Author Archives: Bill

How to Stop Facebook Game Invites

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It’s happened to all of us. You see this –



Oh boy!

Oh boy!





and your hopes are raised. It’s a facebook notification! What could it be? Did somebody like a hilariously witty post of yours or comment about how handsome you are on one of your photos? You click on it and –



Goddamnit!

Goddamnit!



It’s a stupid game invite.



I get about a half dozen of these a day. People on my friends list inviting me to play some dumbass game on facebook. What really pisses me off is that I know they don’t care. It’s not like they’re playing Frontierville or Mafia Wars and suddenly think “OMG this game is so fun! My friend Bill would probably love to play this! I should let him know!” These games are nothing more than straight up pyramid schemes and players get rewards for spamming their friends. I know this because I totally used to play those games all the time.



I’m not proud but I used to be one of those people that sent out game requests all the time. I eventually realized what I was doing (or just became bored) and stopped playing them. In my experience facebook games can be separated into two categories: THE SPAM MACHINE and THE KINDA ACTUAL GAME.



THE SPAM MACHINE is the text based RPG like Mafia Wars or Superhero Wars or War Wars. The model is loosely based off games like Hobowars and Kindom of Loathing but they’ve taken out all the story, dialog, puzzle solving and fun. In these games you basically “go on missions” (click a button) until you level up. You belong to a guild that is nothing more than the number of people on your friends list who have started an account with the game. The bigger your guild is, more missions you can complete. You can also fight other guilds. If your guild is bigger, you win the fight.



Most of the SPAM MACHINE games only allow you to complete so many “missions” in a given hour but will give our extra missions or other in game bonuses simply for inviting friends every day. These games are turning people into Nigerian Princes every day.



THE KINDA ACTUAL GAME are flash games that actually have a little bit of entertainment merit, depending on your taste. These are Angry Birds, Bejewled, Farmville (although Farmville does have some SPAM MACHINE qualities) etc. These games don’t require you to have a bunch of friends play but still offer plenty of in game bonuses for having friends play.



Either way, if you receive an invite to play any of these games. Your friend doesn’t give a shit about you or actually think you might like it. You’re just another brick in their Castleville. If you want to stop these invites from flooding your notifications bar, here’s what you need to do.



Call them out on their shit.



Yes, I know that you can block certain game requests but this attacks the problem at it’s source.



The next time you receive a game request on facebook. Just write a message on that person’s wall. Something like –



“Thanks but really don’t want to play Bubble Blitz.” A little too polite. Might not drive the message home.



“I DO NOT WANT TO PLAY BUBBLE BLITZ” or “STOP SENDING ME GAME REQUESTS”. Assertive. To the point.



“FUCK YOU I DON’T WANT TO PLAY BUBBLE SHITS OR WHATEVER. IF YOU SEND ME ANY MORE GAME REQUESTS I WILL EAT YOUR FUCKING SOUL.” A little too agressive. Will probably result in that person unfriending you.



Sending the person who sent you the game request a mesage could also stop the game requests from coming but by posting it on their wall you’ve made it public. They know that these requests aren’t wanted. If they did, they’d post on your wall about it instead of sending you a private notification. If they get four, five or more posts on their walls from different people telling them to stop then they’ll just stop sending requests all together. Every farmville will wither and every Mafia will be gunned down.

New Year’s Resolution Update #1: Uh… Mulligan?

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I knew when I decided to take on 10 resolutions (11, actually. Totally forgot to put “floss every day” in there) that it wasn’t going to be easy. I knew that a couple were going to be broken and I told myself that when that happened, I would keep trying. One of the biggest problems with New Year resolutions for myself and a lot of other people is that once you have that one cigarette, that one cupcake, that one spoonful of heroin, you throw your arms up in the air and say “well, better luck next year!” People give up after the first shot not realizing that failure is an important part of the process of improvement.



I’m proud to report that I really mastered the “failure” part of the improvement process last week completely.



Seven. Fucking seven. I broke seven of my resolutions in less than seven goddamn days. Again, I knew that this wasn’t going to be easy but seven? What the fuck?



Granted, a few of those were due to the fact that I got a terrible cold on January 2nd. I had the whole fever/chills/dizzyness/sore throat/stuffy nose package and I had to work. I missed a blog, really didn’t feel like working out and just ate whatever was in front of me. Just sitting around and sniffling was boring so I played some flash games on my laptop.


That’s four right there.



Some of the stuff was just unconscious. Sitting in a training class at work I didn’t even realize that I was biting my thumbnail until I was halfway through the damn thing.



There’s five.



Haven’t called my parents since New Year’s eve. Gonna do that today and really, once a week’s not bad but I’m still counting that as six.



Finally, some things are just Pavlovian. A conditioned response. You’ve trained yourself to do it so much that it’s not even a reaction so much as a reflex. Like yesterday when I was sitting on the couch with my wife and I farted. Didn’t try to fart, one just kind of sneaked up on me. I did what I had done a million times before and pumped my fist up in the air in victory and said “yeah!” when Jena gave me a look and said “really? it hasn’t even been a week?”



She probably couldn’t tell you my other resolutions to save her life but she remembered this one. It’s burned into her mind. She’s got a personal stake in this one. And that was seven.



This is all fine. Failure’s an important part of the process. I’m learning. Master Bruce is falling down. I’m getting over the cold now and fully aware of the things I do without realizing it. I am totally going to do all of these.



Or at least just break six or fewer resolutions this week.

Are You Smarter Than The Onion?

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Pop quiz, kiddos! Below is a series of quotes from Vice President Joe Biden. Your job is to find out if you can tell which ones are actual quotes and which ones are quotes from The Onion. Answers at the bottom of the page!



1: “Signing the Affordable Care Act is a big fucking deal.”

2: “I’ve sure as shit made my fair share of mistakes.”

3: “One babe caught a glimpse of those rims after a Cinderella concert in ’86 and she couldn’t get into that backseat fast enough.”

4: “If you need any help on your pecs, let me know.”

5: “Spread your legs! You’re gonna be frisked!”

6: “Relaxation of Wall Street regulations will put y’all back in chains!”

7: I’ve been dying to hit Tijuana and check out a donkey show, I haven’t seen one since Teddy [Kennedy] and the guys took me down there when I was a freshman senator.”


Answers:
1: Real
2: Onion
3: Onion
4: Real
5: Real
6: Real
7: Both, actually. Huh.

You Say You Want a Resolution?

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Well, 2013 is here and as I look on my facebook timeline I see friends either posting about the resolutions they’re making, how they’re not making any resolutions or how they’re sick of people making resolutions because nobody ever sticks to them anyway.



Personally, I like the tradition of making resolutions in the New Year. There’s something downright poetic about casting aside your past mistakes and hitting the reset button, only looking forward. Trying to face whatever comes as a better person.



Of course, poetry gives way to reality when you stop going to the gym after a month, have a cigarette a day later, strangle a craigslist hooker in a dirty motel room etc.



I’ve made plenty of resolutions in my past. I’ve never been able to stick with any of them so several years ago I decided to make a resolution that I could stick with and never make one again. My resolution was that every toast I’d make for the rest of my life would be “kill whitey” and with very rare exception, I’ve stuck to it and haven’t made a resolution ever since.



I miss it, though. Making New Year’s resolutions. Sure, I get to feel like I’m better than everybody else when I hear about how they broke their resolutions but I miss the little bit of excitement and hope you get from simply making them. Even if you can’t see it through you at least tried to better yourself and that has to be worth a little something, right?



This year I have decided to break my last resolution of “no more resolutions” (I’m still going to toast “kill whitey” until the day I die, though) and make resolutions this year. But rather than make one or two I’m going to go all out and make as many resolutions as I can. I’m an incredibly flawed person so there’s plenty of resolving I can do. I figure that if I try the shotgun approach, then a few of them are bound to stick.



In fact, I’ll try my damndest to actually stick to all my resolutions and will update on my 2013 resolutisplosion (first resolution, find a better name for this idea) every Monday here on youngnotions.com . Okay, here’s my resolutions –



1: Work out every day I’m not working my day job. Use all the little home exercise equipment I’ve bought for myself (I spent 25 bucks on ankle weights like 3 years ago and have only used them once).



2: No more sweets. No more cookies. No more Snickers Peanut Butter Squared. No more gas station donuts. No more giant peanut butter sandwiches right before going to bed. No more daring midnight raids of hotel snack machines when on the road (seriously you don’t know shame until the person waiting behind you sighs as you pick out your THIRD item from the vending machine).



3: No alcohol for the entire year (until New Year’s eve).



4: No playing flash games online. Sites like kongregate.com have taken up way too much free time that could have been spent writing, using some of that exercise equipment that’s gathering up dust or hanging out with my wife.



5: Actually meet all my writing deadlines for this website and my sketch comedy stuff.



6: Call my parents more often.



7: Stop biting my fingernails.



8: Leave the room if I’m at home and have to fart or at least excuse myself if I do fart rather than throw my fists up in the air and scream “YEAH!”.



9: Not wait until the internet gets shut off to take care of the Comcast bill.



10: Get more standup comedy work in 2013.



Well I think that should be enough. Check back every Monday to see how I’m doing with my “Resolution X”.



Okay, shit. that name’s even worse than “resolutisplosion”. Whatever. I’ll think of something. Resolutions start tomorrow because I’m hung the fuck over right now. Kill whitey.

Drinkin’ in the New Year.

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New Year’s Eve is the biggest night of the year for stand up comedy. Tonight there are over a dozen places you can go to have a fancy dinner and watch people tell jokes at you. I personally suggest this one –



I will tell jokes at you.

I will tell jokes at you.





It’s nice to be able to have a New Year’s gig close to home. When I was younger my options for New Year’s show’s were always in some far flung Iron Range town and while I do love going out and making with the jokey jokes, New Year’s is my favorite holiday and I enjoy spending it getting completely hammered with my loved ones. Here’s a little story about my drunkest New Year’s Eve ever.



About five years ago I took a New Year’s show in some town about 20 miles west of Saint Cloud. If a show is less than a two hour drive I don’t expect to stay in a hotel but this was New Year’s. I figured one would be ready for me. I called the guy who booked the show on my drive up and asked where I’d be staying. He told me that he didn’t get a hotel room since it was so close to the Twin Cities.



My heart sank. I figured that if I couldn’t get wasted with my friends on New Year’s at least I could get wasted. I said “but… it’s New Year’s. This is the biggest drinking night of the year!” The booker said “sorry, I’m an old guy. I don’t really think about that.” but I wasn’t an old guy and I did. I needed to figure out a plan B.




I ended up at the Independent in Uptown. Not my favorite bar by any stretch of the imagination but it had friends and it had booze. After waiting in line (one of the reasons I don’t like that place) and paying a cover fee (hey look, another reason!) I finally found my friends at the bar at 11:15 PM and they were all drunk. I, on the other hand, was stone cold sober since I just drove from Saint Cloud. I decided to play catch up.



Here’s the problem with playing catch up. I drank at a much faster pace than everybody else trying to “catch up” to them and after “catching up” to them I quickly “ran right the fuck past” them and eventually “lapped” them. What was once the only sober guy at the party was now the drunkest.



This became clear pretty quick. All over the bar were giant helium balloons. I plucked one off a railing, bit a hole right by the tied-off end of the opening and sucked in a big lungful to do the always popular “hey look at how high my voice is” gag (party classic. Second only to the “lampshade hat” bit). After nearly draining all of the giant balloon one of my friends points out that all the balloons seem to be filled with glitter. A couple minutes later I cough into my hand and see a few flecks of mucous covered plastic glitter. I briefly contemplate going to the ER for my possible case of sparkly lung but decide to ride it out and keep drinking.



As the bar closes everybody pours out onto the street and I’m standing on the corner of Lake and Hennepin waiting for a friend to pull up with a car. I see a few people cross the street on a red light and scream out “HEY! THAT’S JAYWALKING! I AM PLACING YOU UNDER CITIZEN’S ARREST!” The criminals proceeded to keep walking without even acknowledging my authority. I turn to the police officer that’s standing right next to me and slur “Nobody respects the law anymore, man.” He just rolled his eyes and probably silently prayed that I didn’t take a swing at anybody so he wouldn’t have to haul my drunk ass in. I screamed “CITIZEN’S ARREST!” at a few more jaywalkers and eventually just started trying to place random innocents under citizen’s arrest. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.



I eventually pile into a car with my friends and we all end up at my friend Mitch’s apartment. As we spill out of the car into the alley I slip on some ice and fall right on my ass. I proclaim that I am placing myself under citizens arrest and then puke a bunch of glitter behind a dumpster.



The next morning we all went out for brunch, I had the worst hangover of my life and I haven’t played “catch up” since.



God bless us, everyone!

Uptown Rainbow Fight Club?

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So I needed to get something from the grocery store on Christmas day. Now, I know most everything is closed on Christmas and grocery stores are no exception but I thought perhaps one of the literally five grocery stores in a 10 block radius of my home would be open.



That’s right. Five. I’m within walking distance of the Wedge Co-Op, Kowalksi’s, Lunds, Rainbow and Supervalu. You can even add Byerly’s and Cub to the list if you cast the net out an extra mile and a half. Uptown’s got grocery stores and they were all closed on Christmas.



While searching online for holiday hours for some of the stores I googled “Uptown Rainbow Holiday Hours” and one of the first things that came up was the Yelp! review page for the store.



The Uptown Rainbow is usually my go-to store. It’s a lot cheaper than the co-op, Lunds and Kowalski’s but it’s not as trashy as the Supervalu (seriously Supervalu is one of those grocery stores where you have to walk through the stockroom to get to the bathroom. Always a bad sign). Sure, the Rainbow’s a little dirty and doesn’t always have everything I want stocked all the time but it’s alright. I glanced at the Yelp! reviews to see what other people thought of the place and holy shit –



Let me make this easy for you. You’re thinking about coming here because it’s close to your apartment, and you just need the two things. If I may make a suggestion: consider starving to death instead.

Seriously, this is the nastiest, most overpriced grocery in the Twin Cities. I’ve been here for ten minutes and I’ve seen: 1) produce dropped on the (really dirty) floor and put back on the shelf. 2) a cashier throw a watermelon which a customer had just bought. 3) a bro massage his dick as he walked up and down aisles. This wasn’t a minor adjustment we’re talking about. He was taking it slow and easy. Moving with precision. A true artisan.

Which brings me to the other point: this place is an asshole vortex. People push, they curse at you, they shout into their Bluetooth headgear. I’m okay with the prices being so inflated, because this is probably an asshole tax enforced by the city, and I support our teachers and firefighters.

Two stars, because there’s a sign that says “grocery” outside, and they will attempt to sell you food if you go in. Still though… starvation. Think about it.



Okay, I wasn’t massaging my dick. I was scratching my balls. Jeez.



I don’t know if people actually feel this strongly about a grocery store or if people are using over the top reviews hoping they’ll go viral but some shit on this page is just nasty –



This place thrives on the fact that it’s the only grocery store within five miles that isn’t a swanky-swank Lunds/Kowalskis. And by thrives, I mean like a virus.

It is a nasty place. “Crowded” does not begin to explain it. From the moment you pull into the parking lot- which is a total sh*$ show in itself- you are thrust into a sea of people shoving around shopping carts that are very broken and are too big for the layout of this hellhole.

Add some screaming feral children, completely tuned-out employees (to be fair, there are maybe five of them), general dirtiness, long lines, and sketchy produce, and the so-called deals are just… not… quite… worth it.



The parking lot fights thing is actually a recurring theme in a lot of reviews –



The Rainbow Foods in Uptown is some of most fabulous entertainment this fine city has to offer. Some of what I’ve witnessed on my shopping trips (at all hours of the day) are:

* Someone running laps around the store perimeter in flip-flops
* A man getting frustrated and smashing his cart into things
* Managers lecturing the restocking folk… from two aisles down
* Parking lot fights — yes, plural

Shopping in suburban grocery stores? Pfft. You’ll fall asleep in the aisles from boredom.

Honestly though, for as much as Rainbow can be a circus sideshow, they’re always well-stocked and organized. I don’t know how they pull it off, what with the flip-flop marathons and all. And there are a few checkout clerks with wicked senses of humor, too. It’s all part of the magical experience that is the Uptown Rainbow.



Okay, I’ve been shopping at this place pretty regularly for a few years now and I haven’t seen a single parking lot fight. Is this a problem that Rainbow fixed after the Yelp! blitz or am I just missing them?



This place is cool on mushrooms or if you want to look at girls youd sleep with but never date. And the pharmacy dude wears a sick eyepatch but its probably because he has some brutal tattoo.



Okay I’ve seen that pharmacy guy before and after reading these reviews I think I know how he ended up with the eyepatch. Uptown Rainbow Fight Club.



rainbow uptown

Broccoli Makes You Retarded?

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Oh, google autocomplete. You’ve done it again!



Last night I was talking about farts, as I often do. I was telling my stepson about how beans aren’t the only food that can make people fart and, in fact, broccoli is actually more potent in that task. He then looked at me like I was crazy. The kid didn’t know that broccoli makes you fart and didn’t believe me when I said it does.



That’s fine. I have the internet. A mere 15 years ago I’d have to dust off an encyclopedia or eat a bunch of broccoli and wait an hour but today I can just google it. In fact, I was so confident that I told him that it’d probably be the first autocomplete response when I typed in “broccoli makes”.



Turns out it was the second answer. The first? Well…



Uh...

Uh…





Great. As if we didn’t have a hard enough time already getting the kid to eat his vegetables.



This is the first I’ve ever heard of it but enough people have searched for it online that it’s the first autocomplete response when anybody types “broccoli makes”. Holy shit.



Okay. After seeing this I had to look into it. Most of the links on the first page were just to yahoo answers and cha cha pages of people asking the question and getting answers like “no dummy their full uv vitamins that maek yer brain healthy lol”.



Shit. There might be something to this.

Shit. There might be something to this.





Wikipedia had nothing on the subject at all. In fact, the only website I could find that supported the claim was reposting Cracked articles and seemingly not crediting the author, it lets Wiz’ fans know about all the latest stuff going on in Current Biology magazine. Seriously. There’s a whole entry talking about how our bitter taste bud receptors were made to warn off things like broccoli cuz it can make you all Sling Blade.



Now, normally I’d trust the scientific reporting of a meme aggregation service owned by a rapper who says he spends $10,000 on weed a month but I thought I’d take a look to see if there was an actual article since Planet Khalifa wasn’t kind enough to link it’s sources.



Turns out there totally is an article about the stuff. Now, the article itself is way over my head and I had a hard time discerning if they were actually saying that broccoli can cause disabilities or if Planet Khalifa was taking what they reported out of context but I’ll just trust Wiz and never eat broccoli again. Or any vegetable, for that matter.



Might as well steer clear of fruits while I’m at it.

Something About This Whole Gun Debate we can all Agree on.

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Last week’s tragedy in Sandy Hook has kicked up a lot of dust. The way the news rushed to get info out to the public caused a bunch of errors and unsubstantiated rumors. Fox News has pulled out the old Red Herring of violent video games to kick around. And, of course, the whole gun control debate has come to the forefront. Everybody from high level politicians to half of my goddamned friends list on facebook have been out there demanding that guns should either be banned or given to teachers to prevent this from happening in the future.



I have my opinions about gun control. I haven’t really talked about it on social media because I’m not about to change any minds but of course I have my opinions on guns. Sure, I could post on facebook about how the “deer rifle” this guy used seems to be designed to take out a platoon of genetically engineered armored cyborg deer with flame spewing antlers. I could tweet about how a small part of me wishes that the government would instate martial law just to see you gun nuts try to fight back against the might of the world’s most well funded military with your precious fucking firearms but I’d be doing nothing more than pissing off people who disagree with me. Also that would be way too long for a tweet.



I don’t fault people for reacting strongly, though. Things like last week’s massacre are hard to process and bring out a lot of strong emotions in people. There’s bound to be some harsh words and irrational responses. No matter what your opinion on gun control and however you’re feeling about this whole incident, though, there’s one thing that everybody in this country can agree on. These are the dumbest fucking parents in the world.



For those of you who don’t want to click the link, that right there is a story about an 11 year old who brought a gun to school. The gun was allegedly given to him by his parents for protection in the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre. The kid pulled the gun in recess and put it to a friend’s head and threatened to fucking kill her if she tattled. Thankfully, the gun wasn’t loaded considering there are roughly 650 accidental gun deaths and over 15,000 accidental shooting injuries a year.



Whatever. I think we can all agree that these parents should not be in charge of kids. Even the biggest gun nut wouldn’t think that the solution for the gun control debate is “give kids guns”. Nobody ever thinks “give kids guns” is the correct answer for anything ever except maybe to the question of “how do you be the worst parent ever?”



More proof that these are shitty parents is they raised a kid who accepted the gun and took it to school. Remember. This kid is 11. That’s 6th, maybe 5th grade. This kid should know not to take a gun to school. Just to check I asked my 12 year old stepson what he would do if, after hearing about the Sandy Hook shooting, I gave him a gun to take to school for protection. He said he wouldn’t have accepted it. Smart kid.



So thank you, worst parents ever. In a time where our nation is fiercely divided you bring us all together in agreement that you’re incredibly fucking horrible at being parents.

Parody Style.

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Holy shit this Gangnam Style thing is getting out of hand.



Gangnam Style is now the most watched youtube video of all time. Beating out Justin Bieber, Rebecca Black, Jeff Dunham and a bunch of other talentless trainwrecks that make me weep for humanity (seriously, internet. Jeff Dunham?).



I understand it’s popularity. It has a hilariously bizzare video, a catchy tune, Asian women and a guy screaming at a butt.



BUUUUUUUUUUUUTT!

BUUUUUUUUUUUUTT!





Now any viral hit is pretty much guaranteed to be subjected to parody but Gangnam Style is getting close to reaching Rule 34 proportions. If it exists, there is a Gangnam Style parody of it.



Political parody –
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTCRwi71_ns&w=560&h=315]



Literal video parody –



[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKwdDbdPego&w=560&h=315]



There’s one about farmers gangnam styleing about how important farming is –
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LX153eYcVrY&w=560&h=315]



Minnesota Style is getting close to a million views. There’s a Gangnam Style for nearly every state (I don’t know if that’s true. I just checked 3 other random states and saw that they all had Gangnam Style parodies).
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0z078OcLbM&w=560&h=315]



There’s a Gangnam Style parody for both Hanukkah and Chanukah –
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbfk65aFKps&w=420&h=315]



[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3TvOjl10ro&w=560&h=315]



I wondered if anybody decided to pick the low hanging fruit of “Gangbang Style” and a whole page of stuff came up.



I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Weird Al is the only person on earth that gets a free pass on parody songs.

The Republican Candidates. Where are they now?

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Can you believe it’s been over a month since the election? I got thinking about all those kooky republican primary candidates that were occupying my nightmares no more than a year ago when I heard something on the radio about Tim Pawlenty getting a job as a consultant for something or other. It made me think about what happened to all the other candidates? What are they doing? Let’s take a look.



Mitt Romney
mitt

Before we get to the primary candidates let’s look at the biggest loser. Last I saw was some fluff news story about him pumping his own gas or something. My guess is that he’s dealing with the loss by hiring Obama look-alikes to hunt on his private island for sport or trying to build a spaceship to find Kolob.



Herman Cain
Herman

Probably out sexually harassing some chicks.

Seriously though he pops up in the media every now and again. He’s recently been calling for conservatives to create a 3rd party because the Republicans don’t represent true conservatives these days and the current party has a little too much legitimacy.



Ron Paul!
ronpaul

Ron Paul quit Congress. Below is his 48 minute retirement speech. I only saw the first couple of minutes but he comes out the gate by shit talking Democrats, Republicans, government and Congress. I don’t know if he’s being badass or just whiny.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q03cWio-zjk&w=420&h=315]



Michele Bachmann
220px-Bachmann2011

We will never be rid of the monster. This bitch is bulletproof. Pure teflon. She will be screeching on TV about lightbulb freedom and trying to get people to pray the gay away long after I’m dead. I don’t know how the 6th district keeps re-electing her. I seriously don’t.



Rick Santorum
frothymix

Ugh. Who cares? Seriously. I think he’s doing weekly columns for worldnetdaily or some bullshit. Whatever. Fuck him. Ugh.