138th BreakMentalDown Post Spectacular

It's the 138^th Blog Post Spectacular. In this post you'll see madcap antics, insane guest stars, flan, kittens, and a wholly original idea that wasn't copped from “The Simpsons.”

How can we celebrate such a momentous occasion? The big 138 is not something to be taken lightly. However, I'm not going to just list off 138 random factoids about my previous posts, because that would require a factoid about THIS post, and I'm pretty sure that would suck the whole enterprise into some wormhole from which there is no return.

And I hate wormholes.

Instead, I decided to just list 19 random things that may or may not have been considered for a BreakMentalDown.com post at one time or another. With heavy emphasis on the “may not.”

138 Interesting Facts about the Creation of BreakMentalDown*

1. Just inventing an app called “Pornstagram” will not make you into an automatic billionaire. You need awesome filter names like “9 inchifier” and “Charcoal.”

2. Zombies are just like you, they just want to be loved. Although in their situation the phrase “Be loved” shall be known to mean “eat brains.”

3. I practice a very advanced form of Kung-Fu where I sit on the sofa and watch TV.

4. An entourage is unnecessary to view “Entourage.” Sure it might help, but eventually it will just devolve into everyone wanting to be Ari.

5. Put in contacts first, THEN touch Sriracha. Never flip that order.

6. If our toes were kept on our appendix, we wouldn't be so gung ho about bursting them all the time.

7. If you reprint old posts and give them a new title, it counts as both a new entry and a way to trip up Google.

8. Despite what Ernest Thayer might claim, I actually wrote “Casey at the Bat,” as an ode to my Westie dog.

9. Thirty eight percent of all UFOs are merely ducks with probes.

10. No, you can't pull off that wet suit.

11. The carrot is neither a car, nor does it rot. But the first part isn't true in awesome land.

13. People only watch baseball games out of obligations to their nephews.

Awesomeville.

14. Pencils were created to punish those people who were dumb enough to takes the SAT.

15. I want to write a fan letter to Mavis Beacon, but I'm not certain if she'll get upset if I hand write the letter.

16. Ice cream makes a perfect breakfast, dinner and dessert. If you have it for lunch though, there's definitely something wrong with you.

17. Twelve is a metaphor.

18. Calling movie majors, movie majors, really angers “film majors.”

19. Life constantly imitates the smash PC game “The Sims.” Just the other day I died while swimming when someone removed the ladder.

20. There is no way Superman was a communist. Everyone knows the yellow sun does not shine in Communistville.

Now I'll leave you with what we all came here to see: hardcore nudity!

*abridged

Too Hot? Too Cold? Get Lukewarm with New Action Hero Luke Warm

“The name is Warm, Luke Warm, and I'll take my hot chocolate with an ice cube in it.”

With a catchphrase like that, my newest super spy creation, Luke Warm, will be a worldwide phenomenon. He combines both the dapper good looks of a James Bond with the common sensibility of someone who doesn't like the roof of his mouth scalded when he goes to take a drink of a delightfully chocolatey beverage.

He also hates ice cream headaches. He truly represents the everyman top secret undercover spy.

"Looks like it's getting a little too hot in here. Literally"
-Luke Warm's catchphrase and main weapon

Luke Warm will traverse the world in a “Kung Fu”-esque fashion, battling the baddies who want to freeze and/or burn people. The enemies will run the entire gamut of temperature-related-evil. Just imagine he'll have to do battle with both ice monsters and fire demons. Microwaves and refrigerators.

Just imagine a scene where in one fluid slow motion shot, Luke rolls around and blammo, takes down the winters in Minnesota. A twirl later and he's also destroyed summers in Minnesota. Boom boom. I realize this would involve him taking down pretty diametrically opposed concepts, and concepts are hard to destroy, but I'm certain Industrial Light & Magic could whip up something that lives true to the assassin's creed of Mr. Luke T. Warm. Minnesota hot will clash with the Minnesota cold, equaling out to a nice Seattle lukewarmness.

I'm certain popular opinion will side with both Luke and me on this opinion and concept. Sure, some people might questioningly arch their brow when they see you put ice cream in the microwave, but when they find that ice cream both scoops better and doesn't cause facial pain upon consumption. That right there is the downright definition of win win.

This clipart of a Snowman represents Luke Warm's
worst enemy and occasional closest ally.

People use the phrase “too hot” or “too cold,” but you never hear anyone proclaim something as “too lukewarm.” Extrapolating this out a little further, Luke Warm will represent the baby bear from Goldilocks, sweet and kind and loving porridge but ready to pounce and maul at the slightest drop in temperature. That is logic pure and simple.

Yet these same people will blow hot and cold on Luke Warm's amazing abilities. I realize this cold hard logic isn't going to be enough to sway some people. They will stick hard and fast to their theory that coffee should cause third degree burns and Popsicle should be kept just a tad above absolute zero. They do this just to be “that guy.”

But Luke Warm is definitely not “that guy.” He's far too cool to sink to that level, he drinks water straight from the tap, leaving the faucet handle going straight down the lukewarm middle.

The ultimate goal of Luke Warm will not just be getting a Saturday morning cartoon out of the deal (“Warm, Luke Warm Jr. / No one can stop him but temp fluctuations always try / young Warm cuts through each attempt at fry), but make it socially acceptable for me to not refrigerate my pop.

And that is a mission I know he'll accept with warmth in his heart.

A Hopeful Future Rides on the Back of Litterbugs

Blade Runner. The Matrix. Terminator 1, 3 and Salvation. Alien. Predator. Alien vs. Predator Requiem. Alien vs. Predator. My Girl 2. A Very Care Beary Movie: The Wrath of Lionel. The Fifth Element.

All of the above depict a very dystopian version of the future. Volcanoes go off at random, robots use the bones of man to power their Rube Goldberg devices, Chris Tucker annoys and trash litters over just about everything.

It is indeed a pretty bleak future, and this is probably why we refer to it as “dystopian.” But there is one glimmer of hope in all those bleak times. It comes from the final clause in the preceding paragraph (and also this paragraph), in the future, trash litters around on just about everything.

Just imagine a future littered with Terminator endoskeletons

If these movies are to be believed, our descendants have found a way to truly capitalize on our precious time. No longer must we walk upwards of 32 feet to find a trash receptacle. When we're tired of using it, we just drop it. Wind will blow it away, or acid rain will melt it. No longer must we waste time for trash management, because litter is the wave of the future.

This might sound horrible, like its aiding in our untimely demise, but just think about it, if you're eating a Twinkie while running away from a flesh eating zombie robot, you're not going to want to take time to throw away that wrapper. You'll want to drop it and keep running, replete with the power embued in you from the Twinkie's beef fat. We can fight the robot masses if we're not busy trying to figure out what to do with our garbage.

Another great thing, we don't have to pay garbage men.

I realize I've gotten ahead of myself. Why is littering such a phenomenal advancement in our society? Just keep in mind, if we're busy not wasting all of our times trying to figure out where to throw our trash, we can think up ways to save the world, like by instituting trash-throwing-away programs or curing AIDS.

Once the pile of trash starts dwarfing us, we'll realize this plan is working. It's a little known fact, but in addition to smelling like roses, trash also serves as an excellent heat insulator. By merely having a welcoming layer of old issues of Vogue and pork rind dust coating our homes, we are actually insulated much better and can turn down the thermostat, thus resulting in a happier ozone. And happier ozone results in less carcinogenic ways and less melanoma. Since cancer is bad, litter must be good.

Trash lining all the streets might seem like it has nothing but positives associated with it, and I'll admit, this is true. As I've said, we've seen how happy it made everyone in those dystopian movies. They were in awful situations, but they knew they had trash, they would survive.

We might even breed some rare form of super-plague some super-plague-antibiotic-resistant-strain of SARS or BARS or some other acronym word. We could then use these horrorific diseases to play fun games like “Who will die on Tuesday?” or “Jenga.”

As the saying goes, where theres' super-plague-antibiotic-resistant-strains of SARS, there's super-plague-antibiotic-resistant rats. I imagine a rat of this magnitude will be able to do cool things like Kung Fu and talking. And a radical rat like that can probably use its massively large brain to figure out a way to prevent the robot uprising and save our entire existence. Or, at the very least, it could karate chop off some of the robot's heads and take care of that problem before it becomes an issue... Splinter?

He just might be our way to survive past 2012. 

He is a radical rat.

Link Up with These Passwords to Foil the LinkedIn Hackers

So you've had your LinkedIn password stolen. Don't worry, it happens to everyone who can't think of a password more in-depth than 12345. Thankfully, I'm here to help you make a better password selection.

Why should a password not be the name of your kitten? Because once people know your LinkedIn password, they can change your profile. No longer are you a hotshot smart person at some hotshot smart firm. Nope, you're merely a fluffer for Vivid Entertainment, and merely an “adequate” one at that.

Don't get stuck in the fluffing corner, protect your password by choosing one from the following list of impenetrable passwords. They're so strong that nobody, not even Angelina Jolie in the hit docusmash “Hackers,” can crack your account. Now you might say choosing a list from what's bound to be a top 10 blog post in respect to LinkedIn passwords that involves references to Angelina Jolie might result in bad things. Bad things like people knowing your password.

This is a common fear to have, but don't worry, it won't happen. You see, hackers know you might choose a password from this list and from that, they know you won't choose one from this list. But you will choose one, because they don't know you know they know you know they know you know they know you know. Plus, they're hackers, so they're incompetent (no we're not-sincerely, Bob, the Hacker).

Top 6 Awesomely Impenetrable Password for People Who Had Their LinkedIn Password Stolen and Want Something as Equally Awesome as the Name of their Favorite Baha Men Song.

123456

Curses, I can't hack into the account! I'll just have to be
content with my millions of dollars, neat kids and
Brad Pitts.

If you're one of those 12345 password people, have you ever considered going up to 123456? It's roughly 20 percent more secure than anything you could come up with on your own, yet you won't be too out of it to remember when you want to drunkenly log onto LinkedIn and angrily ask for a recommendation.

LinusAndLucy7

But our password protection solutions don't stop at just adding another sequential digit to your already super secure password. We strongly recommend inserting punclines to old Peanuts cartoons as your go-to password.

Solitary Single Space

Another great password is “Solitary Single Space.” This can mean either that phrase or, well just a solitary single space. Either way you're going to have an ironclad password. If you go with the former, who would guess that as a password? And if you go with the latter, nobody would guess a solitary single space as a password. Typing etiquette demands someone have two spaces after a period and what's a password but the start of a new sentence. If anything, those nefarious LinkedIn hackers would guess “Double Single Space,” and would face an error page of doom.

Sprocket32

Use my cat's name as a password. His name is Sprocket, and he's adorable. But what's even more adorable is if there were 32 of him. Sure, the world might spin out of its orbit under the weight of all that fur, but at least we'd go out in an adorable fashion.

Not a Random String of Characters

I'm not going to recommend a string of random characters, because when you forget that password (which you will), coming up with a new string of random characters is quite an undertaking.

Facebook

One of the most common passwords to pop up from the LinkedIn hacking endeavor was “LinkedIn.” This is an entirely foolish password because the hacker can just look at his screen, realize he's on LinkedIn and make the connection to YOUR password. However, if you choose “Facbook” as your password, there's no way any hacker could make that connection.

Dark Chocolate is Dark, because it's Evil

“Oh sweet, here's a bowl completely filled with chocolates. Yum! … Oh wait, it's 80 percent cacao dark chocolate. Nevermind, there's some celery over here, I'll just have that. No thanks, I don't want any of your bizarrely bland chocolate. The “chocolate” that requires air quotes. I'm fine with my non-food food that is celery.”

You've made this exact statement before. Sure, yours might have involved more blaspheming, but the basic argument still existed—dark chocolate has no taste and is therefore evil. My main problem is that it even has the gaul to call itself chocolate. Sure, it does have the cacao in it, and in greater quantities than an edible chocolate bar, but when I hear the phrase “chocolate,” I think “yum,” but these abominations are very far from that.

It doesn't taste right, it doesn't break right, it's just not chocolate.

Milky Way Midnight is dark chocolate done right.

There is a percentage where I'm completely okay with the darkness of chocolate. Up to 60 percent, and I'm great with it. It's not normal chocolate, but it has it's own unique charm and still tastes really good. But tick it up to even 61 percent and that sweetness turns to sour evil.

Can't we call dark chocolate that's over 60 percent chocolate something else? Something like “Really Light and Ineffective Doorstop” or “Preventer of Kids from Eating Your Baked Goods.” A simple name change like this lowers expectations, no longer will someone expect something sweet that the chocolate name implies, they'll know exactly what they're getting with this altered name.

Many people say they like dark chocolate for the health benefits of it. Something about how it prevents alcoholism or cures zombieism and definitely makes it so you cannot become an alcoholic zombie. Some even truly believe dark chocolate has health benefits. But it is technically candy, and anyone who eats candy for health related reasons, no matter how bad it tastes, has no idea what they're doing in the nutrition game.

This brings us to the bizarre case study of Milky Way Midnight, which is, of course, the dark chocolate version of the Milky Way. Most people aren't enamored with the original Milky Way, were you to ask anyone to name their favorite candy bar, nobody would mention Milky Way as the far and away number one. It's a passable candy bar that many other candy bars do much better.

The above chocolate is too dark. Unfortunately, it's the
exception and not the rule.

Many other candy bars, including Milky Way Midnight fill the role Milky Way would love to have. How does this work? First off, the Midnight edition probably isn't the highest percent cacao. It probably is just beyond the border of edibility. But there's also the amazing vanilla nougat that's not present in a normal Milky Way. The sweet vanilla melds with the more bitter chocolate in a fashion that both saves and elevates this creation.

As people continue trying to “eat healthy” by eating dark chocolate, I hope more companies are swayed to create candy that actually tastes good. They should know the flavor profiles of dark chocolate and how to use it.

Most of all, candy should taste good.

Out with the mold, in with the not dying of mycotoxin poisoning

“Hey, that bread looks really good, why don't you put a little mold on it.”

“Oh great, cheese, nothing goes better with cheese than some mold. I've got some hookup on some black mold!

“Is that a Blu-Ray of the 1996 Shaquille O'Neal starrer 'Kazaam?' Well, technically that's as inedible as it is unwatchable, but through the miracle of mold, it's delicious!”

“Mold, great for my pancreas.”

Anyone who has ever dealt with some of those pro-molders has probably heard statements like these ones countless times (occasionally subbing in Shaq's far inferior “Blue Chips”). I'm going to slap all these people in the face right now when I say this.

Food should not be furry.

Mold says "Oh my darling, oh my darling Clementine."
Everyone else says "... ew."

And this isn't some vegetarian diatribe brought on by the fact that I live with a vegetarian. No, food should not be furry, because it should not be moldy. Yet if the pro-molders are to be believed, mold is a delicacy and should make anyone happy to dine upon it.

Well, unlike the majority of people, I am against mold. Whereas it seems everyone thinks mold is the greatest thing since sliced mold, I dislike it greatly. Mold frightens me. Just seeing that green or black or white blob of fuzz sends shivers down my spine.

When I open the refrigerator and find that unwelcoming hue of awful, I treat it like it's a spider of some sort. I don't make eye contact with it and with great speed I send it to the nearest portal to hell. Spiders and mold, they deserve each other—especially if one eats the other, although I'm really not sure which way that would operate. I'd hope they both eat each other in one of the great murder-suicides-two-birds-one-stone of our time, but alas, that's probably just fantasy on my part.

So we're stuck with mold. Just like it sticks to us.

It's not like I haven't tried liking mold. Lord knows I've tried, I've put it on everything from my oranges to strawberries to fruit cups, but none of them tasted very good. They tasted downright poisonous, in fact. Even when I tried jazzing it up by placing it in a Jell-o mold (AKA a “mold mold”), it just set off my pun sensors and did little for my not-getting-grossed-out-sensors.

Maybe if all the mold types coordinated into a pleasing layout. Just imagine some sort of plaid or 1990s Neon Crayola swath, I could dig that. But instead those organisms usually only stick to one or two color palettes, and I really don't dig the white-on-green-Philadelphia-Eagles-inspired-mish-mash combination of color.

Many people claim that because molds play a large role in the production of food, beverages and enzymes, we should view mold formations of food as an evolution, a delicacy . Well, faced with that post apocalyptic society where awful greens and whites exist, I don't want to live there.

Enjoy your mycotoxin poisoning.

My Privacy is Important, So I'm on Social Media

PRIVACY NOTICE: Warning - any person and/or institution and/or Agent and/or Agency of any governmental structure including but not limited to the United States Federal Government, James Bonds, Eskimos and Eskimo Pie makers, also using or monitoring/using this website or any of its associated websites, you do NOT have my permission to utilize any of my profile information nor any of the content contained herein including, but not limited to my photos, my abstract theories on Chalupa strategy (eat it), Ponzi schemes, and/or the comments made about my photos or any other "picture" art posted on my profile. It goes without saying this includes my collection of vintage Grover Cleveland Zombie erotica.

Feel free to publicize my anti-Spork rants though. This is the tine for our voice to be heard on that issue.

You are hereby notified that you are strictly prohibited from disclosing, copying, wagging a finger at, distributing, mimeographing, disseminating, tipping the hat, dissecting, mocking, or taking any other action against me with regard to this profile and the contents herein—this especially applies to the pictures of heroin, just because I find it punny. The foregoing prohibitions also apply to your employee, agent, student, secret agent, mistress, Don Draper, or any personnel under your direction or control.

Violators will be shot. Survivors will have their wounds tended to in a kind and caring fashion. It will be a long and painful recovery process, but together we'll look forward to the day when we can shoot big smiles at each other, have a laugh and I'll send you on your way before shooting you in the back and finishing the job I should I have done four years ago.

The contents of this profile are private and legally privileged and confidential information. Please note the lack of “air quotes” around privileged. Yeah, it's actual privilege. The violation of my personal privacy is punishable by stoning. UCC 1-103 1-308 (You sunk my Battleship) ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Pillows should be soft.

Oh man, I'm so tired, I think I'm just going to lay down my head. Yawwwwn. Oh good, there's a pillow here, that will allow me to sleep and put the past 96 hour staying up bender behind me.

THUD.

Blast, a rock hard pillow has foiled me once again. There will be no sleep today. What's the world record for staying up? Eleven days? I guess I'll have to do that then.

Pillows are designed to be soft, yet for some inexplicable reason, stores sell pillows that many people will confuse for boulders—jagged, uncomfortable, hard and impossible to use for restful sleep. Good for crushing villagers and disheartening coyotes, but of little other use.

People, we're no longer cavemen. We can use life's luxuries like feathers and fake feathers so we no longer have to rely on these stone age contraptions. We've spent several millenia moving away from awful sleeping arrangements, I just don't understand why anyone would want to go back.

I realize there is a time and a place for some of these pillows. No, not for decorative purposes, because soft ones can be just as decorative as hard ones. Although, use one of these bad boys at a pillow fight during a sleepover and nobody will make fun of you for wearing Power Rangers underoos. But once everyone has had their Goodnight Tang (Tang diluted with vodka) suddenly that person has to go to sleep on a hard pillow. He might not have concussion, but he's also not going to have a good night of sleep.

I believe that's how Alexander the Great rose to power.

This is like one of those Highlights Magazine "Can You Spot
the Difference" pictures. But there is no difference.

One of the worst offenders in the hard pillow racket is people who use decorative pillows and put shams over them. Apparently they keep their shape because they're unsuable and pillow refuse to touch them. Really it should come as no surprise that people put “shams” on those things. It's kind of like the ultimate FU from the pillow making industry.

When I worked at a newspaper, I needed to stay overnight in the newsroom once to do an early story the next day. I didn't know this when I showed up to work, so I ended up improvising a pillow out of my shoes.

And that “pillow” actually allowed much more comfort than some of these so-called actual pillows. Although I suppose that partially had to do with expectations—you hear the word “pillow' and you think soft. You hear the word “shoes” and you think walking. When you use shoes for sleeping, you don't expect soft. You do expect the need to reconsider your life choices though.

I really don't want to live in a world where shoes can trump pillows on a softness scale. Unless people are using pillows as shoes to break into the Louvre and do some sort of infamous art heist. That, I can get behind. But not this. Pillows lost out to shoes, and that's just not right.

But that's the only occasion when pillows should be used as shoes and vice versa. We need to go back to when shoes were shoes and pillows were pillows. Pillows demand to be soft. That's why I will never purchase a hard pillow. On my bi-four-yearly pillow purchasing excursions, I will make sure to get the soft ones and let the pillow industry know this is what we want. I encourage you to do the same. Don't just sleep on it, demand that you can actually sleep on it!