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Hashtag Twinkies Are Back!
Oh my God.
I was in the grocery store a few days ago and you’ll never guess what I saw!
Hostess products! They’re back!
Oh, sure, it’s been in the news for the last week or so, but I finally saw them with my own eyes! Now I know the rumors are true!
Our long national nightmare is finally over!
Now, wait, there’s a sign there I should probably read…
Huh. “Due to overwhelming demand, Hostess currently has limited product supply.”
Now that’s interesting, you see, because – believe it or not – I didn’t have to push my way past anyone to take these photos. There didn’t seem to be any mad rush in the pre-packaged baked goods section. In fact, I was the only one in the aisle. And as it turns out – and maybe my eyes are bad – the shelves seem to have plenty of Hostess product.
Could it be that – perhaps! – last November, the sophisticated epicures who snatched up the last boxes of Donettes, Ho-Hos and Ding Dongs because they just couldn’t live without them eventually realized…that they could? Did someone put them wise that Little Debbie, TastyKake, Blue Bird and half a dozen other companies all make similar items and that Hostess products are not unique in the snack cake industry?
Or is it possible that in 21st century America, where grandiose displays of insincere emotion reign supreme and members of the social media-obsessed populace who were busy trying to outdo one another tweeting 140-character eulogies to the Twinkie never truly cared about it in the first place? It’s been less than a year – could these same people really have become briefly obsessed with dozens of other inconsequential news stories of the day since then, having long forgotten that delicious golden sponge cake and creamy filling?
Say it ain’t so!
But if it is, Hostess 2.0 doesn’t want to start off on the wrong foot. They’re going to want to be upfront about stuff like this. A good way to start would be a slightly more accurate sign.
And whether they use their original sign or the version I’ve thoughtfully suggested, it might be more convincing if the shelves weren’t full.
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The Nauseatingly Colorful World of Dollar Store Tiki Merchandise!
LIKE YOU, I collect tiki mugs and related exoticabilia.
Unlike you, I’ve done so for ages. I’m not some Ionakana-Come-Lately who just started a few years ago when it became wildly trendy. No, I began collecting tiki stuff a little before that, when it was just reasonably trendy.
But soon after it was wildly trendy and everyone and his kaikua’ana was into tiki stuff, it therefore became decidedly less trendy, and then, eventually, not trendy at all.
…And that’s when the dollar stores got in on it. Well, mostly.
Yet to this day, people like me (and, yes, okay, to a lesser extent, you) were as much into tiki stuff as we’d ever been (since we got into it originally, that is). We march to the beat of a different pahu, you and I – we care not for fads, for trends, for what may or may not currently be “hep.”
So you’re saying, “Ted,” you’re saying, “That’s great! Trendy or not, this dollar store tiki merchandise you’re about to show us – why, it’s just more great tikibilia for us hardcore tiki enthusiasts to enjoy, right?”
You’d think that, sure, but you’d be wrong.
And here’s why: Above is a very small cross-section of my tiki collection. Oh, just a few things I quickly threw together that I had lying around here. I’ve got boxes of this stuff, sure. Doubles of a lot of stuff, and doubles on top of doubles. Yeah got a pretty awesome collection. Yehhhp…
Now look at the tiki crap the dollar stores peddle:
The difference, as any hupo can see? My stuff – the good stuff – isn’t colorful.
That’s not to say you must banish color from your little homemade polynesian paradise. No sir! That’s not what I’m saying at all!
However, the bright hues shouldn’t come from your tikis but rather your little paper umbrellas, your leis, your aloha shirts, your Japanese glass fishing buoys, the gushing blood when you slash open your finger cutting up pineapple slices for garnish, and so on. That’s where the color comes from, pal – but your tikis…? They need to be dark and drab. Look, I’ve got green tikis, blue tikis, red tikis, sure – but they’re in somber, muted shades!
They’re not these dayglo moai-nstrosities!
Another thing: your tikis shouldn’t be happy! These are vengeful gods, people! They need to be angry, or at the very least solemn! Most of the dollar store tiki accoutrements feature moronically giddy, smiling faces that look like they’ve just smoked a great big úmeki of Maui Wowie while listening to Iz Kamakawiwho’sis mangle “Somewhere Over the Wonderful World.”
But the dollar stores don’t get it all wrong. In fact, our good friends over at 99¢ Only nailed it with these waste baskets:
Sure, they had them available in lime green, neon pink and bright blue, but as long as they offered them as well in sensible dugout canoe brown, you won’t hear me complaining!
Dollar Tree, too, surprised me recently with this very tiki-bar-specific accessory:
The requisite fishnet hung from the rafters – an oft-forgotten but mandatory item without which no authentic tiki bar is complete!
Lest you think my exotica expectations from dollar stores are a little unreasonable, know this: They started it. Specifically Dollar Tree. About ten years ago they offered – for a buck a piece! – these amazing guys:
A buck a piece these were!
And they’re not teeny-tiny tikis, either–they’re between 6″ and 7″ tall each. (There were a couple others, too, that I’m just too lazy to pull off the shelf and photograph.) So looking at these – you realize, at least for a while, right when tiki stuff was at its most popular – Dollar Tree got it!
But somehow in the years since then, they lost it, and now would-be tiki-philes who don’t know any better are buying this stuff and throwing parties – unholy, dangerous parties, no doubt infuriating Kū-kaili-moku, the Hawaiian god of war. Much like Rainbow Brite’s arch-enemy Murky Dismal, he hates colors! Probably!
Me, I’m taking no chances. Oh, sure, I’ll buy a set of their three hideous bug-eyed shot glasses for a buck.
But they must undergo a very sacred, never-before-photographed ritual before they’re given a place of honor on the altar that is my tiki bar!
Sacred! Oh so sacred!
Annnd messy!
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Quiz: 1970s TV Show or Sign in My Neighborhood?
HERE’S some fun: Like me, you’re a fan of signs of various sorts in my neighborhood and 1970s television.
Ah, but how well do you know them both?
I’ve devised a little quiz to help you find out! Of the following images, which are title cards of obscure 1970s television programs, and which are signs I saw when I was driving home from getting Thai food?
1.) 1970s TV show or sign in my neighborhood?
Answer: TV show.
“Baba Sweets and Jalebi Junction” (CBS, 1973-1975) starred Mabel King as Eleanor “Baba” Sweets – the sassy ticket agent at the train station in the Little Bombay section of Detroit. While each half-hour was a non-stop laugh-parade of hilarious travelers, fans especially remember Norman Fell as a harried commuter who always slept through his stop in Rochester Hills and ended up in Jalebi Junction waiting for a taxi to bring him home.2.) 1970s TV show or sign in my neighborhood?
Answer: TV show.
Though it lasted just one season, “Justice Street” (NBC, 1976) is widely regarded as the quintessential procedural cop show as well as an important forerunner to “Hill Street Blues” and “The Commish” – indeed, both Stephen Bochco and Stephen J. Cannell cut their teeth writing scripts for the series. Andy Devine turned in a surprisingly subtle performance as former Disney animator turned police detective William “Bill” Justice, and many attributed his untimely death in early 1977 as the reason for the series’ demise. As it turns out, it was an argument over a parking space on the Paramount lot between co-producers Quinn Martin and Jack Webb that doomed the show just weeks after debuting to stellar ratings.3.) 1970s TV show or sign in my neighborhood?
Answer: Trick question – TV show and sign in my neighborhood.
“The Paul Lynde Show” (ABC, 1972-1973) starred Mr. Center Square himself as Paul Simms, an attorney at odds with his deadbeat son-in-law. Unabashedly derivative of “All in the Family,” it was destroyed by the competition: “The Carol Burnett Show” and “Adam-12.” Inexplicably, it’s also the name on a sign outside a store specializing in women’s footwear a few blocks from my house, located on the corner of Pawley Street and Lindemere Avenue. Update: Turns out the business is actually “Pawl-Lind Shoe.” Thanks to eagle-eyed reader Arlene H. for the correction!4.) 1970s TV show or sign in my neighborhood?
Answer: TV show.
Prolific producer Garry Marshall developed “Mr. Pizza & Kabob” (ABC, 1978) as a mid-season replacement for the Aaron Spelling bomb “The San Pedro Beach Bums.” Ronnie Schell played restauranteur Jimmy “Mr. Pizza” Delvecchio (nephew of Al on “Happy Days”) while Hector Elizondo played Kabob, his eager but inept Armenian immigrant busboy (“Ooh, dat veddy veddy good idea, boss!”). Despite eight crossovers on five of Marshall’s other shows, the series couldn’t find an audience and was gone in just two months. Never one to give up on what he felt was a viable property, in 1990 Marshall reworked the premise into a popular motion picture, turning the pizza parlor owner into a successful businessman played by Richard Gere and Kabob into a beautiful, kind-hearted prostitute (Julia Roberts).So! How’d ya do?
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A Present From Mr. Whiskers!
CONTRARY to popular belief, Mr. Whiskers, though old and gray, can apparently still move fast enough to take down one of our fine feathered friends.
And how nice of him to leave the leftovers on the back stoop, where I walked out this morning, barefoot, and, eh, found it. Oh, believe me, there was more to my gift, but Mr. W’s the modest sort, and so he asked I not photograph the legs and entrails, which I understand is a delicacy. Just apparently not to cats.
He’s a giver, Mr. Whiskers, is.
Why, just last month he also left one of his trademark elongated hairball/Friskies Buffet vomit sausages for me. On the car.
“What a nice fellow, your Mr. Whiskers,” you say. “Placing it, as he did, precisely where it can be flung free with just a convenient swipe of the wiper blade.”
Oh no. As evidenced by the smear trail on my windshield, he horked it out on the edge of the roof and it slowly sliiiiid down.
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Comic Con 2013! Live! From the Floor!
DON’T worry, folks – I know these posts are coming a bit erratically lately, but I’m still alive.
I’m down here…on the floor. Finally woke up with my usual Friday morning hangov– eh, migraine, and it occurred to me: oh yeah, the San Diego Comic Con is this weekend. It somehow snuck up on me yet again and as usual, I have no material ready for it.
Join me, won’t you, in revisiting last year’s Comic Con post which my regular, what?, six readers all agree is “the only mildly amusing thing you’ve ever posted on this crap website of yours.” Yes, all six of you made that exact same observation, sure.
Oh, you know things have taken a sad turn over at Ted Parsnips Dot Com when I’ve resorted to linking to old posts! Yep, wonnn’t be long now before this domain is available once again at GoDaddy!
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58 Energy Shots You Need To Ingest, Just For God’s Sake, Not All At Once! Part 4 In A Series!
VITAMIN B12!
As I’ve said before, I’m convinced it’s among the most energy-giving ingredients in energy shots, so the higher the percentage, the better, right? The more energy you’ll get, right? Hell, I sure think so! But maybe you’re concerned you’re going to do irreversible damage to your hypapituathyglavin gland and burn the little bastard out permanent-like. To this I say: Worry not, friend! I did a Google search! It’s all good! Still, I’m not the last word on serious medical issues – who do I look like, Jenny McCarthy?
Anyway, let’s review a bunch more of these things, huh?
Stacker2 6 Hour Power
Price: $1.99 at RiteAid
Calories: 0
Vitamin B12: 500 mcg / 8333% RDA
Flavors: Grape, Punch, Very Berry, Lemon-Lime, Orange
Before: So very tired!
After: Not so very tired.Stacker2 is to energy shots what Jel Sert is to freezer pops. They’re behind more energy shots than you can shake a stick at, and if you take a bunch of them at once, like I did for the purposes of these reviews, you won’t be able to stop shaking that stick for hours! Or just shaking! Ha!
Stacker2 6 Hour Power gets points for having a lot of different flavors, and while the above three were bought at RiteAid…
…this Very Berry one…
…this Lemon-Lime one…
…and this Orange one were all bought at Dollar Tree (which continues to carry a bunch of Stacker varieties, but the stores near me no longer carry these 6 Hour Powers). At 8333% of your recommended daily allowance of vitamin B12, these shots will pep you up some plus you’ll have enough B12 for the next, oh, let’s do some quick math here…almost the next three months.
Genesis Today Pure Energy Organic Energy Shot
Price: $2.49 at Walmart
Calories: 30
Vitamin B12: 30 mcg / 500% RDA
Flavors: Acaí Berry, Goji Berry
Before: Dozing off
After: Simultaneously watching Star Trek episodes “Errand of Mercy” and “Return to Tomorrow” (1980s Picture-In-Picture technology, folks!) while listening to Information Society’s “Tell Me What’s On Your Mind.”Two and a half bucks is a lot more than I like to pay for my energy shots. But I know a lot of you count on my site for reliable nutritional advice, so I picked this one up and you can pay me back when you can. Pure Energy is the only energy shot that’s packaged in a glass bottle, and that’s gotta count for something! It’s also got 100 milligrams of natural caffeine, and they underline it on the bottle, too, so I reckon that’s better for you than artificial, un-underlined caffeine. “USDA Organic” reads the label, so there’s that, if that’s something that interests you. Go back to Topanga Canyon, you long-haired hippy freak!
Energy Now
Price: 99¢ Only at the 99¢ Only store
Calories: 0
Vitamin B12: 125 mcg / 12.5% RDA
Flavors: Mixed Berry, Citrus
Before: Sleepy
After: GrumpyCan’t you just see Jerry Stiller in a commercial revisiting his Seinfeld days shouting this product’s name – a paraphrased version of his memorable (one-episode) catchphrase? Creation’s Garden, manufacturer of this energy shot, drop me a line and I’ll let you know where to send the check for this, my latest million-dollar idea. Frankly, such an advertising campaign could really give these shots the shot in the arm that they need, considering their Vitamin B12 level is a paltry 12.5% RDA. (Actually, they may want to check that: according to my calculations – based on US government recommended daily allowances – it’s actually 2083%) However, the biggest problem with Energy Now is a lack of ingredient-blending: I’ve had a number of different bottles, shaken up before opened, that had small bits of bitter, gritty white particles in them. Great, I’m in need of quick energy and I end up spending ten minutes standing over the sink rinsing my mouth of grainy vitamin supplement!
Wow, that’s another nine more down! At this rate, we’ll finish this fool’s errand I idiotically embarked on – according to my calculations – sometime in 2016!
…Serenity now!
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It Begins…!
Summer’s over, kids!
According to Dollar Tree as of Monday, July 8, it’s officially Back to School time!
Hurry in and get your pencils and notebooks, gang! Do it now!
This time next week it’ll be a Christmas display!
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I Wanna Be A Lifeguard!
If you’re like me, you don’t have the swimming skills, upper body strength, CPR training or six-pack to become a lifeguard on one of Southern California’s beautiful, trash-strewn beaches. Nor do you likely have the dedication to work towards achieving any of these things. And for what, really? The chance to swim out in cold, polluted water, dodging stingrays and sharks just to drag some fat-ass back to shore who somehow managed to fall off his trendy paddleboard right smack between a riptide and an undertow? Who the hell needs it?!
That’s why I was thrilled when I found this at TJ Maxx the other day.
Two-day lifeguard certification class: $140 and a weekend shot to hell – and there’s no guarantee I’d pass.
Boogie board with the word ‘Lifeguard’ on it: $9.99.Yeah, I think I made the right choice.
Now I can head out to Zuma with this slung over my shoulder and impress the entire beach-going public without even getting wet. And once those military dog tags I bought on eBay arrive, people’ll really stop and take notice.
This is going to be the best summer ever!
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¿What’s Bueno? Freezer Pops!
In a rare (but not unprecedented) show of bipartisanship that will not doom our country, this week
is also
Yes, both 99¢ Only Store and its sworn enemy Dollar Tree have put aside their hate and contempt for one another to reach across the cluttered, messy aisle to one another in an effort to mutually offer you, the discount store consumer, not this week’s “What’s Bueno!” item, singular, but a panoply of “What’s Bueno!” items, plural!
And what are they? Freezer pops!
This couldn’t happen at a better time, either – we’re right smack in the middle of this summer’s first miserable heat wave here in the miserable Los Angeles area, so if you live around here, pal, you’re going to need ’em.
Today’s freezer pop enthusiast has a much wider variety to choose from than when you and I were kids. Back then we had Fla-Vor-Ice and Otter Pops and, brother, that was it! That was it!
And while they’re still available (as you’ll see), today, those parched of throat and desiccated of uvula can also reach for over a dozen other brands, for just a buck a box, including such delights as these here Kool Pops.
Licensed by Kool-Aid owner Kraft, these artifically flavored freezer pops are made with Real Fruit Juice from concentrate, so it’s a snack you can feel good about, eating one after another after another after another. Oh, no one stops at one.
They even make a tropical version, which I refused to try because like you, I hate banana-flavored anything. And yet, I like real bananas. Truly, I am an enigma.
Here are our old friends Otter Pops, just like you remember them, complete with crudely-drawn mascots, who have been part of Otter Pops for much longer than crudely-drawn characters have been trendy.
A $1.00 rebate on a box of Otter Pops that cost a dollar?! Astounding! Even more astounding is that there are people who will find it worth their time to cut out the UPC and the form from the box and fill that out, include a copy of their store receipt with price circled, put that all in an envelope, and affix a 46¢ stamp to it and send it off to Otter Pops to get a check for a dollar in the mail in six to eight weeks.
Also available are these 100% fruit juice Otter Pops. Despite the box warning me that they contained no high fructose corn syrup, I bought them anyway and they were quite refreshing.
For years, Otter Pops had mail-in offers for merchandise on their box backs. Some time ago, I sent away for a Louie Bloo Raspberry beach towel. When it arrived, I was disappointed that it was far too small for a gangly manchild such as myself to actually lay out on at the municipal pool. Inexplicably, it was as though it was designed for a child. What the hell?!
Here’s the international equivalent of our proud American freezer pops. They’re called Bolis Icesticks and they’re made in Mexico. The plastic they’re encased in is quite a bit thicker than any of the other pops. You don’t snip off the end with a pair of scissors, either: they’re segmented in two, and you snap them in the middle. The package notes that “BOLIS ICESTICKS are a convenient, inexpensive refreshment.” Inexpensive, sure. But I don’t know about convenient – you don’t need scissors to get ’em open, but snapping them in half leaves you with two separate sections and they can be messy.
Tampico knows its customers! The “number one selling citrus punch brand” in the US (according to its website) chooses to package its freezer pops the same way they do it south of the border, down Mexico way, in those snappable tubes, like Bolis (above). Like you, I can’t imagine why!
Sunny D Orange Citrus freezer pops. All one flavor, gang. No purple stuff here.
Wyler’s Authentic Italian Ices come in four flavors. To me, the only “authentic” Italian ice comes in a paper cup with a peel off lid and you eat it with a wooden spoon, and the only flavor is lemon.
And here’s Slush Puppie Slush Bars. Some trivia for you, courtesy Wikipedia: [Slush Puppie’s] original owners, Will Radcliff and his sister Phyllis, came up with the name while sitting on their front porch in Cincinnati, Ohio. The unique spelling of “puppie” was added to bring attention to both the name and the product. I think you’ll agree they succeeded.
Made with 100% Apple Juice, these Mott’s Freezer Bars come in four delicious flavors – Apple, Apple Strawberry, Apple White Grape and Fruit Punch – which I think we can assume has a delicious apple undertone to it.
Fla-Vor-Ice Fudge Pops are made with Real Hershey’s Cocoa. I like my fudgicles (or Fudgesicles, as they’re known east of the Allegheny) on a stick, dammit. When it comes to freezer pops, it’s advisable to stick with fruit flavors.
…Eh, that said, there’s also these freeze & eat Soda Pops. They come in A&W Root Beer, Crush Strawberry, Dr. Pepper and Crush Grape flavors. Well, those are mostly fruit flavors. Fruit and root flavors. And Dr. Pepper.
Sunkist has gotten into the act, too, with these so-called freezer “bars” as they call them – again, made with real fruit juice from concentrate and no high fructose corn syrup. This country runs on high fructose corn syrup – you better believe it, brother – but I reckon a little change of pace won’t kill us. Special thanks to eagle-eyed reader and 99¢ Only Store shopper Chris in the Sacramento area for sending this in. Your official I’m A Pal of Ted beach towel is in the mail. (Child size.)
Hawaiian Punch Freezer Bars feature four extreme flavors but best of all, the box has Punchy snowboarding down a frosty Hawaiian mountain. Totally awesome! Today’s 3-D rendered Hawaiian Punch mascot is a character with attitude. He’s edgy; he’s in your face!
These guys are your bargain basement freezer pops. Fun Pops are filled with inconsistent levels of colored fluid that seems to vary wildly from pop to pop, and come packaged in cheap a net bag. Yet you get twelve of these and they’re 2 ounces each (well, if they were all filled uniformly) which is more than most of the other varieties. So it seems to me you could do a lot worse than Fun Pops.
According to the label, each bag “may or may not contain: Grape, Orange, Blue Punch, Pina Colada, Banana, Lemon-Lime, Peach, Watermelon, Cherry, Mango, Green Apple & Strawberry.” Still, I passed on these because with my luck, I’d have gotten a bag with like three disgusting banana pops and no peach.
It’s not just me, right? There’s nothing worse than artificial banana flavoring, right?
Mike and Ike: The candy you never buy is now available in freezer pop form that you might buy!
Jolly Rancher has gotten into the act, too, and while they only offer two flavors, they do taste a lot like their hard candy counterparts.
Angry Birds freezer bars feature tangy flavors matching the colors of the red bird, the yellow bird, a pig, and the blue bird. As a bonus, each box has an Angry Birds bookmark that kids can cut out and use – a nostalgic throwback to a time when kids still read books and weren’t spending their free time playing heavily-licensed games on their smartphones.
All of these freezer pops are fine, I reckon, but now we’re down to my top two:
These Snapple Sorbet bars come in colored sleeves, but the innards are white as the driven snow. They’re really good.
But these lip-puckering sour WarHeads freezer pops are my hands-down favorite – and now yours too.
Interestingly, nearly all of these varieties of freezer pops are manufactured or licensed by The Jel Sert Company (or “Big Freezer Pop” as consumer watchdogs know them, probably), the folks who started it all back in 1969 with Fla-Vor-Ice.
And yes, Fla-Vor-Ice is among the brands available at the 99¢ Only Store and Dollar Tree.
They’ve got a Tropical Flavors pack, too. But you’ll want to stay away from that.
I think you’ll know why.
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By Request: Watermelon Oreos Review!
SO THE OTHER DAY I brought the gang into the conference room here at Parsnips Industries, LLC to brainstorm and pitch ideas for upcoming posts. As usual, it was a colossal waste of my time and quickly devolved into an argument over who would win in a fight between Jaime Lannister from “Game of Thrones” and Hanna Horvath from “Girls.” (The overwhelming consensus was that Hannah would wear Jaime down with her self-centered whining and then finish him off by getting naked for no reason at all.)
I finally managed to get everyone back on track with the promise of cookies (I had a half-finished package of Oreos at home I mentioned I’d bring in) and that’s when the head of the Ted Parsnips Web Design Team chimed in with one of his usual moronic ideas.
“Why don’t you review those new Watermelon Oreos?”
Of course, I was suspicious because for someone whose weekly paycheck depends on the commercial success of this site, he’s for some reason constantly trying to undermine it. Surely no such cooky exists! Watermelon Oreos? Yeah, sure – they’re probably right on my grocer’s shelf next to the – phpht! – Peanut Butter Pop Tarts.
But I called his bluff and looked into it. And to everyone’s surprise, it turns out there really is such a thing as a Watermelon Oreo.
So here’s the review:
Aaah, they’re okay I guess. You’d think they’d be disgusting but they’re not.
Still, I wish they’d have waited to launch this particular variety until they developed a seedless watermelon creme.
Ted Parsnips
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