Tuck's blog

Last week I was on hiatus, watching a foreigner representing a political party (DPP) that is in trouble deliver a defensive speech aimed at her opposition (KMT). It was more interesting than going on a pilgrimage to the holiest of holies: the Brickskeller, where if you are lucky or shagging a waitress they might have one of the 20 beers you are looking to drink that night.

Here's some of what we had on the menu Friday night at the watering hole:

51st State Amber Ale

Only available at my misanthropic hidey hole of choice, this amber ale is better executed than the crap spewed forth by Michelob under the moniker Amber Bock. It's a medium-heavy weight liquid. The brew has low gravity, around 5%. It deserves a slow pour and a moment or two to settle. It possesses a medium head which is not very long lasting provided you don't try to fill the glass in 5 seconds. It has a smooth pull and hints of smoke from lightly toasted barley. It has a syrupy quality that causes it to linger on the tongue. It's a gourmet microbrew that is not entirely suitable for session drinking. It's good for a one off, a change of pace, or accompanying a smoked, mellow barbecue dish.

7.4/10

Brooklyn Lager IPA

Yellow the color of a "Used Saves" sticker from a college bookstore. Powerful bouquet of multilayered hops. It is slightly bitter and sour, but simultaneously tangy, tart, and delightful. This is something to be enjoyed slowly, not chugged like a watery mass manufactured, rice and corn based brew. The medium carbonation adds to the bite of the hops. The head is thin and pale, but will leave notches in a grimy glass. The melange of yeast bitter lurks just behind the cacophonous symphony of at least 3 types of hops. Not for session drinking. You probably won't enjoy more than 4 before it becomes a little too bitter. The gravity is around 6%.

7.3/10

Hocus Pocus (magic hat)

A summer seasonal offering from the little Vermont brewery that could. It has a light liquid weight and a fast pour. It's coloration is a mellow yellow, like that of a pale dandelion. The head doesn't last very long. It has tiny, fine carbonation that does a Fred Astaire dance on your tongue if you let it take a little lap around your gullet before swallowing. It is a refreshing low gravity brew at 4.5%. This gentle ale is sweet and spicy. It has hints of lime citrus and orange blossom honey. Grains of paradise are lurking in their with a tangy kick to the jaw. It has mild North American hops twang like a Minnesotan accent (definitely not Bavarian stuff).

7.8/10

Magic Hat #9

Medium-slow pour on this not quite pale ale. It has a lightly toasted caramel barley sweetness and a lingering stickiness that is naggingly familiar. It has a hoppy jitter that isn't as overpowering or sour as some IPAs. It is a medium weight liquid, slightly darker than your average light beer, but not into red or amber territory. The head is almost non-existent. It is very mellow and has a smooth pull. It is appropriate for session drinking, but not so highshelf that you couldn't use it for ping pong games. It is low gravity at 4.6% and flavored with apricot that brings out the starchy goodness of the barley. Hoppier from the tap, but milder in the bottle.

7.85/10

Benjamin Franklin once said, "Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy."  I could not concur more.  I fancy myself a connoisseur of beer, though it may sound pretentious.  I think it my duty to sample the many beers available and provide an informed opinion and review to potential purchasers of said beer.  While it may be a never-ending quest in a constantly evolving micro-brewery market, where every Maw and Paw restaurant thinks they can brew their own beer; it is for you dear reader that I fight the valiant fight.  If I happen to taste some choice beverages along the way, so be it.

Bought the Magic hat summer variety show.  It has some old friends and some new friends slyly thrown in.

Magic hat Notion 8

The coloration is dark, almost the same color as the beer bottle.  It is a deep black in the middle, fanning out to a lighter bottom, not unlike the coloration of a proper black and tan.  The head doesn't last, even when poured quickly.  It is higher gravity than most watery American beers at 4.2%.  It has large round bubbles that make it quite quaffable and give it a smooth pull.  Dakley toasted barley, like a weak, watered down dunkelweissen (also spelled dunkelwiezen).  Not quite as powerful a smokey flavor as an Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier.  There is a tiny hint of sweetness and a soupcon of hops.  This beer is like a smokey double bock on training wheels, so low gravity and no gruet goodness.  Overall it receives an 8 out of 10.  I will drink it, but I will not actively search for it.

Circus Boy

This is a moderately successful attempt at a heffeweizen.  The beer possesses a murky, cloudy golden coloration.  It is unfiltered and therefore some people would roll the bottle between their flattened palms to coax out the yeast and grit at the bottom.  The head is long lasting.  The liquid weight is surprisingly light.  It has a medium fast pour.  It is wheaty and hoppy in an understated kind of way.  It doesn't have the monster starchy, sweetness of other unfiltered wheat beers.  I would put it well above Shiner, but miles below Pyramid.  As an enthusiast of wheat beers, this pulled at my heartstrings like a Disney movie from before 1995.  Much like a Disney movie post 1995 it disappointed and seemed somewhat lacking in the execution of its artistic potential.  At least they didn't add Banana, or cloves, or cinnamon accents to it.  7.7 out of 10

This is just a taste.  There will be more to come.

Wombat lovin'.

The best site for all you wombat needs is here. Here is some crazy Japanese wombat stuff. Thank you and goodnight

With the death of Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn on August 2nd, I thought it appropriate to discuss authors facing repression for the publication of their materials. The advent of the internet, cheap portable digital cameras, wireless web, and cell phones have made Solzhenitsyn's memoir-style of writing seem quaint and outmoded. Now everyone is capable of being a reporter of man-made catastrophe. The problem now faced is that many governments, unused to having let slip the reins of the propaganda carriage, have responded with the cruel torment of the lash, to drive and corral digital citizens. Web service providers kow-tow to authoritarian regimes, handing over IP addresses and names. This phenomenon is not limited to China, where Hu Jia, Woeser, and Chen GuangCheng (who published his report on forced abortions on paper and digitally) have been jailed, beaten, and harassed. Even in countries where freedom of speech is supposedly guaranteed, such as Canada, we see this phenomenon cropping up. Once jailed, some bloggers find a shiv as the reward for reporting the cold hard truth. Others are beaten to death before they even reach the prison yard.

The internet has opened up previously impossible freedoms in mass communications. But it is also a powerful tool of repression, a propaganda machine and an addictive new opiate of the masses. If they so choose, people can get lost in a whirlwind of information from their RSS and spend hours learning, connecting, and investigating. They can also invest their time in writing pornographic fan-fiction about Yoshi from Super Mario. The internet is a virtual manifestation of our minds and how much easier is it to get caged in our own thoughts, now that they can be presented using Flash and Ajax code. Don't let yourself become an LCD/High Def Ivan Denisovich. This article may ruffle a few feathers, it may be monitored, or it might be a giant piece of Fluff. Whatever the case, rise up downtrodden digital peoples, cast of the shackles of the net, watch an eclipse or meteor shower, climb a mountain and revel in your harmony with nature rather than basking in the radiating glow of pixels.

The Chinese simultaneous loathe and respect the man.  I say this not just from an analysis of Chinese language blogs but from a Numerological standpoint.  While 8 is a lucky number, thus they started the games at 8/08/08 8pm, the number four is equally if not more unlucky.  The reason that 8 is a lucky number is that it rhymes with "fa" the word for wealth/prosperity.  The reason that 4 is unlucky is that it rhymes with the word for death, "si".  While assigning swimming lanes is supposedly random or related to the rankings from previous competitions, it seems like hardly a coincidence that in multiple medal rounds, including the last, they have placed Phelps in lane number 4.  By doing so, the Chinese were effectively telling Phelps to "go die."

In a world where nothing is sacred, except for my grilled cheese which I swear bears the true image of the Virgin Mary, I would like to think that there are still some un-corrupted bastions of masculinity in the jocund group of beverages known as Beer.

Alas I was, am, and perhaps always will be a fool.

With rising commodity prices, beer manufacturers find that the profit margin is higher when they include fruit juices either real or simulated. Addicting new users at an early age to the sauce, so as to ween them on to manly beverages, is also a priority.

Thus I give you the latest victims of the feminization of beverages:

• Wild Blue: (RIP Anheuser-Busch) No, re-branding as a micro-brew doesn't make you one.
• Michelob: (another AB [ed: Fuck Up]) Hopefully these beers will go the way of candy cigarettes, a forgotten novelty item relegated to back shelf of certain stores.
• Grolsch of all people. They tried this already. It is called Shandy, or in places that god forgot, Zima. When I used to think of manly, no-nonsense beers, automatically this brand would spring to mind. Grolsch I hardly knew ye, hardly as in drinking hard.
• Pyramid, I love and simultaneously loathe your Apricot Weizen. You are like a really obnoxious attractive woman, whose obnoxiousness and ignorance is almost made up for by her appeal, but not quite. Jenny McCarthy of MTV's Blind Date circa 1995 would be the ideal demonstration of this.
• Warsteiner not you too? A Cola flavored beer. That sounds almost as bad as a Red Mocho cooler. What of your integrity? What about the 1516 German purity law, ReinheitsGebot, that you wrote a mini history of on the neck of your bottle? Come on, even the Vorlufiges Deutsches Biergesetz isn't that loose yet.

And in the "let's try and weasel our way into a share of the Corona market" category:

• Miller Chill: Chelada style is not a legitimate style of lager, I don't care it isn't. This isn't me discriminating over the youth of a beer style, this is not a type of beer seen in brewing competitions.
• Bud Light Lime: Two beers does not a category make. If I pooped in a Heffeweissen and also in an Irish Stout of my making, that would not mean that I invented Anusia lager

The Belgian Lambics opened the floodgates, and many undesirables have arrived at the party. Though I somewhat hypocritically love Lambic beer, it is not the fruit blends, but La Vieille Gueuze that gets my cork a poppin'. The world of Brewmasters and microbrews is now so legionous that they must resort to gimmicks to call attention to their little Brauerie. Lambics are not in my opinion real beer. They are amazing, but they are more like a malt champagne blend. I don't like this slippery slope, because it can too easily turn into this

When I was working for TSI (which stands for Tremendously Shitty Institution), I couldn't help but notice that tons of people came in slurping on the straws of frozen concoctions. I am not making a reference to Jimmy Buffet, because if there actually were any tequila in these frozen beverages I would not have a problem with them. Let it be heretofore known that these beverages are a powerful, negative, corruptive influence on society for the following reasons

They degrade the common decency and turn the common man's mouth into an uncouth vortex, a receptacle not holding in decorum with civilized society. People being the uncivilized heathens that they are would leave many of these empty or half-full beverages lying around our store. Not only that but they would make tremendously loud slurping noises as they tried to squeeze the last 25 cents out of their 4 dollar beverage.

Behold the enemies of public decency and manliness:

Godiva Demons

Chick-Fil-A

Sonic

Starbucks

The high amounts of sugar mess with people's digestive systems and cause obesity and diabetes. It is quite easy for people to find room for a liquid desert after stuffing their maws with greasy fast food because a liquid is not as filling. Thus people consume away, not knowing that they are unwittingly consuming 100 calories [Starbucks], 660 calories with 86 grams of sugars [Godiva] , 720 Calories [Sonic], 810 Calories (243 of which are from fat) [Chick-Fil-A]. To put this into perspective you would have to drink 8 Keystone Light beers and eat just one Pringle's potato-chip to equal the number of calories in a single serving of a Chick-Fil-A shake, and you would still not have all the saturated fat and sugars!

This is without even mentioning that the vast majority of these iced drinks are discriminatory against the lactose intolerant. If this is an egalitarian beverage, should not everyone be able to enjoy.

Given that they are a public nuisance due to factors of noise from slurping, a threat to the health of anyone that consumes them, and discriminate against the lactose intolerant; these concoctions should be labeled a threat to all positive masculine properties, or Virtus in Latin.

Early Cuyler would pull out his knife or boomstick and justifiably attack this threat to "manly males of the masculine race." While normally, "because it tastes good" would be ample justification for the consumption of a foodstuff, these beverages are a negative influence on society.

He stands in a bent or bowed position and his hands chop at his opponent, opening cuts on their foreheads and noses. He is a thick man who intentionally encourages comparisons between him and a male lion, with his thick abundant mane-like beard. Let us examine this man and inquire as to whether he has deserved the reputation earned as a vicious professional fighter. Certainly he is enough of a media phenomenon to beat game four of the Stanley Cup in ratings, but he cannot beat the Scripps National spelling bee.

Let us now examine Kevin "Kimbo Slice" Ferguson's opponents, their respective records for insight into his relative strengths as a fighter in this newest of popular sports. Starting with his most recent opponent, James Thompson, who is 14-9-0. The Colossus has lost 3 straight matches, and lost 7 of his last 10. His most recent win is over a fighter Don Frye who is so past his prime I would throw him out if he we a gallon of milk. Frye has not been seriously competitive as a heavyweight since about 1998 and was obviously used as a stepping stone to set Thompson up for greater fighters. In the fight we see Slice, who clearly doesn't have the cardiovascular stamina to go more than 3 rounds, exhausted. After a couple of decent shots to Thompson's head the ref calls the fight, when it is clear that the fighter can continue. This makes one question whether the outcome of the fight was predetermined, when in clear defiance of the crowd and the evidence at hand a ref calls the fight.

Tank Abbott is his second most recent bout. This was more typical of Slice as a fighter, an early punchfest that ended in the first round. Slice punched Tank in the back of the head and somebody jumped in to the middle of the fight.

We will see this trend forming later when we examine the street-fighting tapes that skyrocketed Slice to fame. David "Tank" Abbott was chosen as the best match up because stylistically he is the closest to Kimbo, they are both unrefined brawlers who are getting a bit long in the tooth and used to bare-knuckle. Tank's glory days are well behind him.

His first real professional fight was against a journeyman fighter who has not fought any world-class notables in the sport. This journeyman's name, Bo Cantrell. What kind of fighting spirit do you have when someone submits you with punches? Are you a coward? A real warrior would never submit due to punches, and thus this fight should not be seen as a great matchup.

Despite the booming cell phone, real estate, and outsourcing businesses, it is quite likely that not a single member of gentle Nortonia will visit this oil-rich country for myriad reasons. I am sorry United Arab Emirates, you have been perma-banned from my travel itinerary and not simply due to concerns over safety. While I respect your culture, your people, and what makes you distinct; we have irreconcilable differences.

Among them being:

9. Swearing and making rude gestures (including minor incidents of "road rage") are criminal acts in the United Arab Emirates and may result in significant penalties.
Any country where I am not allowed the ability to scream four letter words after running my car into a telephone pole is not worth the trouble of getting there. Not only am I not allowed, but I can be prosecuted for doing it. Outrageous! Some of my most poetic use of the three languages I speak fluently and two that I BS my way through are profanity laced and very authentic. No freedom to curse is a pretty big offense, considering I tolerantly spent 2 years in a country that jails renegade bloggers.

8. Legal Nightmares Aplenty
The featured attraction is a case where a woman's car was stolen, she had sound evidence to prove such and the court found in favor of the criminals. Not only was her car not returned, she had to pay legal fees, and the criminals are now counter-suing for damages. The lowest rated government agency in terms of user satisfaction is the Department of Justice. For good reason.

7. They Discriminate Against Fat People
This link while mostly devoted to the ways that airlines are coping with the rising overhead and inflated gas prices, also includes a feature near the bottom related to our new favorite nation. They are proposing to charge customers based on how much they weigh! I am not corpulent by any stretch of the imagination, however a number of my friends have many things in common with beer kegs, including body-shape. To subject people, especially women, to be weighed in public--as if making us take off our shoes wasn't enough.

6. 7-Star Hotels
The Burj al Arab is so opulent and over-priced that lonely planet mocks them for it. How pretentious, how much of an inferiority complex do you have to have to give yourself 7 stars?

5. Draconian Drug Policy
You can be arrested for simply having a prescription. You can be arrested for having a banned substance in your bloodstream or urine. You must carry a note from your doctor explaining the need for your prescription. Some medications that are over the counter in the US, UK, AU are illegal in the UAE.

4. No Ogling
"It is illegal to harass women. Harassment includes unwanted conversation, prolonged stares, touching any part of the body, glaring, shouting, stalking or any comments that may offend." (emphasis mine) My face is filled with more craters than the moon due to acne, thus I prefer to do most of my admiring of women from afar. I think sometimes that the ladies prefer it that way as well. To make one of my favorite pass-times an arrestible offence, especially something so innocuous.

3. Electric Boogaloo No not this but rather this Look closely at the sockets and the voltages. While this might not seem like a big deal, you shell out you 30 to 60 bucks for an adapter and converter, it is. The odd combination of using both European style and Australasian plugs is a tremendous pain. Especially since many Circuit Cities, and the standard adapter pack carried at RadioShack does not include the Australasian adapter. My reasoning for using the nomenclature Australasian is this: it is used in Australia, New Zealand, parts of Thailand, and Vietnam. I might be making a mountain out of a mole-hill but imagine a cranky, petulant, food-deprived child traveling on the same tour bus, who is screaming because they can't play their white Nintendo DS.

2. No Sexy Time Adultery is illegal. Public displays of affection between adults are socially unacceptable. People must dress modestly, men and women, and wear loose-fitting clothing. No Speedos or thongs I guess...and Homosexuality is illegal. Although living in Maryland I am kinda used to that by now...

1. No Beer for you
Individual licenses must be purchased for the individual Emirates in order to handle, sell, buy, or consume alcohol. What is good in Abu Dhabi, is not good in Sharjah, Ajman, or Dubai. You can only consume alcohol in hotels and a very select number of restaurants. This means that you as a responsible adult cannot go to a supermarket or liquor store and purchase a modest amount of your favorite grain or grape beverage for personal consumption. Having seen the idiocy that can be caused by excessive alcohol, I can understand the regulations in Shariah that prevent its consumption, but I do not want to be exiled to only drink in the Champions Sports Bar.

Submitter apologizes for the lame VH1-like countdown format, but list postings seem to be popular around here. Maybe because structurally they are easier than maintaining a continuous argument, thesis, or critique. But hey at least there was no smug dead-pan commentary from Michael Ian Black. So, for all these reasons and more, I am crossing you off of my list of places I have to visit before I die United Arab Emirates.

The revival of Carlos Mencia's career.

Carlos has made a career of being not funny but offensive. The author has no objections to offensive comedy, so long as it is artfully done--for example Lenny Bruce, George Carlin. The Aristocrats is the authors favorite comedy feature film. But even Dennis Leary is a more insightful and talented comedian than our friend Carlos. Despite guest spots on "In Living Color," "The Shield," and "The Bernie Mac Show" Carlos has few accomplishments to boast of in an illustrious career that includes a guest spot on Moesha, "The Three Amigos" comedy tour, Multiple HBO stand up specials, a cable ACE award (even more of a joke than a Grammy or Emmy), and three seasons of the television show "Mind of Mencia". Maxim magazine, though hardly a bastion of hard hitting journalism...oooh lett me rephrase that... recently named him number 12 in their worst comedians of all time. http://www.maximonline.com/slideshows/index.aspx?slideId=2090&imgCollectId=98

Not only has he plagiarized from comedians Bill Cosby

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Sam Kinison

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The State

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and Ari Shaffir

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But his original material is not funny. His bit on vegetarianism is not funny. His bits on Iraq, white people, michael jackson are NOT FUNNY. While attempting to "juxtapose existing social issues with ethical convention," he indulges in and perpetuates stereotypes. He is not using stereotypes to provide insightful social commentary in the manner of Dave Chappelle, he is just spreading and capitalizing on racism. Carlos' career is an example of affirmative action gone wrong. Yes, getting more Latino people on television is a noble goal, BUT DID YOU HAVE TO PICK HIM? Really? There were no better Latino comedians? How about John Leguizamo? Paul Rodriguez?

A comedian should be supported because of their anecdotes, their unconventional outlook on situations, their ability to vocalize something common to many people's life-experience, their provocative use of language and delivery. On all accounts Carlos Mencia fails miserably. His delivery suggests that the louder he is the funnier he is. Perpetuating stereotypes without good reason not only doesn't offer social commentary or examine the phenomenon behind the stereotype, it hurts social progress by breeding racism. His continued career shows that if you are persistent and network with the right people, you can succeed due to a lack of people of your race on TV whether or not you as an individual are funny.