighting each other for fun anyway— we have the two royal snotty teenagers fight each other to the death in a needlessly elaborate, televised, grudge match. Admittedly, this is a difficult to stomach option for our soft 2012 eyes and ears, but I suspect that the population that suffers through the impending octuple-dip recession will be a much hardier folk with a greater preference for pragmatism in lieu of mollycoddling weakness .

It will certainly be difficult for the anti-monarchists among us to argue that the crown was passed on to the next generation unearned. We also have almost 15 years of documented proof that the winners of reality tv events are veritable living Gods in the arena of public opinion. Who doesn’t remember Richard Hatch, Boston Rob, whoever won one of the Big Brothers?

Truly, we would have the leader we need, and deserve.

Community 101: The Locomotive That Runs On Us

Any of you that follow me on Twitter or are friends with me on Facebook (which, given what I know about the demographics of my readers means approximately %115 of you) might have noticed that I'm pretty upset by the recent string of decisions by NBC to try and destroy my spirits--I mean delay the return of Community. In the interest of full disclosure, and linguistic clarity, I've decided to offer you a lexicon of the major terms, phrases and call signs of the Community Memedom.

#SixSeasonsAndAMovie

The primary identifier of Greendale Human Beings, aside from being middle to high earners between the ages of 18-35 who are willing to do anything to save a show beside actually watch it while it's being shown on television, (that's a television demographics joke, for those of you keeping track at home) is this charming little slogan. While it comes from humble origins, as a throwaway sight gag during a clip episode, it has become a mantra for people whose biggest problem is the withholding of a television program for marketing purposes. 

This is, actually, one of the easiest to understand terms in the bizarre lexicographic menagerie of the Community world: it means we want Six Seasons and a Movie worth of Community, preferably  uninterrupted by hiatuses prompted by NBC's attempt to promote a buddy cop show starring a St.Bernard named Bernie O'Brien who talks with a heavy Boston accent. Given that Community is a multiple award winner and emmy nominated show it seems reasonable for fans to suggest that it shouldn't have to be in a fight for its life against a monkey in scrubs and the reanimated corpse of "The Office," but here we are. 

Proper Usage: "Watching The Office is about as funny as being told you have Chlamydia. Bring back Community! #SixSeasonsAndAMovie."

#TheDarkestTimeline

One of my personal favorites. The slogan that launched a thousand ships and a million mediocre photoshop attempts. Contrary to popular belief, The Darkest Timeline is not exclusively a potential piece of prophecy referring to a future Romney Presidency. The Darkest Timeline is a closing credits gag from  Emmy nominated episode, named after the patented NBC show selection methodology,"Remedial Chaos Theory." The meme is invoked whenever the show is put into jeopardy and references the fact that as we enter into a universe without Community we must be departing into an alternate timeline where everything is horrible and all hope is lost. As we drive a path into this dark and pointless existence, the fact that there is a perfect alternate timeline where we have eliminated system racism, elected Jon Stewart president and returned to a regular weekly airing of Community is comforting to people like me. 

This meme even comes with a convenient symbol, a black goatee. Now you too can wear the standing symbol of evil twins everywhere to signify your lack of faith in a loving God and passion for pop culture references in your relationship driven network comedies. To be completely honest, and particularly selfish, this is actually pretty good for me. Movember is coming up and, as I've mentioned, I'm completely unable to grow a proper beard for myself so now I have a plausible excuse to wear a fake one all month. 

Proper Usage: Community has been canceled, forget "The Road," this is clearly #TheDarkestTimeline.

Annie's Boobs

This one is a little bit more disappointing than our previous entries. In an episode of Community where the Gang create a Goodellas inspired chicken finger smuggling operation Troy buys a monkey and calls it Annie's Boobs.  Being that Annie is a character with boobs, as well as a monkey, hilarity ensued. While the premise of the gag is absolute comedic genius, I understand the utility of this particular term is probably limited. It's helpful for the uninitiated to understand that Annie's Boobs can be a useful designator anatomically  OR zoologically,  if you find it difficult to differentiate between a monkey and female breasts during a conversation you're doing one or both of them horribly wrong. In spite of this, an explanation gives me a great opportunity to shoehorn an Alison Brie gif into this blog post which, based on polling, is the single greatest way to drive traffic in the history of the internet. 

October 19th

Our final entry in the list of things that the Internet is going to be yelling at you about also continues the trend of Community fans bizarre temporality fetish, October 19th. I'm going to offer this up as advanced warning, sometime in January when all of your cool friends start tweeting and Facebook posting about how January 17th is suddenly October 19th you'll thank me. The origins of this particular meme stem from the above video, where the Community gang offer an uplifting message that, no matter when the show comes back, it will be October 19th. 

A cute, hopeful, and funny message presented in a vaguely stockholm syndrome-y way. I can hardly imagine a better way to explain the relationship between Community and it's fans. 

And that, ladies and gentleman, is my brief introductory course in some of Community's more popular memes. Now, go watch the show and, for the love of God, when it comes back on television watch it. Us middle-class, college educated tv snobs have life hard enough without our favorite show being pulled out from under us.

Why I Need A Dog: The Jed Chronicles Volume 1

You cannot even begin to fathom how badly I want a dog. I know you think you want a dog (unless you want a cat, in which case you need to give your head a shake) but before you strap your big kid pants on and bring yourself into this equation you need to ask yourself a few important questions:

Take A long hard look at the light blue lips
of madness and consider that answer again.

1. Are you willing to fight me for a dog? My math skills aren't exactly streets ahead, but I've calculated my odds of trying to bully you into giving up on your doggy dreams at 100%. I'm going to find some way to force you to drop it, and I won't remove physical intimidation from my list of possible strategies. The reason is simple, there is a finite number of dogs in the world and every one you take lowers my odds of getting my dog. I know it only lowers those odds infinitesimally, but that won't stop me. Doubt it? Before you answer that you need to decide if you're willing to push a man who thinks Ke$ha qualifies as great music? Are You?




2. I already know exactly what kind of dog I want and we belong together. When the stars align and I get my Golden English Labrador-Retriever named after the greatest imaginary president in American History, Jed, the world will be, quite simply, a more correct place. One of the world's many tragedies is that I have been forced to live 22 years apart from my spirit animal. Another? That the world has been deprived of seeing me frolic around with an English Labrador Retriever. They're like a slightly lazier version of the smartest, cutest, most awesomest animal on the planet. It's like they genetically engineered a dog version of me. How does your piddly little "want" compare to a compulsion on the part of the entire world to right this current, perverse, anti-equilibrium?

3. I'm really lonely, and I probably need this more than you. (Imagine that being said in a tough/manly voice.)

I cannot impress upon you how adorable the world would be if I had a little/big/old/really-any-sort-at-all Golden English Labrador-Retriever. This is the kind of cute that gets hard-lined directly into your system. The kind of cute that hooks you so badly that the only way your sweet addiction can end is butt naked, covered in glitter and sugar in a ditch on the side of the 401 trying to recover from a 72 hour Nyan Cat and puppy picture bender of Hangover-ian proportions.



To make a long story short, I need a dog. I might not get one today, hell I might not even get one tomorrow. However, one day you will look over the horizon and spot a shining golden beacon of canine magnificence and you'll already know its name, Jed.