How the fuck did this shit get by me? I guess I’m not a soda afficinado. In fact, I sort of just grip it and rip it. I’m a junkie, I don’t have time to be investigating. I just need to consume before I get the shakes. I did some interneting today, and came across this:

For the first time in the brand’s history, Mountain Dew is introducing a flavored line extension available exclusively in a diet version.

Diet Mountain Dew UltraViolet, on store shelves for a limited time for 12 weeks beginning August 10, combines the light citrus flavor of Diet Mountain Dew with a refreshing juicy rush of mixed berries without the calories.

The product will be supported with a full slate of TV and radio advertising developed by BBDO NY.

Well anyhoo, I’ve been seeing this shit everywhere now. It’s on all the shelves, and I’m pounding it like a motherfuckah. You have to understand, I drink liters and liters of Diet Dew a day. The ability to throw in a little different taste amidst What Will Eventually Kill Me is fantastic. I recommend this to any fellow diet cola junkie, looking for some variety amongst their addiction. You only have twelve weeks until it’s back to can after can of bland ole Mr. Regular Chemical Death.

You have to love a sensationalistic headline, don’t you?

Infinity Ward posted some CTF goodness over on their official Youtube. Holy shit is this gameplay footage gorgeous.

I’m just kidding about it the headline, though.   Sort of. My brother worked at a summer camp and told me that some kids played CoD and you know, had years to go before their first nocturnal emission. My therapist’s kid plays it, I think he’s thirteen. EVERYONE plays it. It’s universally loved. Like pizza.

[ story via kotaku ]

TODAY IS AWESOME. Today my friend Mr. Google has informed me of something amazing. People have found Omega Level searching for “Harley Quinn Cumshot” as well as “Comic Cumshots”. I hope you guys weren’t doubting me when I said that super horndog nerds have the hots for Harley Quinn. And if you did, I have found my redemption. Welcome to Omega Level, my perverted friend. Anyone who searched for Harley Quinn Cumshot will be a friend of the site.

Forever.

SUPERMANFUCK! Today someone was lovingly corralled from Google to our site via “Supermanfuck!“. What exactly does this mean? Oh, the possibilities! Are they describing the quality of the man fuck? “Oh, I received a super man-fuck last night?”

However, my preferred idea is that this is a sexual position I haven’t heard of yet. Perhaps the Superman Fuck is a position where the lucky party on top, mid-coitus, stretches their arms forward as though they were assuming the classic Superman mid-flight pose. It’s perfect, and can easily be transformed into the Superboy and/or Superwoman fuck. I intend on trying it out asap, I’ll get back to you guys.

MORE SEARCH ENGINE TERMS!

Today shows “Masturbation Cumshots” bringing people into our demented den. However, I’m more impressed   by “Lamictal Cured Me.”

I WISH I COULD SAY THE SAME! Just kidding. It really does help. If I wasn’t on it, I wouldn’t be typing this. I’d be sleeping for the fifteenth hour, covered in crumbs, blood and depression. After Batman beat my invalid ass.

Every Time I Die has been one of the few bands whose albums retain unchallenged positions in my personal rotation. Especially in their last effort (2007’s The Big Dirty), ETID combine straight-ahead thrash & paralysis-inducing breakdowns with southern-rock groove & clean hooks to create an irresistible sonic cocktail.

The garnish, of course, is Keith Buckley’s penchant for crafting evocative, powerful lyrics. Buckley’s anecdotes act as supportive frames, giving the listener just enough to imagine a more personal narrative. I’m not sure, but I’d bet that I’m not the only ETID fan who finds himself pondering lyrics such as those found at the end of Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Battery:

Stay wistful and young.
The affected are banking on oblivion
In the drone of embittered hope.
And we’re sold by the way they wrote it.

Oh, it’s the end of the line
I’m cornered by a precedent
The sneering public eye.

It is better to destroy than to create what is meaningless.
So the picture will not be finished…

Or maybe I just give Keith Buckley too much credit because he was a literature student & high school teacher. I don’t know.

In any case, September 15^th sees the release of New Junk Aesthetic. I’ve been looking forward to this album for quite some time and have held my head high despite some more disparaging news (i.e. Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz contributing guest vocals & the departing of longtime drummer Mike “Ratboy” Novak).

My optimism for New Junk Aesthetic is instead rooted in the fact that it was completed before Novak left, providing one last documented recording of the foursome (Novak/Williams/the brothers Buckley) that I’ve learned to love. Further, my love for sweet album packaging is appeased by the stellar artwork of guitarist Jordan Buckley.

Yesterday, Wanderlust was released as the first official video for the new album. I’m still sorting out my feelings about the track, but my initial impression is favorable. That may change. Or it may not. But for right now, I’m going to pump my fist and contemplate the following:

We’ve lived under this dark cloud forever
Waiting for the bad light to break.

Just let me try that one again, with a little more feeling –
We slept at the crossroads together, trying to make an honest mistake.
Just let me try that one more time, without a smile on my face.

Give the video a view and tell me what you think.
Every Time I Die – “Wanderlust”

Alien Penetration Erotica. Yes, someone typed that into Google today, and Mr. Google passed them along to us. I’ve started a Category, Search Engine Terms, for collating all the bizarre references that bring people here.

As an aside, whoever typed in Alien Penetration Erotica, I can help you. No, serious. I don’t know if my readers are aware of Mandy Morbid, but you should be. She’s a gorgeous porn star, with tattoos and a pink mohawk. I wish I could make that up. Her body is refuckulous, in the same way that Christina Hendricks’ is. As in, she’s pale, with curves that defy logic.

And, oh yeah! She   made her own real life Alien Tentacle rape. It’s odd. Morbid is awesome enough to give away scenes free at her website’s archives, which can be found here.

You know what’s fucked up? Someone searched Alien Penetration Erotica, and I could help them. Because I’ve watched it.

Yes. Someone, somewhere in the world searched for “The Dark Knight Masturbating” yesterday. Just think of that. Seriously, someone did it.

And then Google brought them to us. I’m horrified and honored.

Looking ahead to the next few weeks’ comic releases, I realized that September 2^nd brings the first issue of Strange Tales Max. This three-issue miniseries is composed of short stories by some of the most acclaimed creators in underground comics, many of whom have seized the opportunity to run amok with Marvel’s more recognizable characters.

On the one hand, I think this series could be great for all involved parties; the creators gain exposure that their usual work does not afford them, Marvel gets to tout a badge of artistic merit, and the readers get their filthy paws on some unique work. If all goes to plan, Strange Tales Max could be responsible for quite a few Eisner-nominations.

However, such an endeavor also runs the risk of choking on the vomit of its own novelty. Comic book fans are, on the whole, not a group who like their mothers’ apple pie recipes fucked with. If Marvel runs a story about Peter Parker giving up the superheroics in favor of free-form dance, then they might just shoot themselves in the foot.

Quirky or novel are not always synonymous with successful. Just ask DC’s Wednesday Comics — despite heavy promotion, its first issue was only the thirty-sixth best selling comic of July (with subsequent issues faring worse). And even though I think it contains some of the best story-telling I’ve read lately (Kerschl/Fletcher’s The Flash/Iris West, Pope’s Strange Adventures, & Busiek/Quinones’ Green Lantern comes to mind) even I can’t get over the shitty newsprint material. In my opinion, such beautiful art shouldn’t be folded over and printed on gray toilet paper.

Perhaps Wednesday Comics may work better once it’s collected into an absolute edition. Maybe Strange Tales Max will be unappreciated until collected into a full anthology. Either way, both should be commended for the ways in which they strive for something else.

Strange Tales #2's cover is from Peter Bagge's "The Incorrigible Hulk"

It’s Saturday night and the gang of villains, molesters, and deviants that I call best friends are hanging out in my basement. Per usual our attention is divided between sparkly movements on the slab of plastic my consoles are hooked up to, and my computer. This is simply the way things have been, are, will be, as long as my friends and I hang out. One could only hope. Maybe someday there will be children and recitals and stoic boredom, but for now, our rituals are complete and typical.

It makes sense then, that I was showing my friend Bags the latest Diablo 3 videos that evening. For like my room, like our vulgarity and flatulence, Blizzard itself has become rote in our lives. It’s funny that I can say our lives, meaning my friends — all of them. You see, Bags doesn’t play Warcraft. Neither does my friend Jesse. Neither does Pepsibones.

But after listening to what has to be hundreds of hours of talk about raids, and dungeons, and Molten Core, and various bullshit going on in Vent while they were over, all my friends   have a working knowledge of the Blizzard universe. It has become ingrained, ritual, a part of our lives.

My girlfriend turns to me during the weeknight:

“Do you have to raid tonight?”

I remember explaining World of Warcraft and my uh…addiction to it when I first began dating Sam. I wasn’t aware of the extent of her nerdiness at the time. You see a beautiful blonde girl obsessed with fashion and you think one thing:

“I’m burying this lifestyle as deep as possible.”

I was living in the Warcraft closet. I mean, she knew that I played videogames. That was common hat. But as anyone who plays WoW seriously knows, WoW eschews being a video game and becomes a lifestyle.   Telling your new girlfriend you play videogames is one thing. Telling this to your girlfriend is another:

“Yeah, you see…On Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday…I sort of have to…like…every night I have to be online at 10 o’clock. Yeah. Like, I just have to be. I need to raid.”

“What’s raiding?”

“You see that’s a good question…”

And the conversation spirals from there. Luckily my girlfriend likes to get human amounts of sleep. You know, eight hours or some shit. I’ve heard about that. Sounds neat. I prefer going to bed at 1:30 am and waking up in time for class, whenever that may be. So it works out. She sleeps, and I continue the caffeine and sleep deprivation cycle that is ultimately going to kill me.

But now she gets it, now she knows. And now she asks me if I’m raiding on evenings.

As I said, it’s ingrained, it’s never ending. If you know me, it’ll infect you eventually.

Saturday evening again and we’re still peering over the videos. One of my best friends, Dave, walks over from the plastic slab where Madden is being played to the computer. We’ve moved on from the Diablo 3 videos. Now we’re watching the trailer for WoW: Cataclysm. The next expansion. The newest drug to snare us. It’s never ending.

Every couple of years Blizzard dangles new content in front of the junkies to get us excited, to keep us playing. New characters, continents, abilities, experiences. They know their clients well, they know how to keep us engaged. We’re watching the trailer and of course I’m losing my mind. It’s new WoW! Holy fucking shit!

Dave and I have been the comrades in Blizzard arms since 2000. Nine years now. We have spent a third of our lives plowing through hordes of demons. Dave’s the pusher, really. He got me into Diablo 2 back in the day, and the rest is history. I often tell the story of how my senior year of highschool was all Diablo 2 and Wendy’s.

For hundreds of hours during my senior year, Dave and I, parked across the city from one another, would play Diablo 2 until the wee hours of the morning. I remember with a nostalgic grin the only thing that could bring a stop to our gaming. One of us would inevitably say:

“Fuck, I’m hungry. Want to go to Wendy’s?”

But of course the trip to Wendy’s, the conversation at Wendy’s, the conversation from Wendy’s was all and only raving Diablo 2 madness. Holy shit mana leech ring blah blah Cow World blah blah Mephisto run.

And of course, the only logical conclusion is that we went back to our grinding on our computers immediately upon our return.

Dave, staring at the monitor, staring at Blizzard’s newest drug, rubs a palm against his eyes and says with a laugh:

“Fuck, I’m never going to be able to quit this game.”

But what would we do, if we quit the game? Or specifically, if we quit Blizzard? It sounds so pathetic when I type it, I’ll admit that. But to our defense we have full lives filled with nights with friends, madness at diners in the early mornings, I have tricked a girl into dating me. But there is this other side of us, punctuated by Blizzard. Always Blizzard.

You know you’ve been involved with Blizzard for too long when you can identify parts of your life by the product of theirs you were playing. It’s like asking your Dad what he was doing by asking him to talk about various seasons of his favorite sports team.”

“The 1982 Bruins? Oh yeah, I was…”

I can do the same thing with Blizzard. It freaks me out.

Diablo 2? Senior year.

Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction? Freshmen year of college, DT’s new album, Lord of the Rings.

WoW? We decided to play it during New Year’s Eve, 2004. I got it for my birthday.

WoW: The Burning Crusade? I spent the better part of it addicted to sleeping pills.

WoW: Wrath of the Lich King? The midnight release at Gamestop. Playing it until 3 am. Going to class the next day.

And so on, and so forth. It’s comforting and it’s ritualistic. I look forward to being able to associate future events with points in my life. Who knows what I’ll be doing when Diablo III hits? Finishing my Master’s Degree? What will I be playing when I have my first kid? Will I have to rearrange my honeymoon to fit the release of Galaxy of Starcraft or whatever they drop on us next?

Just kidding. I wouldn’t do that.

Wink.