Revenge of the Four Loko

Is it still cooly ironic to drink Four Loko a second time? Probably not, but given that the drink is soon to be devoid of its caffeinated properties, I thought it would be worth a revisit. Also, I'm a few beers in this time, so we'll see how the Loko does its thing now.

2010: The "Cranberry Lemonade" is my flavor of choice this time, if only because the flavor made me chuckle.

2013: I noticed that Four Loko is based out of Lacrosse, WI. Way to poison our youth, Wisconsin!

2014: Opening the can now.

2015: The flavoring isn't as intense as the watermelon flavor I originally tasted, and the liquor isn't as prominent. We'll see as the night progresses.

2021: Also just found out that the idiot that shot his TV with a shotgun because Bristol Palin kept advancing in Dancing With the Stars is also from Wisconsin. Bad week for Wisconsinites.

2023: The liquor aftertaste is becoming more prominent.

2027: I think I've made a huge mistake - there's at least 70% of this left.

2037: I'm not the only one doing this, as this link illustrates, though - to be fair - this guy is a pussy, and -according to him - "young, dumb, and full of cum." I don't know what that means.

2044: That guy is 5.5 hours into it, two cans in, and is rambling drunk. This guy is a f'n lightweight.

2046: DUDE FELL ASLEEP. STARTED THE FOURTH AT THE EIGHT-HOUR MARK

2105: ...and we're done. Sure, I'm drunker than when I started, but as we can see, it's not that much worse than a couple of strong microbrews. The caffeine is a plus, though.

0245: ...and I just woke up. Maybe I drank it a little too fast. Also, quite thirsty. That guy is still a pussy, though.

Android App Spotlight #35: Untappd

So you're checking in to the locations you visit and the boring shit you're doing at home, but are you really sharing all the meaningless information you can? The answer is no, at least if you are the makers of Untappd, a new mobile app that seeks to answer that question that has plagued us all  from time to time: "Whatcha drinkin'?"


To me, this seems like more than just another checkin app, if only because tracking beer is something to which I am no stranger. Since this time last year, I've been taking photos of the beers I've drunk and keep a collection of them online. (it's been a while since I've uploaded a new batch, but they're patiently waiting on my camera) I got the idea for this from a guy I met (and many like him) who collected beer bottles as wall decorations. I liked the idea of collecting them, but thought that keeping track of hundreds of beer bottles could get out of hand, and moving them would suck. This served as a fun compromise.

Untappd is like this, except more social. You make friends like you would on any other social networking site, and when you're at the bars, you can "check in" the the beer you're drinking. You can also share the bar you're at, too. From there, you can check in to just the app, or you can share with your friends on Facebook, Foursquare, and Twitter. You can earn badges, too, if that's your thing.

What's notable about Untappd is that it's not really an Android app at all - it's an html-based mobile app, which you access through your phone's browser. Traditionally, I'm not a fan of these types of apps, as they're not as stable as their locally-stored counterparts, nor do they take advantage of the platforms unique features, but they do allow for widespread use, and - in Untappd's defense - this is the nicest mobile app I've ever seen. I've still come across some flakiness while using it, though.

(You do know how to make a shortcut to a website on your home page, right? How you bookmark the website in the browser, long press on a blank area of your home page, select shortcuts, select bookmarks, and select your bookmark? You totally knew that, right?)

No God-fearing American dislikes beer, and if you expand your tastes beyond Miller Lite, you might want to share these tastes with friends. Untappd lets you do that, and hey - no precious MB's taken up on your phone's hard drive.

Lean Cuisine Review #4: Apple Cranberry Chicken

Grilled chicken in an apple reduction with cranberries, french cut green beans and whole wheat pilaf


We return again to the Lean Cuisine Spa for their Apple Cranberry Chicken. After exploring some of the other locations on the map of the mighty LC, I'm thinking this spa might be the go-to place for the good stuff, as the ACC was one of the best LC's I've had so far.

Maybe I just like too many vegetables, but I find a lot of these meals are lacking in veggies. Come on, LC, I'm trying to get healthy here! What's cheaper and more filling than vegetables? Well, whole wheat pilaf is. Except the folks at Lean Cuisine obviously think that my hunger pains somehow cloud my ability to think, because ol' Brad knows that pilaf is dish primarily consisting of rice, not the rice-shaped orzo pasta which I found here. I can hear them now - "Oh, the fatties will never know. They're too busy stuffing their face with a combination of sugar, trans fat, and sadness." Well, this guy found out your scheme, and he's about to blow this racket WIDE OPEN, bitches.

It was nice to see the pearl wheat mixed in with the noodle-which-definitely-weren't-pilaf - it gave them a bit of chew, and the texture difference allowed to savor each bite rather than simply swallowing a load of soggy noodles.

Cranberries freeze very well, so the ones found in my dinner were just as good as you would find anywhere else, and their tartness was helping the dish tickle the taste buds in several different directions. This only got better when you combined it with the "apple reduction" which honestly tasted like the gel stuff you would get on the "apple cobbler" of the old-school TV dinners, but when used in moderation, there was a definite apple-flavored sweetness that got the job done.


Chicken is a LC staple protein, and I've found the quality of the chicken bites varies from dish to dish. The chicken breast in this meal, however, was some of the best I've had in a TV dinner. And when you combine that with the rest of the dish, you have a series of flavors going in several different directions, and it makes you almost forget that you're eating a stupid diet frozen meal. The stark, black tray that stares you in the face after eating it all snaps you back to reality.

Rating: Four out of Four sad-faced Brads. The person, not the tiny nail which is also called a "brad".

The Four Loko Experiment

With all the hubub around Four Loko, it's only a matter of time before they're banned nationwide. On a recent trip to the liquor store I noticed the variety of brightly-colored cans in the cooler and thought today was the day to try one for myself. I can only imagine what the dude working the register thought when I brought up my made-my-own sixpack of seasonal and regional craft beers, only to augment it with a Four F'n Loko.

Last year, I had a bad experience with a "malt beverage" called "Wild Blue" which I mistook as a microbrew, but turned out to be made by Anheuser Busch and tastes like blueberry-flavored ass. It's the only beer I've ever thrown out, in fact. While I'm not a stranger to terrible beers, I wasn't expecting the same thing from Four Loko. Rather, I was expecting something like those nasty wine coolers my mom used to drink on the rare occasions when she drank at all.

My favorite artificial flavor is watermelon. At least, as a kid it was. I don't know what it was - it didn't taste like watermelon at all (not that I'm particularly a fan of regular watermelon flavor to begin with), but whatever that super sweet flavor was patterned from, I literally ate it up, particularly in the form of Bubblicious. Ergo, I was super excited to see Four Loko offered a watermelon flavor, which I bought up with much haste.

As if the name, or the drink being found amongst the alcohol not being indication enough that this was an alcoholic drink, they are certain to spell it out for you along the top of the can. They also happily call this a "premium malt beverage with artificial flavors, guarana, taurine, caffeine, and FD&C Red #40." I have no idea what FD&C Red #40 is, nor why they would want to brag about this fact alongside the caffeine and taurine, but now we know it's there. Also of note is the can is 23.5 ounces, so not even Four Loko is immune to the damage of the grocery store shrink ray.

I poured the Loko into a glass to best enjoy its flavor. I also allowed the pleasurable pink drink to rest for several minutes to breathe. The picture doesn't fully convey just how unnaturally pink this substance really is.

As I mentioned, I was expecting the heavy liquor presence of a watermelon wine cooler, but I was surprised to find the sweetness of the sugar water coming through before followed by the harsh and sharp liquor presence. By the time I was making my way to the bottom of the can, the liquor was getting more cloying, taking me longer to swallow after my sips. The sugary watermelon flavor was making my teeth hurt, too, though I guess kids who drink those sugary sodas would be used to this. It doesn't taste good, is what I'm saying, though really, who is surprised?

Is there a buzz? Of course - the thing's 12% alcohol. Of course, there are good microbrews that are 10+% too, and they have the added benefit of not tasting like shit. Beers don't have the energy drink properties, though, so I guess you could call that a win for the Loko. The argument in support of Lokos, when faced by prohibition by governments, is that you can get the same alcoholic and caffeinated properties by downing the occasional Red Bull during your drinking session, and I would claim the same. So, in the end, my Four Loko experiment was foiled by the fact that this thing tastes disgusting, and as I would hope these kids would learn, you can still get a mighty good buzz without sacrificing flavor. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some nice beers to which I should attend.

Lean Cuisine Review #3: Pizza Margherita

Tomatoes, red onions, garlic, basil & reduced fat mozzerella [sic] cheese with an olive oil tomato sauce on a crispy thin crust.

Image courtesy thespicybananas.com

Behold. The pizza margherita is perhaps the truest and best form of the art of pizza-making that is or will ever be. If pizza was a band, and the toppings combinations were its songs, "pizza margherita" would be the one that's played as the second encore on the last concert of their farewell tour. The combination of the soft, salty cheese, sweet tomatoes, fresh, crisp basil atop a crust of the simplest ingredients toasted to a crusty perfection in a wood-fired oven - it's perfection in its simplicity.

Of course, there are some liberties that can be taken with the recipe: some artisans prefer to use tomato sauce instead of fresh tomatoes, some choose to finish the pizza with a splash of olive oil, and - if you're Lean Cuisine, ignore all tradition altogether and create a margherita in only the vaguest definition of the word. Continuing on the band analogy, if pizza is a hugely-successful rock band, this version of its classic ditty "margherita" would be the shitty cover your loser brother has been trying to master on his guitar in his room for the past three weeks.

Certainly if you're over the age of sixteen you've had at least one run-in with microwave pizzas, but, if not, here's how it works - the frozen item is placed atop a flat piece of cardboard, the top side of which has a metallic circle upon which the pizza sits. The metal helps reflect the microwaves, which toasts the bottom of the pie at a higher temperature than the rest of the pizza cooks. The back of the box said that it only took a scant two minutes and thirty seconds to cook the pie, though if I wanted crispy crusts, I could leave it in for another fifteen seconds. Not being a communist, I cooked the pizza for 2:45.

The first thing that hit me was a big scent of basil that came from the large amount of dried stuff that I could clearly see sitting on top of the pizza. I guess the intent was to use the herbs to cover up the tastelessness of the "mozzerella" cheese, which tasted like a combination of salt and bad dreams. Though I use canned tomatoes on a very frequent basis, they're can't replace those recipes that call for fresh varieties, imposing a curious staleness in texture and flavor. I don't know why LC even bothered using "fresh" tomatoes, because there was also a base of tomato sauce, which tasted better anyway, though it provided a slick surface for that terrible amateurish experience when you take a bite of pizza and half of the damn cheese comes sliding off into your mouth, leaving your next three bites of pizza being nothing but crust. The crust was like many other pizzas in its field - tough and chewy, though there's a little hint of olive oil and garlic powder that took some of the edge off. Crispy? What do you think?

Lean Cuisine and other diet frozen dinners have been getting a bad rap for years because they didn't just taste bad - they tasted really, really bad, and it made people sad at times in their lives when their body image was already plenty sad in itself. There are some (relatively) decent Lean Cuisines, but in a case like this where they take a dish renowned for its freshness and purity and make it out of crappy frozen ingredients and salt, it makes me :'(  . The only consolation is that I noshed on this as a slightly-inebriated late night snack, so I didn't have to rely on this as my only means of sustenance for eight hours.

Score: 3 1/2 forks out of a possible 79.

Lean Cuisine Review #2: Cheddar Potatoes With Broccoli

Roasted potato wedges with tender broccoli tossed in a rich and creamy cheddar cheese sauce.


I'm pretty sure Lean Cuisine makes standalone side dishes, but I don't think this was intended to be one. I mean, it has just as many calories as a typical LC meal (and an even higher amount of sodium thanks to the cheddar cheese sauce), but maybe I was just missing something. Perhaps there was something more than just broccoli and potatoes in this "meal."

The cheese just kinda sat on top in
a big puddle

Now, don't get me wrong, potatoes are my favorite vegetable by far, and they're the most versatile foodstuff this side of corn, and broccoli is perhaps my second-favorite vegetable, with me eating literally a head of it in a sitting. The thing is, only one of these vegetables freeze well, and it's not the tater. The starch prevents things from resurrecting very well, and the crisp, tender potato I envisioned in my head prior to my first bite was nothing like the mushy brown cubes waiting in my tray. Some green vegetables, like peas, are just as good frozen as they are fresh, and others are good enough, and I think broccoli falls into the latter category - it's not the same as fresh stalks, but when I'm intending to eat an entire bag of it, I don't mind all that much.

The cheddar cheese was the exact same rubbery, vaguely-nachoish cheese that are found in many dinners and vegetable packs showcasing the stuff, and served only as a means by which to cover up the failings of the vegetables. Honestly, though, I would have been much happier just eating the potatoes and broccoli with a little salt, knocking the calorie count down by 100 or so, and feeling free to open up another LC, treating this "meal" as the side dish it really is. Even worse is that this "meal" isn't even really difficult to make. It's, like, really easy. Why did I pay $2.50 for this "simple favorite"? Why do I keep using so many quotes? Who am I? How did I get here, and why am I still so hungry?

Android App Spotlight #34: ASTRO File Manager

Price: Free ($3.99 for no ads)
Website
AppBrain


This is one of those apps that's so integral to the way I use my phone that I take it for granted. You're probably already familiar with it, but if not, you should be: Astro is a simple and effective way to browse the file structure of your phone and the contents of your SD card without needing to hook your phone up to a computer.

It's pretty much a full-featured file manager, allowing you to rename, edit, and delete any file on your phone, plus the search function has come in handy a couple of times. Most importantly for me, it's been an easy way to install non-Market apk's - just throw them on the SD card and navigate to them through Astro. While typing this, I've discovered that the app even has the ability to backup and restore all of your apps - something for which I've been searching for quite a while. (It's said that if you restore apps through Astro they won't appear in you Market's listing of your installed apps, which would make updates difficult. However, they should show up in your AppBrain list of apps, and if you install new updates via that program, it should get the Market to recognize that you have it installed again.)

Astro is one of those must-have apps back in the day when Android didn't have that many "must-have" apps of which to speak, and it's easy to see why. If you have any desire to tinker around with the guts of your phone, you will need an app like this at some point.

Lean Cuisine Review #1: Butternut Squash Ravioli

To offset my terrible, terrible diet when dining out in restaurants, I cop out a lot of the time at home and stick with the Lean Cuisines. I mean, if I'm going to eat something that's healthy, why bother cooking it myself? Over the course of exploring the wide and diverse offerings from the LC menu, I've found that some are better than others, so in an effort to expand my Lean Cuisine palette, I thought I would branch out from my comfortable revolving stable of flavors and try some of the many other varieties offered in my grocer's freezer.

Butternut Squash Ravioli? How could they take such a delectable gourmet treat and put it inside of a microwavable tray? For starters, it's part of their Spa Cuisine collection, which I guess implies this is the type of food that you would find at some sort of fancy fat camp. The ones the celebrities attend, no doubt. Rest assured, this one's sitting at a cool 4/5 stars on the LC website, so I'm certainly in for a treat.

I figured out how they were able to cram these ravioli into a healthy packaging - there's, like five f'n ravioli in this damn thing, and they try to hide it by covering it with a shitload of vegetables. In fact, there's nothing but vegetables in this meal - no meat.

The Italian cream sauces traditionally achieved their texture from the use of eggs, butter, and cheese, though the Italian found in the Olive Gardens of America usually weigh everything down by covering it with heavy cream. Obviously, neither of these options are particularly lean, so the cream sauce is created here through skim milk, chemicals, and a loose definition of "cream sauce." The box claims that walnuts are in this dish, though what they actually mean is that one lonely walnut has been broken into several pieces and scattered through the tray, perhaps as a game to distract you from how fat you've become. Obviously there was only one texture in this dish - mush - and the yellow butternut squash goop that filled my ravioli was a nice change from the other vegetables, which are constantly reused in most of these meals. Things could have used some salt, but at 590mg already, I didn't dare add anymore.

I think pasta dishes are tricky because they can't add too much without upping the calorie count, plus I'm sure that butternut gel isn't cheap to make since they can't use it in any other meal. If I was at a spa and someone tried to serve me this, I would punch them in the mouth. Still, the ravioli and sauce tasted somewhere in the ballpark of butternut squash ravioli, and the abundance of vegetables means I'm at least full for the time it takes my stomach before realizing it was gypped with regards to meat.

Final Score: 57 out a possible 133.

Android App Spotlight #33: picplz

Price: Free
Website
AppBrain

Tell your life's story through pictures with picplz, a nifty app that not only allows you to take ordinary pictures and make them interesting through the application of various filters. You can show them off on the picplz site, but you can also tag the photos with the location of where they were taken. At the same time, if you so desire, you can check yourself in via Foursquare and post it to Twitter or Facebook, too, to share with your friends no matter how few social networks they belong to. It's surprisingly fun to try and come up with good pics to share, and if you're going to checkin anyways, (you do check in, don't you?) it's a cool way to do it.

Android App Spotlight #32: Withings WiScale

Price: Free
Website


Alright, let's say you have the awesome Withings Wifi Body Scale, which takes your scale readout and sends it online for tracking on the Withings site, uploading to Google Health, or even Twitter. Now, let's also say that you would like to have access to this information no matter where you go via your Android device. Unfortunately, there was no way for you to do this, until now! with the beta release of WiScale, a port of Withings' iPhone app.

It's a pretty simple app, with a single-day breakdown of your weight, BMI, and fat mass when the phone is in portrait, and a line graph that shows progress over the span of weeks or months. What else could you want in an app that reports the output of your bathroom scale? I guess the ability to install to the SD card would be nice, but it's only 450KB, so it's not all that big of deal.

Obviously this app fulfills a distinct market - those who have splurged on the scale, and own an Android phone, and want to have immediate access to their weight at all times, but it could be useful the next time you're trying to decide between the deep fried bacon and the side salad when ordering at a restaurant. Personally, I could have used this about four months ago, though that deep fried bacon was mighty tasty.

Android App Spotlight #31: Lookout

Price: Free ($2.99/mo or $30/yr for advanced features)
Website
AppBrain







With how much we are using our smartphones nowadays, more and more of our sensitive information is sitting, unprotected, on our phones. What happens if someone steals your phone, or you lose your phone, or you accidentally erase all of your Google contacts? I'm not going to lie - my backup strategy is largely throwing it up into the cloud and hoping the Big G holds onto it, but anyone who's serious about backing up (and we all should be) knows that the key to protecting your data comes in redundancy, so while Google will probably keep everything nice and neat for you, it's no guarantee. Furthermore, with the future of computing being these little handheld computers, you're going to start seeing some viruses that target the platforms, and given Android's unfettered Marketplace, how can you make sure the apk you're about to install isn't going to steal all your information? Oh, and another thing, what if you misplaced your phone in your apartment and can't find it?

There's a solution for all of these things by way of Lookout, an app that combines signature antivirus protection, data backup, and lost phone services. I've been using if for the past six months, and I'm generally pleased.

Every time I download an app, and every week (the frequency can be changed), my system is scanned. While it's only signature-based scans (it's looking for pre-defined malicious code, so zero-day vulnerabilities are still a threat), but I haven't had a virus yet! That's probably specious reasoning, though, as I don't know if any viruses have actually been reported on Android. Still, each of these components can be disabled individually, so you can turn it off if you don't like it.

The app can also back up your calls, contacts, and pictures on a frequency of your choosing. The calls and contacts backup are just a source of redundancy for CallTrack and Google Contacts, respectively, but it's good to have that extra safety net. The pictures, though, is new, and something that I find useful, though be sure you choose to back those up during a time of night when you're plugged in, because I imagine that takes some juice. You can restore your data onto another phone if you so choose.

There's also a locating service that allows you to track your phone's location from the Lookout website. You can ping your device at any time, and it reports back with a Google Maps overlay. You can also choose to make your phone "scream," which signals a loud alarm on the phone, and remotely wipe or lock your phone.

The ability for remote wipe and lock is coming in the paid version of the app, which is being released on November 16th. Once that paid version is released, it's also moving some of the features available in the free version - mostly the data backup features - into the paid version, but until that paid version is released, you can still grab the free app and be grandfathered in on the backup services.

I would have happily paid a one-time fee for the app, but with the subscription model they're adopting ($2.99 a month or $30 a year), I don't know if I'm willing to pay that much for the remote wipe capabilities. Add to that HTC's new website which will provide much of that functionality for their phones for free, and I don't know if this was the wisest decision to make pricing-wise. Regardless, there's going to be a version of Lookout running on my phone for some time to come, giving me considerable piece of mind.