taste test: burker king ketchup & fries potato chips

holy crap!! i hit the gas station mother-load!! coming off of 12 hours of driving in 60 total hours we turned off the interstate to fuel up. after holding my breath and dealing with an odor that can only be described as ‘a baby diaper full of curry’ in the bathroom i headed out into the main area to get a bottle of water and see what odd atrocities i could find. i scanned the chips and suddenly my eyes widened as i came across a bag of something i have never seen before: burger king potato chips. i was scared and intrigued all at the same time when i grabbed a bag of the ketchup & fries flavor. this would prove to be a great thing and a scary one all at the same time.

p.s. i searched like crazy for these on the interwebs and info is sparse. however after some digging i came across the manufacturers website and found some nutritionals for you to peruse. onto the review.

i’ve lost my mind when it comes to groceries

i have. i used to be a hunter. i would have my list of what i needed (yes needed) to get, go in the store and make a bee-line for the products on the list. now i meander through the aisles and seek out “new and interesting” products, mostly to review here. it’s gotten so bad that my lady now does the same thing too. i’ve now crossed over to the dark side am now a gatherer. it’s a sad day in my world folks. i died a little bit inside when i came to this realization. to put it in perspective, i can take a 15 minute shopping trip and turn it into a 45 minute excursion and go over budget by as much as $25. now that’s poopy.

while we enjoy trying new things, sometimes it can be exhausting. like for example when it’s a saturday afternoon and you are fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with customers in tj’s or the local supermarket. occasionally i will do the whole asian-food-market thing and find some product whose language i can’t understand and have no clue what it is just to purchase and try out.

so i ask you all, since product reviews are some of the main reasons you come here: what product(s) do you want me to review? give me some ideas and i will totally roll with it. not that i am out of ideas, but i want to know what you want to see. also, since the review of the mcskillet burrito is so high on the charts, do you want me to go back an retry it? post a comment and let me know.

taste test: la lechera flakes cereal

that’s right folks, once again trixareforkids brings you something from a local supermarcado. today we are talking about the general mills manufactured, but trademark owned by nestle, la lechera flakes cereal.

to say it was an impulse buy is an understatement, but rather more of a curiosity. for those that don’t know, nestle la lechera is a sweetened condensed milk product. the original flavor is still the most popular but they have spawned other flavors and styles as dulche de leche, fat free and even a coffee creamer product. the original product is aimed at the spanish market, however the cereal and condensed milk have labels with dual translations in spanish and english.

the cereal box is no different and can either teach you spanish or provide a ‘rosetta stone’ interface to learn spanish. to be fair we tried the cereal dry (as a snack) and with 2% milk. no bananas or fruits were harmed in the making of this review to show the true taste of the cereal. let’s begin.

the real reason motorola is going down the tubes

i grew up with motorola in my life. they were the first walkie-talkie i ever used, the first pager i ever had, we can’t forget about such treasures as the zach morris phone or the illustrious moto bag phone, and they were my first cell phone. that was a long time ago. since then i have had some sort of cell phone but generally it has never been a motorola, save for a few.

since last week it was officially announced that the cell phone division would be spun off (though largely for accounting reasons to make the new ceo look good and make the acquisition seem palatable to a potential buyer) and the company would actually be two companies sometime in 2009. this comes on the heels of some really poor sales and a slipping market share. but there’s more reason the company is just not good: failure to innovate.

an interview tip for employers

okay, not that i am in a position to give interviewers tips on how to conduct interviews to potential employees, but i thought i would share this little nugget of goodness with you.

today, while in the throws of an interview with what was a very dull potential boss i look down to inspect the desk and keep from falling asleep and see my resume. what was stuck to the resume was a note outlining the thoughts of the screener as he was conducting the pre-interview interview. i just about stood up and called him on it when i saw the first line written on the note:

i picked this guy for the hell of it

wow motherfucker, way to show a candidate that they at least have a shot. and while you’re at it are there any other ways that you can show your boss that you are wasting his time? speaking of wasting time, when would you like me to thank you for wasting my time? listen, i don’t care that you had a quota of candidates you had to present to your boss but at least have some decency and not call attention to it.

so there you have it. don’t write shit on anything that’s visible to the potential employee that you don’t want him to see. moreover try not to degrade him too much before you even meet him. keep that shit in your head or relegate it to water-cooler talk. you’ve been warned.

microsoft surface: i’m a bit skeptical

i’ve seen the videos and i’ve heard the hype, but i have to say that i am just not sold yet.  i know, i know the videos are cool but i just can’t wrap my head around it.  listen, i am the first one to jump on the ‘latest tech bandwagon’ but for some reason i have this vision of seeing these things collecting dust in at&t stores 3 months after release.  i don’t want to be the ‘i told ya so’ guy, but i’m calling it a fail.  my reasoning is that it’s not a full-featured release, rather it’s a hurried-out-the-door-to-capture-hype release and if it’s not 110% solid it won’t make the grade.

think about it: you’re releasing a product to the consumer public that has never used it or has any idea of how to interact with it (save gesture recognition from the iphone).  not only will they resist it because it’s unknown but they will have to be shown how to use said product and therefore will not get on-board.

i just don’t see the takeoff happening as planned.  sorry macrohard but i’m not feeling your product.  i do see it happening in other arenas in the long run, but i think you are once again ahead of the curve and unsupported.

taste test: trader joe’s fig cereal bars

okay so the real name on the box is ‘trader joe’s “this fig walks into a bar…” low fat cereal bar’, but i’m just to lazy for that so we’ll just call it tjfcb for short. k?

these were an impulse buy. looking to diversify my breakfasty-type offerings i thought to give these a go since they are low fat and can fit neatly in the desk at the office. you can find these smack between the cereals and sugars (a fitting place in retrospect) in the dry goods isle.

unwrapping: be careful as these are delicate. i advise taking the whole box to work or you will find yourself with a pack of fig crumbles. the smell when unwrapping is super-sweet and decadent. honestly it was almost nauseating how sweet it smelled, however the smell of brown sugar and vanilla left no place for me to smell fig. the aroma was reminiscent of kellogg’s nutri-grain cereal bars, most specifically the apple cinnamon kind.

the bite: soft and more balanced. it was still sweet with the fig paste/sugar combo. the thing practically fell apart in my mouth. the fig paste is more viscous that the paste in a fig newton which, i think, adds to the delicateness of the overall bar. when you chew you can feel the seeds from the fig getting stuck in your teeth. a plus for being real, a minus for getting stuck in my grill.  after a couple seconds of chewing there was this past sticky lump in my mouth.  not super-appetizing really.

afterthoughts: i need a glass of milk. i do, this was really some intense sweetness. as a standalone bar, if this is the only thing you will eat in the morning with your cup of coffee, it can fit the bill but i have found some problems. the size is too small to be the only item you will eat. also, if you drink a latte or macchiato from evilbucks you will have downed your day’s worth of sugar in under 15 minutes.

my lady and i split opinions on this; she loves them and i could take or leave them. while i like the general nutritional info i don’t like that they are not portable (i mean they’ll crumble). overall they get 6.5/10 for being tasty but sweet. pick some up for yourselves if you like, i know there are other varieties too.  if you need me i will be chugging milk and flossing all the seeds out of my teeth.

i’m back bitches…..

well that sucked.  i was sidelined while my laptop was being repaired.  that being said, i’m back and should have some new content soon.

-the rabbit

tips from a computer geek

happy monday to you all. i thought i would share a few tips that are sure fire and come straight from the mouth of the guy you call when things go wrong with your pc (this does apply to all family friends or relatives that you call when things go wrong):

• before you even call me: turn the pc off and turn it back on again, this will more than likely fix what is wrong. yep, thank billy gates and steve ballmer for that.
• your computer is slow: face it, if it’s older than 2 years and you haven’t done a thing to maintain it, tough, you’re toast. it’s like a car, it needs oil changes and whatnot. try maxing out your ram (memory) to improve performance.
• your system tray: all those icons in the bottom right hand corner are running programs. you allowed those to be installed when you installed some software. shame on you. start by shutting them down and possibly uninstall the software all together.
• you bought new hardware: that’s great, don’t use the disc that came with it. go straight to the website and get new drivers or download the latest software. then you won’t have to call me in the first place.
• error messages: these are helpful. don’t call me and only say ‘it won’t work’. tell me what’s up and, seriously, if you get an error message write down the details. if i don’t pickup, type the error into google and you’ll probably find your answer.
• send the horse to the glue factory: if it’s not working right, or is going costing you over $300 to fix; get rid of your computer and buy a new one. don’t pay someone $300 to repair a 4 year old pc when you can pay that much money to buy a new pc without a keyboard, monitor and mouse since you already have those.
• don’t open forwarded emails: it’s an electronic chain letter people. be smart, no harm will come to you if you decide to not forward an email and potentially infect hundreds of your friends with a virus. no bad luck will haunt you or baby pandas will be killed. actually that’s good karma.
• unclutter your desktop: i know you like all those icons there for ‘easy access’ but it’s like carrying all the makeup you own, all the cds in their cases, all the dvds in their cases and a stackful of books with you all the time. it’s just gonna unnecessarily weigh you down. delete them. oh and by deleting them you won’t actually remove the programs.
• the internet is a scary place: the only things you need to surf the web are: internet explorer or mozilla firefox, adobe flash, and java from sun. other than that you don’t need anything else. any prompt telling you that you need something is crap. just don’t do it.
• wireless networking: thanks for all the money. i mean it, this is the number one money maker for me. it’s complicated; it’s not always easy, but seriously buy a decent piece of hardware from linksys or netgear for under $100 and manage it yourself. they have fairly simple user interfaces and for godsakes: password protect your network.
• uninstall useless programs: if you don’t use it; uninstall it. if you don’t know what it is and want to uninstall it: google it and you should know what is up and whether or not you can. other than that, just slim your system down. it’s like nutrisystem for your pc.
• the most important one of all: google your problem. because that’s what i do. i’m not that smart but i pretend to be to impress drunken women at nightclubs. do what i do: just search for your problem and your answer is not far away.

i feel better now that we talked. glad i was able to get some things off my chest. and if your question doesn’t fall into one of the above categories then call me. if you own a mac, then you seemingly won’t ever need to call me, so when we do talk we can discuss the weather and general topics.

taste test: archer farms smoky bacon and cheddar crisps

that’s chips to us on this side of the big pond. well i guess in a marketing effort to distinguish fried potato chips from baked potato chips they are calling the baked variety ‘crisps’. in any case these are baked and are purported to be low-fat. let the games begin.