I invented an amazing cocktail just this evening inspired by 90s pop/soda/sody pop.
My roommate ordered a case of Surge off of Amazon, because apparently they sell Surge again now (sooo future). He bought them to give to coworkers as a nice and cool thing to do for the holidays. But we totally ripped into them the second they landed on our doorstep because how could you not? Nobody remembers what the fuck Surge tasted like. Just some blur of a neon, Secret World of Alex Mack, piss-colored 90s children’s soda.
This cocktail I made is inspired by everything Surge makes you think about and feel. Chemical spills, Nickelodeon and peeing your pants in front of your crush – and liking it – on a school field trip in kindergarten.
Photo from CNN
Ingredients:
Surge
vodka
3 ice cubes
1 orange
1 lowball glass
1 knife or whatever people use to peel stuff for cocktails
Put the ice in a glass. Pour your beloved amount of vodka. Pour your beloved Surge in the glass until it turns… pretty green. Take the orange and peel off a strip of orange rind. Place it in the drink wherever you think it fits.
“Summer is great” they say. “We can go to the beach” they say. “Shorts are fun” nobody they say. Sure, summer has its beautiful moments when you’re finally breaking free from winter’s weakening death grip around your pale, chubby neck. But now that we’re in the thick of it, I’ve got some griping to do because I’m charming like that. Holla atcha winter baby. Here are the 5 worst things about summer.
1. NIGHT SWEATS suck
So your winter cuddle and Netflix partner didn’t get fucked off the second your seasonal depression subsided. How great 4 U. But what are you supposed to do in the summer when laying in bed next to each other is about as appealing as sitting next to a bonfire at noon with a humidifier in the dead heat of July? It’s horrible. All you wanna do is snuggle up to your person of choice, but your A/C bill is more than your paycheck and maybe you don’t really need love anyways.
2. Bugs are fucking lame
Seriously. Yeah yeah yeah, the ecosystem, squirrels need to eat, something needs to look gross on my windshield so the powerful gas station squeegee lobby can control the weather with their billions. I get it. Bugs are still the most annoying thing on planet earth.
3. Hot Dogs are weird
‘Nuff said.
4. TV reruns are killing me
I know you’re supposed to be outside or whatever in the summer, and maybe it’s some government conspiracy with Hollyweird to get the kind folk of the nation into the outdoors for vitamin D and fresh air. I say whatever. These reruns of Ellen on tv all the time are sending me into an existential crisis. You can find me in the club / drowning in the screams of middle aged women at a live taping of Ellen.
5. Summer clothes are ugly
the powerful dumb hat lobby is stronger than u know
It’s like the fashion world takes a vacation in January to screw you over for decent summer style. Maybe nobody cares what they look like in the summer because you’re sweaty and frizzy anyways. And don’t get me wrong, I LOVE crop tops. But the cold months definitely have a leg up on better clothing choices. RE: LAYERS. LEGGINGS. FUR COATS. Hats that don’t make everyone around you wish they had a stabbing knife for hat murder.
Honorable mention: Calvin Harris’ “Summer”
Pander-y bore tunes made for bros and basics. PUKE
Just because you’re poor doesn’t mean you can’t be fabulous. This is the shit I do to stay cool as hell without a ton of $$$$$$$$$.
awww FUCK yeah
I LOVE LOVE LOVE going out to eat. But when you’re broke-ish, that can be hard to legitimize. Let me help you, baby. When you go out to dinner, eat half of what you order, and take the other half home for a second meal. This automatically cuts your money spent on meals and food out in half. Getting a $10 burger and fries? Hey, that’s like 5 bucks a meal from an actual restaurant! And waaaaay better than McDonalds. PLUS, if you only eat half of the normally wayyyyy big portions, it’s almost like a diet. A diet of half your hamburger and half your fries. I’ve actually been able to eat like 3-4 meals out of some Chinese takeout because they REALLY give you a lot of food. It’s so fucking beautiful. But nobody likes a cheap ass, so make sure you always tip your beautiful servers.
Salad bars from grocery stores are another weakness. There’s so many vegetables, cool pastas and weird yummy shit that is too hard and expensive to make at home alone. But sometimes the salad bar can get expensive. If you ditch the salad dressing, I’ve found you can save like almost 2 bucks because that shit is heavy. Also try to avoid other weirdly heavy shit like cottage cheese.
Find a friend who is the same size as you. Wardrobe=DOUBLED. But if they have bad style, don’t bother. Ain’t nobody got time fo dat shit.
girl lemme borrow that top
Cancel your gym membership and do yoga videos online. I just canceled my LA Fitness membership that was $40 a month because I fucking hate them. There are plastic surgery videos on the TVs there, contests in the bathrooms to win lipo/botox, and they even sold pizza at the LA Fitness in Midway. The energy around that place is tainted and disgusting. These free podcasts from Yogamazing are awesome and perfect for bedroom yoga. If you have enough self control to actually do them.
Get a couple of friends together and throw a dinner party at home. It is SO much fucking cheaper to feed 6 people at home than out at a restaurant. Plus you can buy some ritzy shit for the price of some not-so-ritzy shit at a restaurant. Just make sure you look up a good recipe or have a friend who actually likes to cook before you ruin the foie gras.
Not quite the same child memory, but similar nonetheless. Image via newyorkstreetfood.com
Ahh, the days of the Ice Cream Man. You’d pray for him to come down your street, count your nickels 10 times over to make sure you had a whole dollar and wait for what seemed like fo. ev. a. Once in a while I’ll hear the bells of the ice cream man, and be taken back to a time where our parents warned us about strangers and pedophiles but we didn’t give a shit because “that big van has ice cream, suckaz!!” Those were the days!
I’ve never been one of those people that pick the ‘three berry’ option. You know, three berry pie, three berry muffin, three berry smoothie, etc. If I had to choose, I’m strawberry or GTFO. I mean, berrylicious is a really bad pun, and it’s ALL OVER any semblence of a berrylicious food. Besides, when berries aren’t in season, or they have to come from a far away place, they are kind of small, wilty and covered in sugar.
I recently embarked upon a dire mission, one to end the end of all ends: grocery shopping. It’s summer, and light, fluffy things are everywhere. It creates this sort of over-the-top need to consume light super things, a la ice cream (holy shit, ICE CREAM. This place in Edina is the shit.), salads and BERRIES.
Not what I was looking for. I forgot these existed. I’m always shocked when I learn someone has one, like Lady Gaga or anyone on Gossip Girl. Image via phonegg.com
Think about raspberries. Blackberries. BLUEBERRIES!!! It’s an awakening. Berries are juicy, filled with anti-oxidents and are so, so yummy.
Here are some light berry-centered things to drive you crazy hungry with!
Fluffy, amazing pancakes with berries and whipped cream (ps why is there not a specialty drive through pancake joint? Should we start one?)
A homemade, fresh berry pie (because pies are always better homemade and freshly made)
French vanilla yogurt, vanilla almond crunch granola, raspberries and blackberries
We are just doomed to worship the dollar, aren’t we?!
If you find yourself with 5 dollars left in your bank account for a whole week until payday, then you are just like me. Thankfully I’ve already done my grocery shopping for the week, and unfortunately that means I have to eat at home EVERY DAY (chinese food just ain’t the same at home).
This week, I’ve made a delectable lemon vegetable soup, partly because it’s inexpensive to make and partly because I binged on carbs all weekend and can’t look at another piece of bread for at least another week.
Lemon Vegetable Soup
The real beauty of soup is that when making something like a garden-variety mix, you can change the ingredients up a bit to your liking. Democracy! Maybe.
I meandered using this recipe as a guide. If you don’t like onions, you can throw in potatoes, or if you really like peas feel free to have a pea party in that pot. Or, like me, you used what you had because it’s allllllmost payday. (But I didn’t just have a shit ton of kale on hand, I’m not a freak)
Ingredients
Veggies are the new black. Image via eattheweeds.com
32 ounces of vegetable or chicken stock
3 whole carrots
1 onion
Two stalks of celery
1 green zucchini
1 yellow zucchini
1 tomato
Bunch of kale
1/2 teaspoon of oregano
1/2 teaspoon of thyme
salt, pepper and garlic to taste
1/4 cup of lemon juice, or one whole lemon squeezed
Steps
Pour the 32-ounce vegetable/chicken stock into a pot and place on medium heat.
Clean all of your vegetables. Begin chopping the carrots and onion into bite-sized pieces. Once the stock begins to simmer, turn the heat down to low and throw the onion and carrots into the pot. Let them simmer for 4-5 minutes.
While the carrots and onions are simmering, chop the zucchini, celery and tomato. Wash the kale and tear off the leaves from the stalk into bite-sized pieces.
Throw the celery, zucchini, oregano, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper into the pot and let simmer for 4-5 minutes. Then throw in the tomato and kale. The kale will need a minute or two to wilt into the pot and quit being so darn leafy. The tomato will get piece-y and that’s cool too.
Lastly, add the lemon juice and you’re basically finished. I like my vegetables to be softer in soup, so I let my pot simmer on the stove for about 10 minutes after I added the tomato and kale.
Also, all the ingredients are affordable. When making something of this size, it’s good to have tupperware and a strong will to eat the same meal a couple of times throughout the week. FUCK Yay budgets!
So this exists now: Pizza Hut in the good ol’ Middle East has conjured up a pizza crust of either chicken fillets or cheeseburgers. If you guys didn’t know the American apocalypse was coming, this is a sign of it. How could this have NOT been made for mass circulation in the states?! This is like every Liz Lemon and stoner’s DREAM FOOD.
But seriously, can you imagine your toilet bowl after eating one of these suckers? Complete and total devastation. Havoc. Chaos. Toilet paper resources drained. You’re dazed, you’re confused, and you’ve just dropped the most futile bomb of your life. The only way out now is a hop in the shower to take over where the TP left off and wait out the cold sweats.
Also seriously, this is like the best PR move EVER to get the “normal, everyday American” to like the Middle East. Well played, Pizza Hut, combiner of cuisines, cultures and nations.
I never hear people talking about strawberry pie. Well, I’m here to tell you it’s awesome. Dab a little whipped cream on top of that baby and you’ve got yourself an awesome dessert. For Easter, my ma made a strawberry pie with jello that is a little different than straight up strawberry sauce and maybe a bit lighter as well. Here’s a recipe if you’re feeling pie-happy.
2PF 