Growing up being into spicy foods and having a father that enjoyed sports bars meant that I got to try every imaginable buffalo wing flavors and heat levels. After so many years of that, only a few places stood out, with wings that had unique flavors or unbearable heat levels (usually these kind of wings weren’t even listed on the menu and the owner/manager of the place would come out to confirm you really want to bring on the pain.)
So, a year ago, when I discovered that Pizza Hut joined up with Wingstreet in co-location to sell their “award-winning” buffalo wings, I scoffed at the notion of a major franchise actually having anything both spicy and flavorful.
Oh, how so very wrong was I. Very, very wrong. My eyes nearly fell out of my skull when I took my first bite of Wingstreet’s Burning Hot Bone-In buffalo wings. My skepticism was wiped out by pain and sheer joy. Not only were they pretty hot (coming from a franchise, mind you) but they had, what I later officially declared, the best flavor on a buffalo wing I ever tasted.
I know I haven’t tasted everything out there yet in buffalo wing land, and I’m certainly trying, but I’m not exaggerating when I saw I’ve tried thousands of different kinds in the course of my 28 years of kicking it on this blue ball of a planet.
So fast forward a year or so later, and here I am tonight, scarfing down on what I now deem as Happiness in a Box, Wingstreet’s hottest and best tasting wings:
I gave up on clearing my throat to get the attention of others who are preoccupied. It has lost its effectiveness in these modern times, so as a course of action, I’ve evolved and developed a new method of getting attention.
I now make retching noises. This has a highly effective 100% success rate. No longer do you have to clear your throat multiple times to get the attention you deserve. My retching noise method is guaranteed to work, every single time.
As an added bonus, it will get the attention of multiple people if there are more than one person in the room with you. So if you have something really important to say, my method works wonders. Practice isn’t even necessary, a beginner will also attain a 100% success rate.
I highly recommend you try this method at your next family gathering or company event, and be amazed at how superior it is over the old throat clearing method.
Note: Disregard the look of sheer horror generated by this method, it is a necessary side-effect for achieving your goal — getting attention.
When talking about albums that are ahead of its time, many people think of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, The Flaming Lip’s Soft Bulletin, U2’s The Joshua Tree, Radiohead’s OK Computer, Massive Attack’s Blue Lines, or David Bowie’s Low. However, one of my favorite that has withstood the test of time and still to this day sounds ahead of its time is Nine Inch Nails’s Pretty Hate Machine.
The day I first heard it was also the day I played my first first-person shooter. I played Doom on the Sega CD (those were the days) while listening to this amazing album. It heralded an era of consistently excellent releases from Trent Reznor over the years, all the way up to the latest album, Year Zero.
With PHM, I love every single song a lot, so ordering them is like a parent having to choose a favorite child. You love each one in a unique way, but you can’t really rank them. However, That’s What I Get and Down In It seem to get a lot more listens from me.
Every once in a while, an album comes along that completely engulfs you and prevents you from enjoying other albums. You know, you hit the repeat all button on your MP3 player of choice and listen to an album over and over and over again. When you try to deviate, it sucks you right back in, holding you tight.
The album that is doing that to me right now is Muse’s Black Holes and Revelations. I thought I was done with the album, I’ve moved on into 2007’s lineup of great albums. But then someone mentions he saw them live and suddenly everyone is talking about how great the album is. Now here I am, listening to the album, again.
There’s always the story of how a band or individual that sold their soul to the devil to play great music. I think Muse went one step above that and sold their soul to God to play such awesome music. Muse’s music owns my face.
Here’s Starlight from the album, it’ll melt your face, too.
After having served me well for 5 years (bought in Feb 2003), I have replaced my Canon Powershot SD400 with a modern digital camera, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ3. As I’ve been spending more time with family, and enjoying nature, I figure it was high time to upgrade to a new camera.
One thing I like with the new camera is the 10x optical zoom which is better than most digital cameras in its price range and class, and the fact that it records high quality movies at 848×480 for up to 30 minutes (on a 2GB SD memory card.) Not to mention pictures are higher quality and crisper compared to older generation digital cameras.
Which leads me into a line of thought I was thinking about the other day. I tend to adopt gadgets much sooner than anyone else does. My family always remark about the gadgets I’d show them, but eventually they end up getting them someday.
For example, I bought the first generation of digital cameras when they came out, they were big, bulky, had terrible battery life, the picture quality wasn’t that great compared to analog cameras, but the LCD screen, ability to store all pictures on a small flash drive, erase them on the spot, preview them, and so on really wowed everyone I showed it to. Fast forward a few years later and now I see everyone at our family gathering using a digital camera.
The same thing can be said for LCD monitors. I bought one when they first came out, even though they were expensive as all hell. A few years down the road and now people don’t even think twice about buying one; they even come default in every computer purchase from Dell, Gateway, Compaq, etc.
My aunt scoffed at my iPhone, saying it’s a toy with a touchscreen. But you just watch, all future cell phones will follow the iPhone philosophy in the near future. They will portable computers that does more than just make phone calls.
After all, I tend to be a barometer of the future in technology. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go try out the new hovertoilet I just bought.
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