Caffeine

I.
Love.
Caffeine.
Hell, the only reason I'm conscious right now is cuz I drank a whole bunch of diet coke today.

However.
I'm not particularly caffeine sensitive, and I'm pretty much half-asleep writing this.
But I digress.

According to Wikipedia, the average person overdoses on caffeine at 300 mg or more. Sounds like a lot, right? Kinda hard to do?
I've definitely had too much caffeine before, but my friend Lauren once overdosed. It's a lot easier than it sounds.
See, your average 8oz of instant coffee (typically the weakest besides decaf) only has 57mg of caffeine. On the other end of the spectrum, drip coffee has 145mg per 8oz. Generally, if you're drinking instant coffee, you can have a whole bunch of mugs of coffee before there's a problem. Drip coffees are generally take longer to make and longer to consume, due to strength and temperature. 12 oz of Coke Zero only has 35mg of caffeine, and 12oz of Mountain Dew has 54mg.

However, a 16oz amp has between 154mg and 160mg of Caffeine. Two of these, and you've potentially overdosed.

Fun Fact:
There are energy drinks that have more than 300mg of caffeine per serving.
For instance, Red Line PowerRush is one of those 2.5oz energy shots that taste like soap. It already has 350mg of caffeine, as does the 16oz Spike Shotgun. Their half-size, the 8.4 oz Spike Shooter actually has 300mg of caffeine. A 16 ounce can of Wired X344 contains 344 milligrams of caffeine. Starbucks 16oz Grande Black Coffee has between 259.2mg to 564.4mg (averaging around 372mg). Even the controversial 8.4oz Cocaine Energy Drink only comes in at a measly 280mg.


If you're someone who's sensitive or inexperienced with high levels of caffeine, please don't get yourself started on these high-level energy boosters. Don't get me wrong, I've come very close to ODing on energy drinks quite a few times - I just love the taste of caffeine on my tongue. My advice? Stick to the sugar-free energy drinks. I've found that you're far less likely to deal with the crash or jitters after the stuff wears off. If you want more natural energy, get yourself a vitamin B complex with C, and take that every morning for an awesome metabolism boost that'll help you lose weight and maintain energy levels throughout the day (spice it up with Chromium Picolinate, a vitamin that not only boost metabolism but also helps curb carb cravings!)
Drink lots and lots of green tea, and make sure to get 8oz of water in you. 8 hours of sleep will leave you beautifully rested for your day. Follow all these steps and you'll have great, natural energy.

Comment with any questions you have or stories! :-)

(all caffeine information retrieved from http://www.energyfiend.com/the-caffeine-database)

Less Than Three

I guess I'm going to do a late-night rant every night.
Except I'll probably forget tomorrow.

Hokay.

Love.

Before I start this, let me inform you that I am filled with headache and sleep deprivation, so that's going to be a large part of what fuels this rant. For being unemployed, I've had a horrendously long day.

So.

Love.

I've always been a firm believer in trusting everyone. I believe it was on this very blog that I came up with the phrase "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, and you're a total dick for breaking my trust. Asshole." ...or something like that.
I feel very similar when it comes to love. As a human being, I know that I have infinite capacity for love... but love doesn't just mean "oh brb we're getting married" kind of love. Love has many, many levels. There's love for a boyf/girlf, love for a spouse, love for a friend, love for a best friend, love for family, love for someone you had a class with and like what they say, love for someone you've never even met but have had a few awesome tweet-conversations with...

There's so many different levels of love.
I've had a few friends in the past get really upset with me, though.
"Well, you say you love me, but you also say you love so-and-so, and you also say you love so-and-so..."
It's honestly just an expression that I use.
"Well then how am I supposed to know?"
...you don't have to know. Focus on you, not those around me.

I literally had a roommate/friend once who wanted me to rank my friends. I basically told her to fuck off. ...we're not friends anymore.

Why is this such a hard concept for people to get though? I mean, I understand people don't get it, so I try to warn people ahead of time. "Listen, I tend to throw the phrase 'I love you' around a lot, so trust me when I say I mean nothing creepy by it." And no, it doesn't mean anything less the more I say it, it's not like you can get habituated to love like it's ibuprofin or pain or something. It's not like when you wear the same cologne for a while you can no longer smell it... it's love. It's sorta like how pie will always be delicious no matter how many times you eat it, or how a kitten is always soft no matter how many times you pet it, or how lard will always make you fat. ...speaking of which, I could really go for some food right now...

I'd like to quote the nations number one poet when I say "Where is the Love?" Yes, of course I'm referring to will.I.am of the Black Eyed Peas, writers of literary and aural masterpieces such as "Don't Phunk With My Heart", "My Humps", "Fergalicious", and "I Got It From My Mama".
Does he not have a point though? I see nothing wrong with spreading my love around. Maybe that's why I give such great hugs - I'm not afraid to hold back.

Didn't we learn anything from Barney? "I Love You, You Love Me, We're a Happy Family! With a GREAT BIG HUG, and a kiss from me to you! Won't you say you love me too?" C'mon, we're a bunch of weirdos raised on Barney, the least we could do is start fucking acting like it.

So next time you get creeped out by me saying "I Love You," just remember I'm probably not out to wed you. Unless, of course, I am, in which case you'll know the difference. ...likely, because you'll be duct taped to a chair in my living room.

Goodnight!

Look at this Fucking Hipster

Another late-night rant? Yes, please!


So I've realized something over the years.
I'm 99% sure that all hipsters are actually people completely devoid of social skills.

Before you scream at me that I'm just a mainstream hater working for the man or some other stupid shit, try and tell me that this girl has social skills.



If you said that she's just rebelling against social norms, you are kindly invited to go google yourself and quit reading this fucking blog. Ever heard the phrase "If you don't get the joke, it's probably about you"? ...yeah.


That's the thing. "Rebelling against social norms" translates to "socially retarded". Seriously? Most hipsters I've met have worse social skills than an autistic person (except autistic people have a medical/psychological reason for being socially awkward... hipsters have no excuse.) Take, for instance, these two fucking hipster girls I met at a party last year. I had been asked to make a playlist. I thought about the party we were going to: it was a dry, outdoor barbecue, filled 99% with people that belonged to our dance team on campus (we'd just had our final show of the year, and this was a party to kind of celebrate it. There were a few people coming that were the host's friends or people's boyfriends.) Knowing the people, I filled the playlist primarily with a) things on the radio, and b) covers of things on the radio. Fun, dancey pop/punky stuff. I spent a good chunk of time putting together this playlist onto my ipod.


To give a little bit of background, I get really, really upset when people touch my ipod. ...see, my ipod kind of freaks out when other people touch him, and has the tendency to freeze up anytime someone does... so I get a little weary of other people touching my ipod. Luckily, most people at this party knew that about me, but just in case, I kept my ipod behind a bush, still attached to the speakers but out of sight.

We ended up essentially having one party inside and one outside (the sliding doors of the apartment led to a nice little courtyard.) Generally I was getting pretty good reactions to my playlist, it was nice. A little while later, I notice these two hipsters with their headbands and loose skirts and tiny jackets and band-you've-never-heard-of shirts and unwashed, teased hair talking closely and drinking from red cups. I move closer to them, and I get a strong whiff of Werther's.
"...are you guys drinking straight Butterscotch Schnapps?"
"...yes? how did you know it was Buttershots and not like... something else?"
"because I'm not retarded. This is a dry party, can you guys not drink?"
"No one's going to know."
"Really? because I was ten feet away and could smell it. I'm the only person here that's 21, and if this party gets broken up for any reason and they find you two with booze, I could get in a lot of trouble."
"You're not gonna get in trouble, trust us."
"yeahokaywhatever."

So they keep going with their schnapps. ...then I see them rifling through my ipod.
"Excuse me guys, but can you not touch my ipod? He tends to freak out if other people touch him."
"Oh, *not putting the ipod down* we're just trying to see if you have any Justice."
"The electronic french guys? I think I have a remix or something. Really though, can you leave it alone?"
"Oh, but we want to listen to Justice! I'll just plug in my iPod!"
"...actually, can you not? I worked for a while on that playlist..."
"Yeah, but there's no Justice on it."
"....yeah, that's because I tried to tailor it to everyone. Also, the host of the party asked me make this"
"oh... okay..."

They finally put my ipod down and sulked away.

About ten minutes later, the host came up to me and said
"...so, my friends want to plug their ipod in...?"
"yeah, but I worked on this playlist for you... for a while..."
"yeah, I know... it's totally rude, but they're kinda pressuring me. I don't wanna listen to their crappy music either, so around nine o'clock ish can we switch it out?"
"....yeah, sure, that gives it another half hour. Sounds good. ...by the way, you know they're drinking, right?"
"they're what?"

9.00 rolls around, and I unplugged my ipod and let the stupid-ass hipster girls have their fun. A couple people gave me funny looks. "It's not my ipod anymore, sorry guys!" as the hipster girls jammed up the doorway jamming out to their french electronica. About fifteen minutes later, I went to leave to check up on my roommate, going from the courtyard into the complex. I look down the hallway, and what do I see? Police knocking on the party's door. So I book it down to my apartment, seconds later getting a text from one of the partygoers saying that the cops broke up the party. Luckily, they didn't catch the stupid-ass hipster girls drinking, but if they had I could have been in trouble were I still there.


This is not an isolated indecent. A majority of the hipster-encounters I've had usually revolve around a) how their strange indie underground music is better than yours, b) their firm belief in something thoroughly unproven like Reiki or Ghosts, quoting "scientific proof," ignoring every study and fact you throw at them, or c) Macs.

And now, as I try to go to sleep but can't, because my brother who pretends to be goth/hardcore/metal is snoring like a mother-fucker, I leave you with this: