The Las Vegas Sphere Blew My Mind

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

The Neon City’s giant orb venue is a real game-changer in entertainment.

By Harold Litwiler from Orcutt/Istanbul, USA — The Las Vegas Sphere, Nevada, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=141409411

During a recent vacation to the Southwest, I had the opportunity to visit The Sphere in Las Vegas, the city’s newest and most social-media friendly attraction.

No doubt you’ve seen the countless videos uploaded on Tiktok and YouTube showcasing the outside of the Sphere. A complex network of LED light panels is what allows the exterior to show anything from a human eye to a smiling emoji. All viewable from large distances, including aircraft miles up in the sky, in crystal-clear HD. It’s basically an enormous highway billboard wrapped around a giant beach ball. Impressive enough, for sure.

But that’s only the outside. As for the interior, well, that’s where this orb becomes rather magical. Inside it boasts a massive 16K wraparound LED screen with 1,600 speakers, accomodating an 18,600 seat auditorium. The Sphere uses haptic, beamforming and wave field synthesis technologies. That’s just a fancy way of saying the imagery and sounds are set up to be as immersive as possible. It also uses 4D elements like wind and scent. 

However, the Sphere is really in a league of its own, and impossible to compare to any other theater system. Watching something in IMAX feels like looking at a postage stamp compared to the massive, nearly 360 degree interior wrap-around screen. Well, maybe that’s too severe. But the following night while watching Godzilla Minus One on an IMAX screen at the Red Rock Casino Resort, I couldn’t help but feel let down by the viewing experience compared to what I’d seen the previous night. 

Frankly, the Sphere is awe-inspiring, and represents a great leap forward in immersive entertainment. 

For my trip to the Sphere, I chose to attend Postcard from Earth, a 50-minute documentary directed by Darren Aronofsky. The band U2 also has an ongoing live concert residency exclusive to the Sphere through March of next year for their album Achtung Baby. Phish is scheduled in April. Having seen that band nearly 20 years ago I can attest their unique style of psychedelic rock will flow perfectly from that glorious screen. Pink Floyd would be another suberb fit. 

The Atrium

The Sphere Experience is a two-part journey that lasts two hours. The first hour is spent in the Atrium, where you are able to interact with several unique exhibits. I took several videos of the exhibits in the Atrium on my X account, which you can check out below.

https://x.com/deanmaxbrooks/status/1731921199012413593?s=20

The first video shows a humanoid AI robot named Aura that can interact with the audience, answer questions, and acts as a guide on a variety of futuristic topics. There are alternate versions of Aura within the Atrium, each covering different subjects, or orchestrating a different sort of interaction. The Aura in the video above shows the AI answering a woman’s question, “What is the meaning of life?”

The video below the one I took of Aura is just a simple pan of the Atrium ceiling, which contains some physical and holographic artwork. The blue lighting and overall ambience is meant to evoke a futuristic vibe. It did feel like I’d been transported to the 22nd century after standing outside in the cold Vegas air for twenty minutes in line. Sphere entry staff actually processed us rather quickly given the number of people attending. Like most venues, you still have to go through a metal detector and have your QR-code ticket scanned. 

There are other interactive exhibits, such as one that scans your whole body to make a digital avatar. Then for a fee it will email you your virtual copy to yourself as a keepsake. That one had a long line, so I avoided it to focus on the different Aura models. Aside from the attractions, there are concession stands. But be warned, all food and drink items are priced like you’ll find at any sports stadium. I paid almost $10 for a single hotdog and $5 for a bottle of water. It seems our 22nd century future still hasn’t cracked the problem of overpriced refreshments. Maybe the 23rd will take care of that. 

The Sphere 

After mulling around the Atrium for about an hour, the real event was finally ready to begin: Postcard from Earth. I’ve taken a short video of the auditorium as seats were filling, which you can check out below. 

You can get a real sense of the size of the Sphere from the video. I sat in the the 300 section, almost right in the middle. This, as I discovered, was pretty optimum seating. Though I don’t imagine there’s a bad seat anywhere in the house, really, with a screen that massive. My ticket ran about $178 after taxes, while “better” seats down closer to the screen were going for almost $300. However, I’m not sure it’s necessary to pay double what I did just to get closer. The Sphere also offers a Director’s Seat Package for their VIP experience. 

Postcard from Earth

Postcard from Earth by Darren Aronofsky (The Whale, Black Swan) is a 50-minute documentary set in the far future inside a space ship that’s just touched down on a distant habitable planet. Three astronauts emerging from cryo-sleep undergo a lengthy reawakening process in which a computerized voice orients them by helping them remember their place of origin. 

Over the next 45 minutes the characters, and by extension, us, the audience, are greeted with a series of images and scenes from all over the world. It’s a fun and creative means to invite the viewers into the world of the story. Aronofsky makes fantastic use of colors, textures and sounds, sweeping across virtually every form of geography, environmental condition and architecture, from just about every culture on the planet. There’s a transitional shot in the beginning where we leave the spaceship and descend from orbit onto earth that is so breathtaking it literally gave me anxiety. 

The Sphere is truly HD, giving unmatched crystal-clear imagery made even better by the naturalistic scnery in the documentary. All the while a soothing voice over speaks to the astronauts (and us). It’s like the most intense and visually stunning affirmation video ever made, and showcases the Sphere’s many immersive features. 

After the show ended, crowds were lead out through a wide corridor that took us through to the Palazzo at the Venetian Resort on Las Vegas Boulevard. 

By Cory Doctorow from Beautiful Downtown Burbank, USA — The Sphere as Mars, view from my hotel room at Harrah's, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=136454844

Important Note: If you’re looking to get an Uber following a visit, you’re much better off going through the Palazzo and connecting with a ride on the Blvd rather than right by the Sphere. When I arrived in my Uber, there was a huge mass of people waiting for return rides at the drop off section. However, I was able to get a return ride from the Palazzo fountain in about five minutes. 

Overall, my experience at the Sphere was amazing. The only drawback is that right now it’s still in its experimental phase, with very limited selections. This is the first venue of its kind, afterall, though there are plans to build other spheres in London and Dubai. The structure was designed by an outfit called Populous backed by the Madison Square Garden Company.  

I see a great deal of potential in the Sphere. It supercedes IMAX and pretty much anthing else. Aronofsky’s documentary and concert films are perfect to start with, but a feature film custom-designed for the immense screen would be phenomenal. If it were up to me, I’d be moving heaven and earth to get Avatar 3 to premier in the Sphere when it comes out December 2025. I don’t doubt Populous has been in talks with top studios and directors for potential projects in the future.

If you live in the Southwest or are planning to visit, be sure to check out The Sphere in Las Vegas for an unforgettable experience. 

‘The Killer’: A Frigid (and Bloody) Portrayal of Middle-Aged Ennui

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

What do you value when nothing matters?

Source: By Netflix — https://twitter.com/netflix/status/1696175927942660584/photo/1, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=74688944

David Fincher’s newest film The Killer, starring the always great to watch Michael Fassbender, perpetuates the director’s ironic passion for neo-noirish nihilism. Fincher might be the only director to have achieved A-list status making essentially highly-stylized misery porn. Even Kubrick’s cold, clinical style often gave some light at the end of each cinematic dark tunnel he crafted. Whereas Fincher tends to suffocate his films in cynicism, reducing his characters to puppets of impulse, hormones, and the wretched post-modern world.

Though it’s not to say Fincher’s works aren’t insightful and stimulating. Indeed, he may very well be the best director working today. But in the sense of being an eye surgeon who’s the world’s preeminent cataract remover. Admirable, of course, even if their work is gut-wrenching to watch at times.

In the case of The Killer, however, our protagonist is not drawn to his deadly profession as a hired assassin out of a need, or even a real desire to kill, but more a matter of needing a profession in which to display his competency and allows him to channel his detachment from humanity. Or maybe it was the job itself that made him that way. Or perhaps it doesn’t matter. As he states in the opening sequence, “I don’t give a fuck.” No doubt an oft-heard refrain from anyone stuck in the conveyor belt of a career, especially in middle-age. Propelled forward through the corporate beast no longer by youthful ambition or hope for some brighter future, but out of unfeeling momentum. For lack of a better alternative. Because retirement is too far away. Because even sitting on a beach in “paradise” becomes maddening after a certain period. So you might as well keep slaving away.

Fassbender’s portrayal reminded me somewhat of famed Navy Seal sniper Chris Kyle, aka American Sniper, as seen in interviews. Frank, unassuming, speaking of his military exploits as though recalling seasons from an MLB career. His 160 confirmed kills discussed like a slugger’s batting average. The morality or even necessity of them dismissed basically because a few suits in government said it was okay to do. I guess there’s no alternative other than to depersonalize as much as possible with that kind of weight on one’s conscience. I still agonize over social faux pas I made decades ago. I couldn’t imagine 160 lives banging around in my mind.

Aside from the standard revenge plot after The Killer’s girlfriend is hospitalized as payback when an assignment goes wrong, the subtext of middle-aged doldrums and detachment run throughout. Tilda Swinton’s character, aka The Expert, states during her confrontation with her vengeful colleague how those in the business fool themselves into thinking they’ll reach a point of financial satiety. It becomes a lifestyle. Automatic. To refer to Kubrick again, it’s like they’ve become clockwork oranges.

To help illustrate how strange a film The Killer is, it’s helpful to compare it to one with a similar plot, but which is quite different in tone and style — Kill Bill Vol. I and II. In those films, The Bride, or Beatrix Kiddo, goes on her “rampage of revenge” up through the hierarchy of her former employer, the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, in order to ultimately rescue the daughter ripped from her womb. It’s a story about motherhood, in which Kiddo has very much retained a normal if vibrant personality even after years of slaughtering targets. Tarantino’s sexed-up hitman rollercoaster ride would indicate life after being in such a nasty biz can still go on just fine. You can still be “Mommy,” as Uma Thurman is credited in the send off no matter how many heads and limbs you’ve sliced off.

Then you have the live-action anime-style of the John Wick universe, in which Keanue Reeves dispenses head shots with video game-style proficiency. A stark contrast to The Killer’s grounded, methodical take, where important tools are boringly ordered through Amazon, and our assassin flies coach.

Ennui is a strange sensation. It’s not really sadness or depression. It’s a sense of feeling automated. I imagine it as the possible mindset of a self-aware AI. All the knowledge and directives are there, but lacking any feelings whatsoever. While young adults may grapple with it during the opening innings of a career and maturity, it seems to take hold mostly in middle-age. It’s a side effect of routine, narrowing life options, a decrease in libido, and a reduction in hormones. An inner sense that change is becoming harder. Attitudes and beliefs decreasing in flexibility. A hardening of being itself. Adoption of status quo. It’s as if one becomes a judgmental Simon Cowell toward everything in life; perpetually unimpressed, bored, even resentful of having even to show up.

And yet, still blindly following rules for their own sake. Because rules matter. The Killer goes on his warpath of revenge almost as a matter of formality. We don’t see him spend any quality time with his beloved. Only a brief visit in a hospital after she’s been patched up, in a scene that feels inserted because it’s what all those screenwriting how-to books tell you to do. Quite unlike Tom Stall/Joey Cusack’s loving and well-established relationship with his family in A History of Violence, before his old mobster associates reemerge and he’s forced to defend the homestead.

The Killer doesn’t have much to say. It’s more about conveying that sense of listlessness that comes with a life that’s stuck in a rut. There’s no redemption. No arc, really. This isn’t Jules Winnfield trying to learn “to be a shepherd” in Pulp Fiction. Our protagonist’s final confrontation with the Client serves to reinforce the detachment theme, as the billionaire’s only interest was having the “mess” of the botched hit cleaned up. Assured of no further reprisals, The Killer relaxes with his healing girlfriend at their beachside estate. A man-eating shark lulled into a food coma. At least until the vocation of killing calls again.

In The Killer, man is less his will and desires, and more whatever work or habit has gotten into his blood, and compels him to act.

How Much Do Pop Stars Make From Their YouTube Channels?

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

Even world-famous entertainers need diversified income streams.

Photo by Szabó Viktor from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/hand-holding-smartphone-with-internet-access-to-youtube-3227986/

For many pop stars, most of their revenue comes from concert tours, album sales, and song streams. Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, for instance, is estimated to have brought in $2.2 billion in ticket sales just in North America alone. Bad Bunny’s 2022 album Un Verano Sin Ti sold 3.398 million album-equivalent units in that year alone.

But what do these pop stars make from the Google Adsense ads on their YouTube channels? To find out, I used a helpful website called Social Blade, which provides estimated earnings reports on various social media sites. While it’s impossible to determine an exact number without seeing a channel’s actual analytics page, Social Blade can give you a good idea of the range.

For this article, I’ll post the range, using a number in the middle as the estimate, and provide a link to each Social Blade stat page so you can check it out yourself.

On to the list. In no particular order, but starting with the reigning pop queen herself:

1.) Taylor Swift

Source: Screenshot of Taylor Swift’s YouTube channel

Social Blade stat page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $1,381,500 ($163,300 — $2.6 million)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $16,850,000 ($2M — $31.7M)

Sixteen million sure sounds like a lot. But to put that in perspective, it’s only .72% of the $2.2 billion in ticket sales she generated just in North America. Basically lunch money for Ms. Swift.

2.) Lady Gaga

Source: Screenshot of Lady Gaga’s YouTube channel

Social Blade stat page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $345,200 ($40,600 — $649,800)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $4,143,650 ($487,300 — $7,800,000)

Lady Gaga has gotten more into acting these days. Her last video upload was almost eight months ago. But at least she has a nice YouTube side hustle to fall back on, should Joker 2 not pan out.

3.) Dua Lipa

Source: Screenshot of Dua Lipa’s YouTube channel.

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $262,550 ($30,900 — $494,200)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $3,135,300 ($370,600 — $5,900,000)

It’s tough to break through on YouTube. But it certainly helps when your music is used in the soundtrack to Barbie, the biggest film of the year. “Dance the Night Away” is a pretty alright jam.

4.) The Weeknd

Source; Screenshot of The Weeknd’s YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $523,800 ($61,600–$986,000

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $6,269,750 ($739,500 — $11,800,00)

Like Lady Gaga, The Weeknd has also made the jump into acting. But doing gigs like the halftime show for Super Bowl LV has also helped ensure he stays relevant in the YouTube algorithm.

5.) Miley Cyrus

Source: Screenshot of Miley Cyrus’ YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $179,250 ($21,100 — $337,400)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $2,126,500 ($253,000 — $4,00,000)

Then you have Miley, who left acting to pursue singing full-time. Famous for twerking on Robin Thicke, Ms. Cyrus has done very well in 2023 with her album Endless Summer Vacation and a number one hit with “Flowers.”

6.) Rihanna

Source: Screenshot of Rihanna’s YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $497,600 ($58,500 — $936,700)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $5,951,300 ($702,600 — $11,200,000)

Talk about getting the best bang for your buck. Rihanna’s channel only hosts 84 videos, but still makes almost $6M a year in ad revenue. Her last upload was eight months ago. Of course, it certainly helps when you’ve been a household name for almost twenty years.

7.) Harry Styles

Source: Screenshot from Harry Styles’ YouTube Channel

NOTE: These stats only include Harry Styles the solo artist, not as part of One Direction.

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $127,400 ($15k — $239,800)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $1,539,950 ($179,900–$2,900,000)

Harry Styles’ boy band days with One Direction may be over, but he’s still making a name for himself as a solid solo act, actor, and YouTuber.

8.) Selena Gomez

Source: Screenshot of Selena Gomez’ YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $286,800 ($33,700 — $539,900)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $3,452,450 ($404,900 — $6,500,000)

Like Taylor Swift, Selena is one of the OG music YouTubers, uploading her first video fifteen years ago, when the singer was all of 16 years old. But now at 31, she’s still doing quite well for herself on stage, TV, and in the Google Adsense game.

9.) Michael Jackson

Source: Michael Jackson’s YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $326,750 ($38,400 — $615,100)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $3,930,650 ($461,300 — $7,400,00)

The King of Pop may have passed away in 2009, but his legacy lives on forever in the YouTube sphere.

10.) Britney Spears

Source: Screenshot of Britney Spears’ YouTube Channel

Social Blade stats page.

Monthly Revenue from YouTube: $187,050 ($22,000 — $352,100)

Annual Revenue from YouTube: $2,232,050 ($264,100 — $4,200,000)

Britney’s best days as a performer may be behind her, but that doesn’t mean she can’t rely on a generous revenue stream from her YouTube channel. In addition to being a top-selling artist, Ms. Spears can now add bestselling author to her lengthy list of accomplishments. Her memoir The Woman in Me sold 1.1 million copies in its first week.

Invest $3,000 and Two Weeks, Make $48k+ a Year for Life

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment
Photo by Gustavo Fring from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-in-plaid-shirt-sitting-in-the-body-of-blue-truck-and-reading-papers-6720534/

Is a Class B CDL the most cost-efficient type of job skill with the best guaranteed ROI?

There’s a strong case to be made for it.

Yes, there are all sorts of free tutorials and courses on YouTube and elsewhere for things like copywriting, digital marketing, YouTube channels, blogging, coding, day trading, dropshipping, SEO, flipping, niche websites, and numerous other categories.

But none of those side hustles or online businesses offer much in the way of guaranteed results or job placement. Some of them have a steeper learning curve than many anticipate, tons of competition, and may require lengthy amounts of time before yielding any real income.

Frankly, many courses and tutorials are simply pie-in-the-sky scams that rely on outlier results to appear legitimate.

But suppose you’re broke, unemployed, or simply looking for a practical (and legit) new career path, and you need something that, you know, actually works, and you need it right now.

In that case, getting a Class B CDL might be your best option.

What can you do with a Class B CDL?

A Class B CDL enables you to drive vehicles weighing 26,001 pounds or less, such as:

  • Tow trucks
  • City busses
  • Drump trucks
  • Cement mixer trucks
  • Box trucks

Comparatively speaking, few jobs come close to the benefits a CDL B can offer in terms of length of training, training costs, and most importantly, return on investment (meaning income).

For instance, there are people who spend four years in college and graduate with $32,731 of student loan debt, but end up with few or no job prospects.

Nursing school or medical technician training for CT or MRI usually takes 2–4 years to complete, and may cost tens of thousands of dollars. Though the payoff can be huge, and almost anything in the medical field offers great job security.

The average income in the U.S. for a lawyer is $144,230. That’s fantastic income, obviously. But you generally only make the higher end of the scale by working in places where the cost of living and taxation are higher (NY and CA, for instance). Then there’s the costly tuition and the lengthy time commitment: Seven years between college and law school.

Professional graduate-level careers in law, medicine, and engineering are no doubt prestigious and offer great incomes. But they come with subtantial sacrifice. You trade almost 10% of your life away to obtain them, during which time you generally make no income and can incur massive debt. And frankly, few people are cut out to be lawyers, doctors, and engineers.

How Much Do CDL B Drivers Make?

By contrast, you can get a CDL B in as little as two weeks, for as little as maybe $3,000 (or even free with tuition reimbursment), and expect to make an average of $48,196 in annual income.

The salary ranges between $35,000 to about $65,000 depending on where you work, your level of experience, and your license endorsements (hazard, air brakes, tanker).

Photo by Braeson Holland from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-truck-on-the-asphalt-8995386/

In addition, with a Class B CDL, like nursing and other occupations that require specialized training, you have good job security. You can go virtually anywhere in any state and find places hiring truck drivers for above the median income for the US. Some states like Wyoming pay an average salary of $57,728 for drivers.

That’s a remarkable ROI for an “investment” of only two weeks, and maybe only $3,000 in total costs.

Some companies might even offer to pay for truck driving school as part of your overall job training. This is the case in currently worker-deprived fields like construction, petroleum, or mining, where you might be expected operate various forms of heavy equipment and machinery.

You can also obtain a Class B CDL when you’re as young as 18 years old. Which means that if you were to start driving right out of high school, by the time your college-bound peers graduated, you would likely have made over $200,000 in income. Meanwhile, your diploma-having peers are jobless or underemployed, and mired in student loan debt.

Is truck driving glamorous or prestigious? Of course not. Most jobs aren’t. But when it comes to offering practical, secure, and efficiently fast job training, a CDL B offers some of the best bang for your buck.

Resources:

How Much Does A Class B CDL Cost?

CLASS B DRIVER SALARY

Donating Double Red Cells to the Red Cross: My Experience with “Power Red”

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment
Photo of myself. Donating double red cells or “Power Red” at a recent Red Cross blood drive.

As I’ve written before, I’m a life-long Red Cross blood donor, first starting at age 17 during a blood drive in my high school.

Initially, I gave out of a desire to cure my needle-phobia (which worked, btw). But after seeing the kind of strong impact you can have on patients in need by donating blood, not to mention the positive effects I felt after giving, I started to donate regularly over the years.

Last Thursday, October 18th, was my 31st donation. Generally, I donate whole blood when I visit. During a whole blood donation, you give approximately a pint of blood. The process usually only takes about fifteen minutes. Whole blood of all types is vitally important for millions of people every year. My blood type is O+, which is the most common, according to the Red Cross. This allows my donations to help about 80% of the US population, as O+ is compatible with any positive blood types. But every kind of blood type is always needed.

In addition to donating whole blood, you can also give other blood products, like platelets and plasma. You’ve likely heard of places where you can sell your plasma for cash, or maybe even done so yourself.

You can also donate red blood cells, which are the most needed component in blood. In fact, you can donate double the amount of red cells as you would in a typical whole blood donation. The Red Cross calls this type of donation Power Red.

When I lived around Philadelphia, it was easy to set up regular appointments to donate whole blood. For a few years I went like clockwork almost every two months, as soon as I was eligible. But after moving to North Dakota in 2012, it became more difficult to schedule donations regularly. In fact, the Red Cross doesn’t even have blood drives in the state, but in Minnesota and Montana next door. This meant I not only had to drive quite a distance to each blood drive, but my days off from work had to align as well. As a result, I missed a lot of opportunities to donate due to blood drives and my schedule not lining up right.

However, while you’re eligible to give whole blood every two months (56 days), in a double red cell donation, you’re not eligible for double the time (112 days), while still being able to give the same amount of the most needed component in blood itself. This means fewer trips, which makes Power Red donations more suitable for busy working adults like myself, or for those who have to coordinate road trips to a Red Cross blood drive (also me). Three times a year is quite doable.

Up until last Thursday, I’d only been able to donate Power Red successfully twice, way back in 2013. I’d tried and failed twice since then due to either bad needle sticks, or my vein not cooperating, thereby ruining the chance to give. This put me off the whole process for a while. If I’m making a special trip and possibly taking time off work to give blood, you’re getting my blood and that’s all there is to it.

(I take this whole blood donation thing rather seriously.)

Double red cell donation is a little different than just giving whole blood. For one, the process takes about 30 minutes or so. It also involves using a blood centrifuge. This special machine separates the red blood cells from your blood, leaving the rest of your fluids in a bag. Then afterward it returns those fluids back into the same needle into your vein, along with some saline. The machine performs this twice, each time taking the amount of red blood cells that you would normally give in a whole blood donation.

I’ve posted a short video below I took while the machine was returning my fluids and saline back into my body:

So, what does it feel like? Well, it’s a strange sensation having parts of my blood returning to my body. Even though the saline is at room temperature, and mixing in with your warmer fluids, it still feels cold going back in. Remember, your body’s internal temperature is typically around 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, so anything even a few degrees lower feels much colder. My lips began to tremble, or at least it felt like they did, while the fluids reentered. This is a reaction due to the brain thinking the body is short on calcium, as the nurse explained it to me.

The process is pretty quiet and smooth. And aside from the needle stick, basically painless. While the machine extracted my blood, I was given a ball to gently squeeze in my hand. On the screen there’s what looks like a little video game “health bar” that would indicate whether the “pump was primed.” A beep sounded if the machine needed me to squeeze the ball to help keep the blood flowing. Then, when the machine switched over to returning my red cell-less fluids, I just needed to relax my arm without squeezing anything.

Other than the coldness and the phantom lip trembling, double red cell feels the same as any other blood donation. Though there are some advantages over whole blood. For instance, I felt less diminished afterward. Usually it takes me a few days, even a week or so, to feel like my normal self again after whole blood. But because my blood “volume” so to speak didn’t change as much due to getting some of my fluids back, I felt normal again in only about two days afterward.

To be clear, in a double red cell donation, you’re still giving TWICE the red cells as you would in a whole blood one, so your body needs twice the time to replenish the red blood cells it lost. Even if you feel good, be sure to consume quality foods rich in iron so your body can recover, as they told me before I left. And of course drink plenty of water.

Pic by author. Donating whole blood in the summer.

Another benefit is you’ll have fewer needle sticks over time. Like many long-term Red Cross donors, I’ve developed tiny little “battle scars” in the crook of my left arm. While these marks aren’t really noticable, the less time a vein is injected the better. I have a good vein, but it’s flatter than it appears, making it a tricky target to stick for even an experienced nurse or phlebotomist. Combined with my naturally low blood pressure, it can make donating double red cells a delicate operation. Perhaps this is why I had failed at it twice years ago.

When you combine the time efficiency advantages with the physical ones, making a double red cell donation is a pretty good deal overall. I think from now on I’ll try to stick to Power Red. I hope you’ll consider giving it a try, too. 🙂

ALL Women Become Wall-Smashed Mutant Monster Freaks At Age 30. Or Is It 25?

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

Or maybe 23? Examining a popular Red Pill narrative.

Photo by Jonaorle from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/beautiful-woman-by-the-window-with-view-on-the-sea-10459947/

Man, she’s beautiful. Oh, wait, she’s 24? Sorry, hideous is what I meant.

You know, Red Pillers — these supposed experts on gender relations and female psychology — tend to speak of women like they are the scientist dudes in a cheesy 1950s sci-fi movie talking about the monster. Attack of the 50 Foot Woman or something. Or like how all those guys in The Thing were discussing the bizarre alien creature that could imitate them perfectly. With that cynical tone of powerlessness and hopelessness.

In fact, that’s a great idea for a bad comedy. A bunch of dudes freak out over a “monster” that shows up in their neighborhood, only for it to be just some random chick who scares them all to death for some reason.

“Good lord, the monster’s growing in height!”

“I think she just put on high heels, Johnson.”

To me, whether you’re a man or woman, if you’re discussing either gender with that resigned, angry, and defeated tone, you’ve already lost the game. You’re basically admitting you can’t functionally engage with and/or despise 50% of the world population. Not a good look.

I don’t have a love/hate relationship with the Red Pill. I have a 5% kind of like, 60% don’t like, 20% actively hate, and like 15% puzzled-by relationship. And 2% butterscotch ripple.

In so far as some Red Pill content encourages guys to follow generic platitudes like “be the best version of yourself” or “level up,” I’m okay with it. The problem is when the Red Pill steps into this weird dogmatic zone where it theorizes cookie-cutter psychology about men and women, starts prescribing a weird laundry list of actions and behaviors young men should do to “get da gurlz,” and hilariously tries to define “Alpha Male.”

One prominant Red Piller even thinks the Australian Party Guy from this 15-year old viral video is the definition of an alpha male. No, I’m not kidding. APG is cool and all, but men like Dwight D. Eisenhower or Tom Brady strike me as way better examples of alpha males than some party dude wearing sunglasses.

The Red Pill Alpha Male.

Then there’s the Red Pill’s obsession with women’s age and the whole concept of the Wall. Likely, you’ve heard of it. It’s basically the idea that women’s “sexual marketplace value,” (SMV) begins to decline precipitously at around age 30 and beyond. What is SMV? How much dudes want to bang you, pretty much. It also measures reproductive ability, as a woman’s chances to become pregnant declines as she ages until menopause shuts the window for good.

However, this “wall” idea very often becomes conflated with “beauty,” both muddling the concept overall. As “women are beauty objects” and “men are success objects,” as the maxim goes, Red Pillers cheatingly hand themselves a permanent trump card. Afterall, physical beauty obviously declines while “success” has no upper limit.

Photo by Ingrid Santana from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/side-view-photo-of-woman-with-her-eyes-closed-holding-her-her-as-sunlight-shines-on-her-face-2100027/

Wow, what a hottie! Oh, no. She turned 24 yesterday? Yuck, I can’t bear to even look at her now.

It all comes across as a giant cope, really. As if Red Pillers are saying that while women have all the advantages when they’re young and beautiful — ha ha — that only lasts briefly, girls. Meanwhile we men are able to dominate with the opposite sex our whole lives as long we’re leveling up.

Then there’s the constantly shifting goal posts.

For years I kept hearing age 30 was the magical wall number. Then it suddenly became 25. Now I’m hearing it’s as low as 23!

I think this one X user Maggie put it best here:

I predict before long the “prime” female age in Red Pill world will creep on down to 18. Every man should be assessing potential mates the same way a porn producer casts new talent, evidently. Or the way a john hires an escort for the evening. Let’s not think of things like personal chemistry, values, or lifestyle when examining a partner — none of those things matter.

By the way, has anyone told Travis Kelce that Taylor Swift is 33 years old? OMG, dude has no idea he’s dating a wall-smashed mutant monster freak! What a pathetic loser he is.

* * *

The nice thing about Red Pillers is you don’t have to examine much of their dogma very closely to see how absurd a lot of it is on its face. Most of these guys simply don’t pass the smell test at a glance. Really, go scroll through the mix if you care to waste the time. Most of them are angry middle-aged guys who got shanked in divorce court, or weird anti-social types who just can’t function properly.

The conspiratorial part of me suspects that the Red Pill is part of a broader depopulation psyop at worst. Or at the least bad theater in the attempt to jigger the YouTube algo for profit.

But all that aside, the Red Pill too often runs afoul of my individualist perspective with its wholesale generalities about the genders to be useful as anything other than “carnival philsophy.” Akin to palm reading or crystal ball gazing. Look, both sexes have their share of assholes, no doubt. But I think you can only look at people as individuals. Trying to lump a whole gender into some easily understandable mass is counter-productive and frankly, rather weird. It’s also why feminism, aka the female Red Pill, is a crock of shit for the most part as well.

‘Talk to Me’ Will Freak Your Mind

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

A good creepy film with a solid cast.

Source: A24

Talk to Me was a movie I instantly wanted to see immediately after catching that freaky AF trailer. It gave me Hellraiser and It Follows vibes. Plus it’s nice to see an independent horror that’s not associated with the The Conjuring universe. A24 — the Nike swoosh of the indy horror world —has done me good thus far, with prior entries like Ari Aster’s Midsommar and his instant classic Hereditary.

While I still had some reservations, being equally reminded of similar godawful teen “prop horror” films like Truth or Dare, Wish Upon, and Unfriended, I was still looking forward to checking it out.

Unfortunately, I live pretty remotely from any decent theaters. The one a two hour’s drive away from me, where I saw Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning, Part 1 this summer, had a giant tear or rip or something going right down the middle of the screen. So I wasn’t about to waste time or money on that one again. So, I was forced to wait until Talk to Me finally arrived on streaming, and for a decent price.

Was the wait worth it? Absolutely.

The premise of Talk to Me is at-a-superficial-glance silly — a group of teens use the embalmed hand of a dead medium to conjure spirits for fun and games, until one of them takes it too far and things turn murdery. We’ve seen this sort of set-up before, in which a group of young people screw around with the spirits and quickly get in over their heads. Such as in the miniature Ouija franchise from 2014 and 2016.

However, while many horror films have a slick and disposable feel to them, TTM boasts a strong cast that really manages to capture that elusive organic sense of a genuine group of teen friends. The standout is lead Sophie Wilde, playing Mia, whose spellbound facial contortions are ones for the ages.

Source: A24.

It Follows has a similar group dynamic aesthetic, but in a more subdued laid back Midwestern style. TTM, with its Australian energy, actually has one of the most amusing montage moments I’ve ever seen in a horror, if any film, period, where the friends all take turns getting temporarily possessed by the spirits they conjure with the evil hand. The camera work by director and writers Danny and Michael Philippou is clever and Evil Dead-esque in spots, and appropriately playful in the beginning.

But it’s not long before Mia falls prey to the tricky (and kinky) evil spirits on the other side of the hand. The rules for the game Talk to Me are pretty straightforward, if a little dubious. You light a candle to “open the door” so to speak. Grip the hand and first say, “talk to me,” Then a spirit only you can see will appear. You then say “I invite you in,” to let the spirit swoop into your body, where you experience what can only be described as a three-way cross between a rollercoaster ride, a mushroom trip, and an orgasm. But be careful not to let yourself stay possessed longer than 90 seconds, or forget to blow out the candle, or else the spirits will be able to linger, and get in your head.

When Mia’s dead mother appears to her, who died from suicide recently, she sees this as her only chance to reconnect with the parent she dearly misses. Except this is exactly what the evil spirits are looking for. They then try to manipulate Mia into killing so they can absorb another soul, with the “mom” spirit taking the lead. Evidently freshly dead spirits (or demons, it’s left amibiguous) are charged with possessing the next batch of suckers. Sort of like an afterlife pyramid scheme. Herbalife from beyond the grave. Talk about pure evil.

I judge horror on whether the story slithers into my mind and haunts me for a spell, as opposed to cheap jumpscares or profuse corn syrup. This one checked all the right boxes. As did Hereditary and even the original Saw, which is underrated as it is forgotten under the weight of a million sequels.

It’s also nice that Talk to Me doesn’t fall to the temptation of trying to be another “social horror.” Though it does make relevant thematic use of social media and drug abuse. And while the dead parent trope is often overused — Midsommar did it for instance— TTM wisely doesn’t center everything around it. Where the narrative of last year’s Smile was effective but thin, and ended somewhat unsatisfyingly, Talk’s ended in — spoilers incoming — quite frankly, terrifying fashion, if a tad predictable. I’d always imagined Jack Torrance’s spirit winding up in a similar way. Trapped discorporate at the Overlook Hotel forever and trying to bugger the living, just as our protag Mia ends up on the opposite side of the evil hand, with an ill-fitting and existentialist nightmare fate reminiscent of Craig’s demise in Being John Malkovich.

Talk to Me ia good creepy stuff that’s worth checking out.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to check out some of my other articles linked below. I’m also a novelist. You can check out my books here. 

Taylor Swift is Giving Her Fans Amnesia

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

And God only knows what she could be doing to Travis Kelce.

Source: Made with Midjourney by the author. Taylor sitting on her pile of gold.

Taylor Swift is a woman of many talents. A global pop queen and beauty icon, serial boyfriend dumper, and one of the OG YouTube success stories. With her massively successful Eras Tour now in its international leg, and her docu-concert movie premiering in theaters this week, Taylor Swift is well on her way to becoming a billionaire.

Well, you can add brain damager to the growing list of her innumerable accolades.

Attendees of Taylor’s Eras Tour concerts are reporting a strange side effect that’s causing them to forget large gaps of her performance.

Fox News reports, according to Dr. Nathan Carroll, a psychiatrist at the Hackensack Meridian Jersey Shore University Medical Center, that this is actually a legit neorological condition called transient global amnesia. Or TGA.

Says Dr. Carroll:

Individuals who experience TGA will attend an event (like a concert, wedding or festival) and later report undeniable gaps in their memory.
For example, during the event, it may look like you’re acting normally and answering questions — but later, you may not recall some of your conversations.
Unlike other amnesias, memory loss is very limited, only lasting about a day, and people don’t forget [autobiographical] information.

In other words, Taylor Swift is so damn good she’s literally blowing people’s minds. Hey, nothing wrong with that, right?

Dr. Carroll goes on to explain that other things like poor sleep, dehydration, anxiety, and anticipation can also cause the brain to blackout portions of activity. Somewhat frightening is also how Swifties don’t even realize TGA is happening to them until much later when they ironically remember that they forgot so much.

TGA reminds me of that weird driving phenomenon called “highway hypnosis.” This is where you drive for long periods of time without recollecting most of the trip. It can happen on short drives from work, or lengthy drives across the state. No doubt blasting “Shake It Off” makes it even worse.

Dr. Soha Salman, another psychiatrist working at the ridiculously wordy Hackensack Meridian Jersey Shore University Medical Center, also blames other unique aspects of Taylor’s concerts like the nostalgia vibes and the emotional connection fans have to her music.

The doctor mentions how things like elevated blood pressure, stress hormones, and the release of cortisol and adrenaline could also be causing the mass short-circuiting of Swiftie brains.

But it’s what Dr. Salman had to say about the use of cell phones that interested me most:

By simultaneously trying to use your phone and watch the concert, you may overtax your working memory and affect your ability to store those specific memories.

Studies have also found that when we are recording something with our smartphones, we are relying on them to remember for us. This could lead to poorer recall of the event later.

Experiencing concerts and other events through the smartphone is something I’ve noticed has become a bizarre modern trend. I realize many are using social media apps to share what’s happening with their friends. But then aren’t you short-changing yourself by missing out on what’s happening right in front of you by acting as a virtual host? Seems counter-productive and unnecessarily burdensome.

Real friends would tell you to pay attention and enjoy the show, and not worry about sharing every second of it with them. Live in the moment. But then I guess everyone feels entitled these days to digitally inhabit someone else’s point of view. “If phone says I can, then I should,” is the mantra.

People vastly overestimate how much “mental bandwidth” they’re capable of sustaining. And in the case of TGA, they’re overextending themselves and losing their memories in the process.

Not to mention their wallets. Taylor Swift tickets ain’t cheap. At her last U.S. stop at SoFi stadium some tickets were going into the five digits, with the cheapest in the nose bleed sections as much as $700 or more. A hefty price for what turned out to be, well, a forgettable experience.

Ms. Taylor Swift could do her devoted fans a big favor by telling them to put away the phones during the concert. At least for a little while. That is, unless she wants to be forgotten.

Thanks for reading. I’m also a novelist. You can check my books out here.

Four Memorable “Air Conditioning Movies” I’ve Seen

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment
Source: Midjourney, prompted by the author.

air conditioning movie

noun North American

A term used to describe a type of film just released but not worth seeing other than for the temporary comfort provided by the theater’s climate control system during a heat wave.

“with the trailers indicating the film’s dubious quality, and its low Rotten Tomatoes score, he designated Wrong Turn an air conditioning movie.”

I’m not sure if the above term has ever been used before. If not, I’m coining it now.

There have been several points in my life where I’ve been forced to stay outdoors, or simply couldn’t stand being at home, while also being bored enough to waste my money on absolute junk films I had no real interest in seeing. All of which coincided with summer time heat waves.

Air conditioning movies serve an important purpose. One might even say a humanitarian one. They get you out of the murderous heat, at the cost of seeing a (usually) bad film. Often these films are matinees of movies that have been in theaters for a few weeks. Or they’re being shown at those dollar theaters six months after they premiered. So they often only cost a few bucks to see.

Fun Fact: One of the big draws movie theaters used in the past was air conditioning to get people in the door. Back before TV’s became ubiquitous in American homes, people would spend all day at the theater catching news reels, Three Stooges shorts, Looney Tunes, and movies, of course. It used to be relatively cheap, too.

Nowadays, you can’t sneeze in a movie theater without spending $100. And God help you if you’re seeing something in REAL ID 3D, IMAX, IMAX 3D, UltraScreen DLX, D-BOX, PRIME, RPX, Cinemark XD, DreamLoungers, attending a Movie Party, Dolby Cinema, ScreenX, 4DX, The Void, 70mm, or BigD.

Yes, you can now go to the theater to get your fill of BigD. No wonder dating is dead.

Here are five air conditioning movies I’ve seen.

Wrong Turn (2003)

Source: By The poster art can or could be obtained from 20th Century Fox (All US rights, UK DVD)Pathé (UK theatrical)New RegencySummit Entertainment (non-USA)., Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1380504

Boy, if ever a movie had a perfect title to describe what it felt like to drive to go see it.

I remember little about this film other than it was part of the early 2000s resurgence of the “killer hillbilly” horror genre originally started by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre back in the ’70s and renewed with 2001’s Jeepers Creepers.

Oh yes, one other thing. The moment the group of young people split up to look for help after their cars break down in the woods, some girl immediately offers her boyfriend a BJ. Hey, I don’t recall reading anything about that in any wilderness survival guide. Maybe it’s only in the ladies version.

Unlike Chainsaw, which was perfectly plotless, perversely original and shocking for its time, Wrong Turn is your predictable paint by numbers teens-get-slaughtered-by-maniacs film, only this time somewhere deep in the woods. It came out not long after the Scream and I Know What You did Last Summer renaissance. Lacking neither the smarts of the former, nor the bosomy charisma of the latter, Wrong Turn premiered during a time when all it took to sell a horror film was to slap a hot teen girl in a halter top on the cover looking moderatly distressed.

Apparently, this awful but profitable 2003 release launched a direct-to-video franchise and even a freaking REBOOT. There’s a Wrong Turn 6: Last Resort that came out in 2014, followed by Wrong Turn in 2021. Hmm, I wonder if some producers weren’t inspired by the same name style Halloween reboot in 2018? We can only gue$$.

I rate Wrong Turn a perfect five out of five air conditioners.

Freddy Got Fingered (2001)

Source: By Impawards, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1209020

If you weren’t alive during, or don’t remember the time when Tom Green was everywhere on MTV, you sorely missed out. I’m still not sure his whole rise to fame wasn’t an elaborate CIA psyop designed to lower America’s IQ by ten points. Though to be fair, you could say that about virtually any social media star nowadays.

Freddy Got Fingered is a subtly brilliant meta deconstruction of the gross-out comedy genre. I know it’s hard to believe that about a film with a title about sexual molestation. But by the late ’90s, Tom Green had risen high enough to earn a blank check from MTV to make anything he wanted.

So what does he do? He makes a “film” with some of the most ridiculously disgusting gross out scenes ever put to celluloid. There’s a scene where he delivers a baby, and then proceeds to swing the infant around the hospital room by its umbilical cord. A scene where he gets sprayed by elephant cum. Then there’s a recurring gag about a young kid who keeps getting seriously injured.

And those are just some of the scenes I remember. I’ve suppressed the rest just like I did with all those Bill Cosby Jell-O commercials from the ’80s.

Oh hell no!

This so-called movie is essentially one man giving Hollywood the finger. Tom Green could have produced a solid high-concept comedy. He could have been like Mike Myers and done his own Austin Powers. Or like Adam Sandler and his many man baby comedies. He could have done a clever Shakespeare-inspired teen comedy like 10 Things I Hate About You. Comedy was easy in the ’90s and early 2000s, because you didn’t have to compete with the internet and streaming platforms. Seriously, there was a five-year period where Cameron Diaz having cum in her hair was the absolute height of yucks. Good times.

Instead, Tom Green made Freddy Got Fingered. For that, I feel he deserves some credit.

I rate Freddy somehow six out of five air conditoners.

The Dictator (2012)

Source: By May be found at the following website: IMP Awards, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34058557

Man, what a run by Sacha Baron Cohen. After his 2006 film Borat made fifty bazillion dollars, and inspired bad impressions at parties for years to come, he popped out this little satirical nugget in 2012.

The Dictator follows an evil despot named Aladeen from a fictional North African nation called Wadiya who fish-out-of-waters in NYC after escaping an assassination plot. Like Freddy Got Fingered, this too has some weird gross-out set pieces, including a scene where Aladeen and his new hippy girlfriend Zoey (played by Anna Faris) somehow share a handshake inside some woman’s birth canal. Don’t ask me how that event came about, it’s down there with Cosby’s Pudding Pops.

The film did make a few notable contributions to the national lexicon and the meme pool cyberspace. Including a clever bit about being HIV Aladeen, a gag about Gen. Aladeen wanting his rockets to be pointy because it makes them look scary, and Aladeen and an associate freaking an American tourist couple out during a helicopter ride over the city.

It feels somewhat loathsome to consign any film starring baby-faced Anna Faris to the lowly status of “air conditioning movie.” The Dictator is a servicable enough comedy, afterall. I actually saw it during a time when I was homeless and living out of my car. The film served as a vital escape and refuge in a dollar theater during a nasty July heat wave. Considering Faris’ lengthy career powered by such films as the Scary Movie franchise and 2007’s stoner comedy Smiley Face, The Dictator is high brow by comparison.

But if I’m being honest, I never would have checked this out had it not been for the fact that it was 100 degrees outside, the local library was closed, and I wasn’t about to sit in my car all afternoon listening to Carly Rae Jepsen sing Call Me Maybe for the umpteenth goddamn time. So off to The Dictator I went.

I rate The Dictator four out of five air conditioners.

Battleship (2012)

Source: By The poster art can or could be obtained from IMP Awards., Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32553181

You know, I’m not quite sure of the precise moment when Hollywood slid into the barren wasteland devoid of creativity in which it currently resides. But if I had to pick a time, I’d say it was right around when it decided to make a movie based on the popular board game Battleship.

Now, at first glance you might be thinking if you were going to adapt any boardgame, Battleship makes the most sense. It’s got conflict baked into it. Besides, it’s not like you can do anything with Connect 4, Operation, or Hungry Hungry Hippos, right? With Battleship you’ve got war. You’ve got guns. You’ve got senseless action and explosions. All the ingredients you need for any successful summer popcorn film. Transformers was also popular at the time, so you had a similar toy-based property raking in billions. You’d be insane NOT to green light Battleship with a $200 million budget.

Well, there’s this whole thing called a “plot” that has to make some sense. And there’s these things called “characters” you need to have in your story in order for it to work. In Transformers, you have two sides — the Autobots and the Decepticons — locked in combat, and represented by two strong characters, the awesomely named Optimus Prime and Megatron. As silly as the whole franchise is, it kind of writes itself. Good robots smash evil robots. It’s like poetry.

But what do you have in Battleship? Nothing, really. So they had to concoct this whole cockamamie story about an alien invasion and the aliens using some cloaking technology that makes them hard to detect, in order to shoehorn in the whole gameboard conceit of having to guess which grid number to launch missiles toward. It’s all too complicated and stupid to comprehend.

Then you have quite possibly the dumbest opening to a summer “blockbuster” in history, with director Peter Berg ripping off that viral YouTube video about some guy crashing through a store ceiling of a convenence store. You’ve got Taylor Kitsch, the King of Flops, whom Hollywood was desperately (and inexplicably) trying to make a thing back then. Poor Liam Neeson must have been blackmailed or something. And Rihanna was in it too for some reason.

I don’t even recall this movie even being worthwhile even as a mild diversion. In fact, I think I even left early I was so bored. Yes, it was preferable to sit in the burning heat in my car than watch this turd of a film.

I rate Battleship two out of five air conditioners.

An honorable mention goes to Hannibal, the 2001 sequel to 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs. Except that was a film I actually wanted to see, and I recall it came out during the winter, so there were no heat-related considerations in watching it. I do remember about a third of the way through realizing that it was clearly going to fall far short of the original, in which case it’s the only film of these five that transformed into an “air conditioning movie” while I was watching it.

You know, we’re lucky to live in a time where air conditioning movies are largely a thing of the past. Like polio and lobotomies. You rarely have to go to a theater to see anything anymore. With movies streaming earlier after releasing, and video on demand, and good ol’ piracy, we can all suffer to our heart’s content at home.

Still, what are your “favorite” air conditioning movies? I can’t be the only one who’s endured here.

Thanks for reading.

Fuck McDonald’s

On By Dean BrooksLeave a comment

A rant about a so-called “restaurant.”

Source: Tdorante10, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

So, about a year ago I was driving across country somewhere in the Midwest and I had to pull in to a travel plaza for some gas. It was one of those stops on the highway that has a fast food restaurant attached. This one, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, had a Mcdonald’s.

As a rule, I avoid fast food places unless it’s late and I’m traveling, and there are no viable alternatives. I was in the middle of a long trip. Usually I pack enough food for a day or two so I don’t have to eat out. Tuna sandwiches. PB&J. Mixed vegetables. Actual sustenance. But it was my third day of driving, and I’d already burned through all my rations. It was getting dark, I had a few more hours of driving to go, and by the time I stopped again it was possible nothing would be open.

That left one hell of a Sophie’s choice. So into McDonald’s I went after parking my car.

You know that shot from The Exorcist when the priest arrives to the house and it looks all foggy and ominous? That’s what I felt like standing outside the door to Ronald McDonald’s Chamber of Misfortune.

Source: “The Exorcist” or Me Entering a Mcdonald’s. Warner Bros. Pictures

“Maybe it won’t be so bad this time,” I stupidly thought as I entered, immediately smelling something that was a cross between a men’s locker room and a public bathroom. There were crumpled napkins on the floor. Crumbs left on tables. Wet rings left from soda cups. Splotches of ketchup all over the condiment counter. Like a party of five-year old’s had just left.

It wasn’t that busy. There were maybe three or four people in there. Middle-aged guys with pot bellies wearing stretched out t-shirts. Creased old white sneakers. A distinct aura of sloth and imbecility. In other words, your regular Mcdonald’s eaters. Not a visting dignitary stricken by an unstoppable masochistic urge due to severe hunger, like myself.

There were several employees wandering behind the counter and in whatever passes for a “kitchen.” Older, mean-looking ladies. I don’t blame them for looking mean. I’d turn into a one hell of a mean SOB too if I had to work at a McDonald’s. But then again, I’d be homeless and living under a bridge before doing that.

Because the old ladies looked so mean I thought better than to order at the counter. I instead turned to one of the glowing, smudgy rectangles nearby. McDonald’s has recently installed these giant smartphone-looking screens in their restaurants that you can order and pay on. This is supposed to make the food ordering process more “efficient.”

I guess they figure people can’t stand to look away from their phones for more than five seconds even to order food, so why not create a giant smartphone for them to order on? Seems genius to me. Who doesn’t want to press their fingers onto the same screen a million other people just touched with their germy, sticky hands?

But whatever, I was starved. And if this screen brought me garbage posing as food into my mouth even ten seconds faster, I’d be perfectly fine with getting hepatitis on my hands. I tapped on the digital menu selections. A simple quarter pounder “meal” with fries and a water. Paid with my card. Then took a little plastic number display to a table in the corner.

FYI, that little plastic number thing usually means someone will BRING your food to you. However, I was about to proven very wrong about this age-old tradition.

So there I waited. And waited. And waited. And no food arrived at my sticky little table. A couple of giant flies did try to land on me, though. And some goober was coughing the whole time in the other corner so hard it sounded like he was hacking up a blood clot. But besides all that unpleasantness, hey it wasn’t that bad.

About ten minutes later I get up and go to the tiny what-passes-for-a-counter counter to inquire about my missing cuisine. Mind you, I was only sitting right off to the corner. Like, if you were working that counter, I’d have been in your peripheral vision. You wouldn’t have even had to turn your head to notice me. But anyway, there my food was, sitting on the counter, getting cold, with the bag wide open. I’d input into the giant smartphone order taker that I wanted a tray as I planned on eating in, as I don’t like to eat and drive, or eat in my car period. And again, I took a plastic number to display on my table. But evidently the highly efficient new system Mcdonald’s had put in had failed to record that request. Either way, I was left with a bag of cold fries and a lukewarm “burger” (yeah right, more like a soggy greased cardboard).

I looked right at Mrs. Sourpuss Face and inquired why no one had brought me my meal.

“We don’t really do that here,” she hissed, and then ducked into the kitchen. I stood there dumbfounded for a moment.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. If you were sitting so close, why didn’t you get up earlier and check to see if your food was there? That’s besides the point. They still put it into a bag instead of on a tray. They left the bag wide open, causing it to get cold. And they weren’t that busy. Like I mentioned earlier, there were just a few buffoons in there when I arrived. They absolutely had time to hand off a simple tray of so-called food just out of courtesy. It’s literally the least the counter people can do. They don’t cook the food. They don’t even take orders for food, with those giant glowing monolith screens. They don’t clean up any tables. So what exactly do they have to do at all other than make customers feel like useless pests?

Dejected, I returned to my table. The food tasted like shit, of course. And after that horrendous service experience, I was pissed off and embarrassed. I’d have enjoyed a meal more sitting in a porta potty than sitting at that goddamn sticky table with the giant prehistoric flies buzzing around and Mr. Hack-A-Lung in the other corner.

Source: McDonald’s menu from the 1970’s.

When the fuck did Mcdonald’s become an absolute dumpster buffet? I remember when Mcdonald’s had a certain mystique. It had the ball pit. It had a play place. It was lively and colorful. Then some dumbass kid probably broke a tooth off on a ball pit ball and that was that. You used to even be able to smoke there. I know it was THE place to go to in the ’70s. That was when Mcdonald’s was at its height, not to mention reasonably affordable to eat at for a regular person. I paid something like $14-$15 for that cold pile of cholesterol-soaked sponges. Now, instead of Mcdonalds being a colorful foodie wonderland, the “restaurants” look like dystopian government offices. Everything is purely utilitarian. Like it were designed for robots. If there is one subtextual message McDonald’s sends with its interior design, it’s “Give us your money, now get the fuck out, asshole.” There’s no warmth. No welcome. No quality. No humanity. And certainly no value for your hard-earned money.

McDonald’s anymore is a monument to culinary failure. It’s like prison cafeteria food a supervillain somehow conned the world into paying $10+ per meal for. It’s staffed by people who aren’t really overworked, they just don’t give a fuck. It’s architectural design looks like it was created by aliens. Literally everything about it is so disgustingly bad that it’s actually shocking that such a business could even exist, much less be a multi-billion dollar corporation.

You’re not even a customer inside a Mcdonald’s anymore. You are a sucker from which as much money as possible is to be extracted, while offering as little as possible in return. Granted, that’s most retail and fast food establishments period. But Mcdonald’s takes it to an art form.

Source: “Falling Down,” or the Typical Mcdonald’s Experience. Warner Bros.

There’s this guy on YouTube called TheReportoftheWeek who reviews fast food. Some of his videos are quite lengthy. He reviews Mcdonald’s meals from time to time. He goes into detail, and gives really good and thorough reviews. But honestly, you only need about five seconds to review any meal at all from McDonald’s. They suck ass and belong in the trash. There, review done.

Really, I don’t know what it is anymore. It’s like every place exists to see how much it can piss you off just enough so you’ll still return. I went to Wal-Mart just today for example, and I’m not even done checking out before some fucking “associate” comes up to me to pester me about doing a customer service survey on the card reader. I’m in line trying to get my groceries in my cart and I’m supposed to fill out goddamn survey? GTFO. I was in line for all of two minutes. What the hell was I even supposed to base my survey on anyway? That’s it, no more surveys. I’m done. From here on out, if I’m asked to do a survey, it’s a guaranteed zero or one star review. I don’t care.

Fuck Mcdonald’s.