Category: Entertainment
THOR’s Day Rant: HOLD THE SALAD!
Written by Troglodad
Thursday, 09 April 2009 13:05
7 Comments

It started out as one of those really bad Mondays. The kind where you oversleep, the kids have some crisis, and you are out of sync the rest of the day. And it keeps getting worse. By dinner time, I was in a pretty foul mood. I decided to splurge and just get dinner out. We went to Wendy’s.

Now, I know that recently I announced my break up with Wendy. But the kids still like her and while Five Guys does a better burger, they don’t have a drive thru. So Wendy got $27 of my hard-earned cash. Me, the wife and kids got frosties, burgers, chicken nuggets and fries. Or so I thought.

I’m not a salad guy. I don’t like bunny food. If something is green, I generally avoid it. For me, potatoes and rice are vegetables. And tomatoes need to be ground up and served in processed form, like ketchup.

When I order a burger, I am very specific about what I want on it. Cheese. That’s it. Nothing else. In fast food world, this equates to me ordering a "plain" cheeseburger. I feel that catsup, mustard or any other topping (except for maybe bacon) dilutes the bovine goodness of a burger. I don’t want a mouthful of conflicting flavors. I want a steak on a bun, ground up so it’s easier to chew. I don’t want a hand-held salad.

At Wendy’s, this is generally not a problem as they make each burger to order. There aren’t racks of pre-made singles and doubles "with the works" sitting under a heat lamp. You have to tell them what you want on your burger — like lettuce, or "everything." So when I order a plain cheeseburger, there shouldn’t be any problem. At Wendy’s, the "plain" is actually redundant, because if I just say I’ll have a "double with cheese," all I should get is two buns, two patties and a mess of melted cheese.

Not this past Monday.

Nope, we get home and start divvying out the food — setting the kids up with plates. McDonald’s plates —   it’s a sick joke I like to engage in, as I’m not overly fond of McDonald’s (kind of like putting pearls on a hog, or however that saying goes).

When I get to my burger — my frosty and fries waiting for the third member of their perfect trio — I get a leafy, green surprise. My burger has been tainted by vegetables. All of them. That’s right, my "plain" burger is now adorned with a full-fledged salad, oozing chlorophyll and insecticides all over that delicious, greasy patty.

I pretty much lost it. I mean, I was already in a bad mood. But that just set me right over the edge. Were I mentally ill, I probably would have driven back to Wendy’s, tied the burger to a concrete block and heaved it through one of their windows.

I REALLY don’t like salad.

And why is that so odd? Why is it that when I go to a restaurant, order a steak, and tell them to hold the salad, they look at me funny? Or when I order a burger and tell them I don’t want any vegetables, even on my plate? Why is that so difficult a request to accept?

When I get an Outback burger, and it’s accompanied by a big nasty pickle (my most hated of vegetables), I just about lose my appetite. The nasty pickle juice has invariably leaked out on the plate, soaking into some fries and into the bun. The meal is ruined.

If I were allergic to onions, and ordered an onion-free meal, would I get strange looks? No. If I were one of those cumbaya-singing, hemp-wearing, tree-hugging, Obama-voting vegetarian hippies, and ordered some free-range greens, would I get contempt from the waitress? No.

What the hell is the problem with me not wanting vegetables?

Babies don’t like vegetables. Let’s face it, they’re an acquired taste. Given a choice, any child would pick candy over veggies. Why then do we have such a fixation on forcing people to eat vegetables?

When I order something plain, it takes less work to serve it that way than it does to layer on the bunny food. Is the cook trying to impose their twisted chlorophyllous obsession on me? Are they so retarded they don’t know what the word "plain" means? Are they Mexican, and can’t speaky the English at all? (See the reaction you get at a Taco Bell when you order a Taco with just meat and cheese)

I’ve made it to 41, and don’t have high cholesterol. Stop hating my meat-and-cheese lifestyle. I shouldn’t have to scrape the ketchup and mustard off my burger’s buns. I shouldn’t have to pick out pickle-soaked fries and use a napkin to blot up that nasty pickle juice off the plate. And God help you when I forget to check my burger first and bite into onions and lettuce when I should be tasting well-done cow flesh.

Some of you reading this are probably thinking that I should just check my order before I leave a drive thru, or send back orders done wrong. Sending stuff back is dangerous. You get angry glares from waitresses, and the kitchen takes their sweet ass time in fixing their own mistake. As for a drive thru, why should I make the people in line behind me suffer while I dig through a bag that has been stuffed to the brim with my order?

Fast food is hard work. I appreciate the hot, sweaty environment — as long as it doesn’t end up in my food — and the long hours and sheer effort it takes to get me a burger and fries in the drive thru. But when I pay you to serve me my food, HOLD THE DAMN SALAD!

 
MTW: “Change is good!”
Written by Chad Phillips
Friday, 23 January 2009 10:20
5 Comments

[Editor's note: The photo and video accompanying this post were added by Ron McClure Jr, unbeknownst to Mr. Chad Phillips, the creator, editor and administrator of MyThoughtWorld, and also the author of the following post. The video is a rag-tag montage of pictures from his posts over the years, and is meant to give tribute and hopefully a chuckle or two. The sappy music was chosen for its overly dramatic effect (Chad is a drama queen), however we here at MTW truly appreciate Chad's hard work, and I personally wish to thank him for affording us the opportunity to spout our opinionated rhetoric. He is not gone for good, but just stepping back...for now (he has control issues).]

…and now a message from our founder:

I'm writing this post to inform our readership of some much needed changes taking place around here. But, to quote my kids' favorite author, Dave Pilkey, "Before I tell you that story, I have to tell you this story…"

Once again the old MTW mailbox has been flooded with letters of both concern and complaint. If you're new here, you probably don't have a clue why there's concern. But if you're an MTW fan, it's no secret that up until just this past week, MTW's content was, well…(how can I put this gently?) static. The fault has been mostly mine, as MTW Regs T.R. Oglodad and Ron McClure Jr. have been serving up some pretty good fare. Once in a while, even Santiago and Cal get into the act. I just haven't had time to edit and administer the site.

The reason for this is bittersweet. Basically, since I was forced into "early retirement" by the conservative rag (I mean that lovingly, BTW)  I used to work for, I went into business for myself. With the birth of my entrepreneurship, I just haven't had time to edit for this site, much less do any blogging of my own. And administration? Forget it. It ain't happenin'. That's the bitter part. The sweet part is that business is good and getting better, but the bottom line is that the extra business is eating up my blogging, editing, and administration resources.

Therefore, I am turning over the editing and administration duties of MyThoughtWorld to MTW Regulars T.R. Oglodad and Ron McClure Jr.  T.R. is a veteran MTW contributor – and the brains behind most of those one of kind, brilliantly "touched" images you'll find on our site. He's also a hell of a writer in his own right. Ron McClure Jr. is likewise a man of many talents, not the least of which is editing and writing. Ron brings with him considerable experience as a team leader as well. His talents will be most welcome here in an administrative and creative capacity.

Please make these guys feel welcome as they fill two rather large shoes (MINE!) in joining the MTW editorial board.

Thanks guys for bailing my tired ass out and good luck.

 
Biggest disappointments in action movies for 2008
Written by Chad Phillips
Wednesday, 31 December 2008 07:03
1 Comment

Actually, this is just the conclusion of the caveman year end (AKA Rear End) movie reviews. This year we manly types didn't have much to choose from in some of our favorite franchises.

In my last review I named this year's Incredible Hulk as topping my list of disappointing movies. Coming in at number two on that list was Guillermo Del Toro's Hell Boy II: The Golden Army. I'm still wondering how a movie franchise which had so much going for it could've gone so wrong. First, there was the stellar cast. Second there was the incredible make-up and sets. Third, there was the special effects team. Fourth, there was the masterful story teller and director, Guillermo Del Toro. And lastly, Del Toro had an incredible story and characters from the previous Hell Boy on which to build the sequal. Yet, for all it had going for it, Hell Boy II is about as exciting as a dirt sandwich. Intimations of just how crummy the movie was going to be were embedded in the opening deckhead underneath Hell Boy's photograph. Apparently someone felt too much needed to be explained…and they did just that. The information was meant to be helpful and cute simultaneously, but it just comes off as cornball with a touch of honey. There was also the very annoying and totally unbelievable scene featuring Hell Boy as, well…a boy, which just didn't work. Many of Hell Boy's one-liners fell flat as well. That's without all the repeat crap we were already exposed to in the first movie. To wit, nothing new is revealed in Hellboy ll, and it lacks the suspenseful story telling of the first installment. It's just a very bad rehash in which too much time is spent on things that don't matter…like the regrettable scene in which Hell Boy and Abe Sapian are reduced to drunken pansies singing Barry Manelow's I Can't Smile Without You. My advice, skip this one for men's night and instead watch it with your boys if you have any. My two younger sons loved it.

That brings me to another Hollywood piece of crap, The Mummy III: Curse of the Dragon Warrior. Again, unlike the previous two Mummy movies, this one has nothing for you if you like both story and humor in the same package. In short, it's the same movie for the third time, but not nearly as entertaining as the first two. To give you an idea of just how bad this latest incarnation of the Mummy is, imagine falling asleep while being chased by an oriental man who is covered with flaming 'smores. That's how bored I was during the chase scenes. And that's pretty much how Jet Li looked as a flaming living statue monster mummy creature. Oh, and did I mention that Rachel Weisz, who plays opposite Brendan Frasier in the first two Mummies was conveniently left out of this latest offering. That's too bad, 'cause she certainly was more fun to watch than her replacement and generated tons more energy with Frasier. Then again, perhaps she saw the script and realized what I'm cluing you into now: The Mummy III sucks out loud.

Finally, the last big disappointment this year (aside from the general election) was Journey to the Center of the Earth. Ultimately unsatisfying as a man flick, Journey gives us the kind of campy sci-fi you can watch with your kids, but which you'd never watch with other adults. While generally likeable, it lacks the things which make it a true knuckle dragger's movie. Don't watch this one guys if you're craving red meat.