From the Late Night Cable Movie Files: Syfy's Yeti: Curse of the Snow Demon

It's 2:00 a.m., I'm a bit tipsy, Isaac's still awake for some reason, but after watching about 5-10 minutes of this awesome 2008 made-for-TV movie, I believe I will live-blog it for all y'all. YOU'RE WELCOME. The beginning part will be a bit of summary but probs just as good as actually watching it in real time.

SOMETHING SOMETHING in the past, a team of white dudes encounters a Yeti in a cave. PRESENT DAY ON A PLANE: An American college football team heads to the first ever bowl game in Japan (?/!), flying over all of Eurasia for reasons that probably don't make sense. The sleazy, generically attractive quarterback is trying to make it happen with the lady team manager. Some guy with a tiny speck of facial hair under his lip wants the coach to start him, but the coach wants him to "show more heart." Some other dude jokes around with "Chub," a large African-American dude, about having snacks. Chub says if they crash in the Himalayas below, he will eat the other guy. HAHA THEY WON'T EVER CRASH, RIGHT? Storm, lightning, turbulence. Isaac is upset that the air masks came down when the cabin supposedly hasn't depressurized. THAT GUY WOULD KNOW. Crashing. The tail fell off. Some guy got sucked out the back. The front chunk of the plane crashes down onto a snowy hillside.

The plane hasn't blown up or anything. The survivors are figuring shit out. The nose of the plane got disconnected, so presumably the pilots are dead. Some chick named Kira is staring in the snow and the QB is concerned. She can't find her brother, a player who is missing, I guess. QB, team manager, Kira, tiny facial hair, and a few other dudes and one other lady have survived. Coach is not yet dead, I guess? A guy in a red polo shirt thinks they should try to hike out. It is snowy and windy. They should find jackets. QB and Kira go to the cockpit. Kira is apparently the trainer. The pilot is kind of still alive. He says they weren't able to send out an SOS. The black box was in the tail of the plane, so they're kind of screwed on the locator in it helping them. Where are these people's coats? QB thinks they should hike back 5 miles to the back of the plane for the spare radio. Facial hair and some other dude volunteer to hike that way. The survivors are going to have to pull the dead bodies out into the snow, go through pockets and luggage for useful items, and make the fuselage a place to stay.

The Yeti has such a shitty costume and is watching them from up the hill! They've found some letterman jackets. Kira found her brother Eric, who is dead. A rescue outpost in Nepal, which is staffed by white Americans, has figured out that a plane went down on the Nepal/Tibet area. Oh the lady is (fake?) Russian. The storm is keeping them from homing in on the beacon, but they're going to try to search anyway. The two scouting bros find dead bodies at the other crash site and start to look for the extra radio. "Yo, I think I found it." Facial hair tries to use it, but it doesn't seem to be working. The bros follow a trail of blood to a cave, looking for survivors. Of course it is the Yeti's lair. The Yeti attacks the one guy whose name we never learned and Facial Hair hides. Back at the fuselage, QB checks on Coach, who will definitely not survive. I love that QB is supposed to be a college football player, but is clearly at least 27 years old. Coach tells him he's the leader. Patriarchal passing of the torch. Oh, and Coach dies. Pretty Team Manager sees the Yeti drag off a body in the night. QB tells her to calm her lady feelings and go back to sleep in their fuselage shelter.

Facial Hair thinks he can climb out of the Yeti cave with his football man strength. Oh, their mascot is "The Grizzlies." The white people searchers are in the mountain snow. Helicopter. Facial Hair almost makes it out of the cave through freestyle rock-climbing, but slips and slides back down. Back at base, Team Manager keeps yelling about a stolen body. The survivors shiver around a fire. The guy with the broken nose keeps saying they need to hike out. "You're not the captain here," he says to QB. "No one's anointed you leader." BLAHBLAH who cares. Oh, I forgot the QB was named "Peyton Elway." SUBTLE. They find some flares. Peyton and the broken nose guy continue to argue. Broken Nose will clearly die soon.

Facial Hair/Rudy ("show me some heart") has overcome his leg injury and climbed up out of the Yeti cave successfully. Team Manager is Sarah. She says there's one energy bar left. Broken Nose whines. The one surviving black guy, who has nice dreadlocks, says they need to acknowledge that help might not be coming. Broken Nose thinks they should use their remaining strength to hike out. Peyton says they shouldn't leave the fuselage. BN suggests they eat the dead. QB and Dreadlocks talk about finding some marmots to eat in the woods. Facial Hair, hiking with a big stick/cane, spots Yeti. Yeti looks super-fake and starts running toward him. Facial Hair somehow trips and slides down a hill real far, hurting his leg more. He hides and Yeti roar-growls. Yeti needs braces.

QB is setting up a marmot trap. Sarah thinks they should just stab 'em with a homemade spear. They bet on whether Peyton's suitcase trap will work. The rescuers are still hiking, two days later. They spot the survivors' fire. Peyton and Sarah see a bunny. The bunny investigates the trap, but they don't successfully catch it. Sarah spears it. Sarah threw javelin in high school. YUKYUKYUK. The survivors whine about eating a "rodent." Are rabbits rodents?

Okay, now Russian lady runs to wake up the American searcher guy. There are huge tracks near their campsite. They're simian, not bear tracks. Abominable snowman?! Headed towards fuselage. Broken Nose tries to recruit Dreadlocks to his team. He gets pissed when Peyton and Sarah don't come back with any meat. Broken Nose is ready to cut up some human meat. He goes to cut up Kira's brother, which is just tacky. Peyton and Broken Nose fight in the snow. Dreadlocks admits he'd eat the bodies. Sarah says no, Kira says anybody but her dead brother. Broken Nose is Raven. Another body is missing. Peyton says the plan may change if nobody comes by tomorrow to get them. The searchers find two left feet and some bloody snow. WORST PROM EVER, AMIRITE?

They've used their second to last match. Why have they let their fires go out? Just keep them going, and you won't need more matches. Peyton goes to cut up some meat from anybody but Eric. "We all just want to live, there's no shame in that." Using a glass shard from the crash, he cuts up some dude. At least they have a fire to cook it. Raven's got a piece of metal to cook it on over the fire. "Smells like chicken," says the guy who was in the bathroom during the crash. Kira says she can't. Later they're sleeping and wake up as Kira burns the remaining bodies. Dude, not cool. She says she's done the right thing. Dreadlocks/Rice is apparently some kind of biology major since he knew about Himalayan marmots and starts talking about mountain apes. Peyton says in the morning they'll try to hike out. Fucking Kira. FOR THE RECORD: I would eat frozen dead people to survive. You can eat my dead body to survive, too.

The remaining survivors are woken up in the middle of the night and Raven is ready to shoot the Yeti with the flare gun. He shoots as it tries to get inside their plane shelter, but wait, it's actually Garcia, Facial Hair who hiked back over five days with two broken legs, one of which was splinted with another dude's arm. But now he's dead! The radio he brought back is completely dead now, too. Oops.

Actual Yeti finds the burning bodies and growls with blood dripping from his mouth. Garcia's body is in the fuselage with the survivors. They cover it with a blanket and hear the Yeti roar-growling. It comes up to the fuselage and starts shoving it around, because  he has super strength, obviously. They try to arm themselves against it. Yeti has but three fingers on each hand. The rescue searchers are close and see him attacking the camp. Yeti pulls out the heart of the bathroom survivor guy and stomps the skull of the chick with him.

Oh, the Yeti can jump supernaturally far/high. Really shitty animation. Yeti grabs Sarah and Raven shoots at him with the flare gun, setting him on fire. Yeti recovers quickly and jumps away with Sarah. Raven and Rice won't let him go after her until light. All their gear says "State College." Creative. Peyton tells Raven and Rice they are free to leave just as the rescuers show up. The rescuers say they will help them find Sarah. Raven is NOT PLEASED.

I'm glad I finally moved to the other couch. I kept moving farther and farther to the end, but sleeping Isaac just shoved his feet into my hip again every time I moved. Sleeping Isaac's feet are assholes. Anyway, the team sets out to rescue Sarah. Sleeping Yeti wants to snuggle her, but she's a wake and scared now. The others now approach the cave. They're going to set off some kind of rocket thingy outside? Sarah escapes the sleeping Yeti's grasp as Peyton and the rescuer dude hold guns on him. As they all jump away from the cave entrance, the Russian lady shoots the Yeti into a hole and they were going to blow him up, I think, but now there's an avalanche and they've all got to run. They laugh and celebrate that they survive. Rescuer dude tells them there's a big hike ahead of them. Peyton and Sarah nearly make out first, though.

They say goodbye to the burnt-up bodies back by the fuselage. They all pay their respects to a football helmet set on top of a stick. In a shocking turn of events, as the sun sets, the Yeti IS STILL ALIVE. They have to set up camp for the night halfway to safety. Meanwhile, the Yeti slaps the football helmet away from their memorial because he is more of a soccer fan.

Next morning, Raven insists they stop so he can rest and pee. He scarfs down a chocolate bar he's squirreled away but doesn't get a chance to pee before the Yeti chases him. He runs back to the others and the Yeti chases all of them. Russian lady will call in the pick-up. Raven separates from the group, Yeti supernaturally jumps on him from far away and starts eating his neck. Russian lady shoots the Yeti a bunch. Bullets have no effect. Take a drink. Yeti jumps at her and squishes her skull (partially?). The other rescuer runs for the radio and shoots the Yeti some more. The Yeti runs at him and attacks and breaks off his leg or something and starts eating it.  Peyton's got the radio and calls for a helicopter pick up. He narrowly saves Kira from sliding off a cliff. It's those two, Sarah, and Rice left. Sarah's still got the makeshift hunting spear. I wonder if it will come in handy. (This is a lie, I do not wonder.)

They have accidentally run themselves to the edge of a cliff. The chopper approaches from one direction as Yeti comes from the other. Peyton calls him Chewbacca and tackles him in the snow. Yeti almost pulls him over the cliff, hanging on his leg. Peyton can't reach Sarah's hand as Yeti claws his foot. Peyton hangs from but one arm as the others rig something up to save him. They attach a rock to the spear with a chain. Sarah throws the spear at the Yeti and he gets pulled off the cliff. She helps Peyton up and he SOMEHOW ends up on top of her and they finally kiss. They have to be encouraged to get on the helicopter. They fly away back to safety.

Garcia, with his eye blown up, wakes up in the abandoned fuselage, alive. But a Yeti hand bursts out of the snow nearby. "You've got to be kidding me," he says. THE END. Haha.There is never any reference to a "curse" or a "demon," so take that as you will. This was pretty terriblmazing.

Anti-Energy Drink Review: Dream Water

Snoozeberries!

I like the sound of Dream Water. It's water. For dreaming. I've had a good amount of booze tonight, including some with an energy drink mixer, so my body/brain are all like, 4:00 a.m.? What do we do at this time, again? I've been meaning to try  the Dream Water, so here we go!

The active ingredients are some sort of concoction called SleepStat and has chemicals I am too lazy to research. Other ingredients involve "reverse osmosis treated water," which sounds pretty futuristic, so I'm on board. The little 2.5 ounce shot I got is supposedly "snoozeberry" flavor, which sounds amazing and also not unlike this. I'm going to take this shot and then start an episode of a new Korean drama and see what happens.

FLAVOR: It tastes kind of like maybe a strawberry Crystal Light or something: fruity, but not too thick.

EFFECTIVENESS: The drink says to take it half an hour before you want to crash. It's been fifteen minutes, and I'm definitely feeling more tired. It is also 4:30 in the morning, so you know, take that with some salt grains. At 35 minutes, I'm pretty much ready to go to bed, but I've got about ten minutes left in this episode, so I'll crash then. Nice and sleepy feeling, though.

OVERALL: I have no idea, because though I think it enhanced my sleepiness speed, I laid in bed for like an hour feeling a bit nauseous. Might've had something to do with mixing Limon, orange juice, vodka, Monster Absolutely Zero, and this Dream Water stuff over the course of several hours. Whatever. It's not the worst thing that ever happened to me.

April of the Day: Lazy insomniacs unite!

Hi friends,

I'm awake after 3:00 a.m., which is not that late for me and I am totes going to pour another drink because I don't have to be to work for 9 hours and booze is in the top 5 of my best friends (no numerical rankings available). But also April is amazing and I feel like I do shit like this on a regular basis, but then I see it on awesome TV shows and start to wonder if I'm, like, derivative. Then I remember that I met one of my closest friends in college calculus and my Perpetual Roommate kind of tutored me through it, so math ain't all bad. Anyway, why my half of the bedroom looks the way it does:

The rabbit hole starts here.

From the Late Night Cable Movie Files: Once Bitten

Once Bitten, an amazing-looking 1985 vampire flick starring Lauren Hutton and Jim Carrey (who knew he was making movies that early?) is rated with one star by the cable gods and is playing on the "Retro" network which I don't think I've ever even watched.

Another great movie about virginity!

Vampire Lauren Hutton sleeps in '80s exercise gear. She needs to drink virgin blood three times by Halloween. Her sassy black butler makes a "wrong side of the coffin" joke. Nobody can find a male virgin for her to hook up with in the next week. What will the Countess do if she doesn't make it? She may lose her eternal beauty!

Jim Carrey drives an ice cream truck and is trying to get it on with his girlfriend in the truck. Apparently he has no access to a bed. She's like, "I'm too good for fucking in your truck." Still a virgin, incredibly young Jim Carrey! Everybody else on Lover's Lane is doin' it but you. His pals at the creepy clown hamburger stand debate whether or not the pressure to get laid to prove one's masculinity is a good thing or not. (Seriously, but only very briefly.) One of them looks a bit like Pandora Boxx out of drag. In a good way, obvs. They're going to go out on the town to find some other, easier ladies. Watch out girls, ice cream man on the prowl! The vampires correctly peg the ice cream truck as full of virgins and call their boss.

The girls in West Hollywood like to do choreographed dances on the street and/or walk a pet LION? (Probably not ladies, actually.) Or they do bikini/car photo shoots on the sidewalk. Also, the title track "Once Bitten" is awesomely generically '80s. One of Jim/Mark's friends just ordered "three beers" and the waiter didn't even ask questions. Apparently at this bar, you can call different tables on lip-shaped phones. Buddy Russell says to Table 17 that he's into "Surfing, candlelight dinners, and Tolstoy." Yep, she's not a real lady! She calls him a sissy for not being into it.

The Countess calls Mark over to the bar and she is so hot. They're going to "share her champagne" AKA she totally drugged it. Mark's buddies get into a run-in with some lady's husband and Mark and Countess run off together before the cops show up. Countess gets him into her limo. Russell considers getting patted down by a lady cop "getting lucky." Mark gets taken back to Countess' mansion. She pours him some wine from her blood fridge and goes to "slip into something more comfortable." If she comes out in a giant t-shirt and sweats, I'll give this movie all the stars.

Haha butler Sebastian "came out of the closet centuries ago"! He can help her reapply her makeup because GAY. Mark admires the painting of naked Countess on the wall. He touches her painted boob! She's into the fact that he's in school to be an electrical engineer. And he rambles awkwardly as she bites off his shirt buttons and then takes his pants off. OMG Sebastian's casual jodhpurs. One of Countess' lackies is a Confederate soldier she turned back in the day. And there are a bunch of vampires that live in a coffin bunk room or something? Whatever. Countess doesn't give a shit if Mark has a girlfriend. She just has to suck his blood two more times.

Raw hamburger. Don't you just want to EAT HIM UP?!

 Apparently the Retro channel doesn't have commercials. Suddenly Mark wants rare hamburger (he wanted overcooked before). Vampiring much? Russell has a "Freelance Gynecologist" sweatshirt. (Ew.) Dear lord. Mark can't give them sexy details because he doesn't remember what happened. Too bad his GF overheard and she's pissed now! I can't believe he's abandoning that raw hamburger! The pastel pink Members Only jacket she's wearing is kind of amazing though. She gives back his ring! Suddenly Mark finds himself dissecting a frog in front of a class he's not even in? The worst part is that he's wearing sunglasses inside. Next, his dad with super high-waisted pants comes into Mark's room and finds him napping in a large trunk. He's pale and hasn't been sleeping at night.

How you say, "Double standard"?

Mark dreams of/maybe actually does get together with Countess again somewhere where there is a lot of dry ice. FACT: I learned from a junior high choir performance of a Phantom of the Opera medley that dry ice smoke makes me sneeze! Nope, just a dream. Robin (the ex) is now wearing white baggy shortalls with a denim shirt. HOT! Somehow he talks her into getting back together because she feels guilty she hasn't given him any yet, and also it's a jumper, not overalls. Still tacky. Men have such insatiable libidos, you guys! Countess is 400 years old and misses being able to snap up clueless, virgin shepherds and get their blood easily.

Russell and Mark's other friend go to pick up chicks at the laundromat. OBVS. Russell makes the other one approach some poor girl. I'd be PISSED if some dude tried to hit on my while I was laundering. Russell gets scared when some other lady actually responds to his overtures. FEMALE SEXUAL DESIRE IS DANGEROUS! Also, the other friend (Jamie/Pandora) got shoved in a dryer. All the clothes in the store Robin works at are white or pastel pink for some reason. She is wearing giant pleated white pants now, guys! OMG, Mark is trying on pants at the store and Countess is hiding in the dressing room. Robin's pants are cropped, too! And Countess is ruining things with Robin. Also, she just non-consensually sucked his blood in the dressing room. Apparently she sucks it out of his dick? Countess is going to get rid of Robin.

Sometimes I want to be like this to old people on the phone at work who ask me questions that I have no answers to but then I just Google it for them because they are old.

Mark only wants to wear black clothes now and the sunlight bothers his eyes. Mark's dad jogs in a gray sweatsuit with a hoodie and little navy blue shorts over the top. Majestically '80s. Mark just looks emo now. He hisses at some small children who wanted to buy ice cream. Uh-oh! I think he's going through vampire puberty, you guys. He tries to go to confession, but it's not a priest, just a drunk homeless guy in the booth or whatever. Now Mark dreams of being a full-blown vampire as Countess encourages him to suck virginal Robin's blood. Foreshadowing much?

Mark is dressed in all black and Robin is pissed that she is Jill (without Jack) for the Halloween Hop. Mark keeps insisting that's he's not wearing a costume, but everybody thinks he's a vampire. Countess cuts in on the dance floor. Ruh-roh! To the amazing song "Hands Off" Robin and Countess dance-fight for Mark. And he plays air guitar on his leg.

You think it's wild now? Via.

Countess is at least 175 years too old to be at this college dance, but Robin tears off her skirt and is wearing a lace skirt over a high-cut leotard that's white (to duel with Countess' black one). Catfight! Mark is having trouble making a decisions. Robin wins and they do a choreographed dance together! I keep thinking she is Kelli Kapowski, but she is not. Since when is Robin wearing lace hand thingies?

Slightly more wild AKA convenient lace skirt and leotard under "Jill" costume.

Mark finally figures out that he's turning into a vampire because he has no reflection. Some man with a muddled "foreign" accent helps Robin do research at a bookstore. He says there's NO WAY an 18 year-old dude is still a virgin ahahahaha! She convinces his bros to look on his inner thigh for "sores" AKA fang marks. Totally heterosexual man shower time! Haha, they have to look at their friend's junk! Uh-oh, some dude called a "Fag Alert" in the shower! The whole school thinks they're gay. AWKWARD! Jamie thinks they really must be gay now: "We're homos, we're rough rangers." Is that a thing? Maybe it's an '80s gay slur. I did some googling and I think he said "rump rangers." Ew.

Anyway, Countess kidnaps Robin so Mark will come back to her murder mansion to save her. He brings his bros along to save the day. They untie Robin way too easily and run into a bunch of tuxedoed vampbros. Since when are there twin vampbros? Countess is going to tie Mark to a dental chair and suck his inner thigh blood. HARD. If he gets away somehow, will he still be a part-vamp? The vampbros let the humans go. Robin thinks Mark doesn't actually want Countess because she's "mean and evil" but Robin is "nice and sweet and pure." Gross. Do you guys think there might be some virgin/whore symbology happening here?

Not into the whole "transformation" thing. Via.

Getting away blahblahblah, vampires not afraid of crosses, only fire. Noted. Extended chase scene throughout the mansion. There's a body chute or something they just slid down. Fun! Meanwhile, Jamie and Russell get seduced by ladyvamps.

More or less comfortable than a dorm bed? BTWs, Sebastian is judging you SO HARD right now.

Mark and Robin do it in a coffin in the meantime so Countess can't use his virgin blood anymore. Wah-WAH, at the stroke of midnight, she's OLD. And now they're doing it again in the coffin instead of escaping from the vampires. And they put the lid down and also, I feel like they probably don't have condoms in there. Oh, the '80s.

Kind of awesome? 3/5 ironic thumbs up!

BTWs: This is my 666th post! Coincidence? NEVER! 

Mood-Enhancing Drink Review: neuroBLISS

We all know how relaxed LL is, right? Image found here.

Oh hey guys, are you still here after witnessing my latest "artistic" project? It's 3:30 a.m. (so really, I wouldn't think about going to bed for an hour or so), I've just finished the last of a few (several?) glasses of vodka and lemonade, and have decided it is time to review the neuroBLISS drink. (Don't blame me for the ridiculous capitalization situation, that's just how Neuro or neuro or neUrO or whatever rolls). The BLISS drink is a lightly carbonated beverage that promises to help me "de-stress the healthy way." STOP JUDGING ME FOR USUALLY COPING THROUGH INVESTIGATION DISCOVERY MARATHONS AND BOOZE, NEURO. Geez!

Supposedly BLISS will reduce my stress, enhance my mood (but it is somehow not drugs?), help me focus (important at this time of day), and give me a more positive outlook. Clearly Neuro has never met me or anyone in my family. As my father once stated (as I recall), all of us kids came out of our upbringing with a firmly sarcastic view of life and a negative attitude. Not sure BLISS can change that kind of hardwiring, but I'll give it a go. The only active ingredient that does not look like a chemical is chamomile. It also contains this stuff. If this drink manages to make me feel good and accomplish some sort of task, I will enter myself into the neuroBLISS giveaway!*

FLAVOR: Bubbly. Vaguely citrus-y. Not bad, really. Because it comes in a white plastic bottle, I was a little paranoid it would taste like coconut. We all know how I feel about coconut. EW. The flavor and the carbonation are pretty chill, so no need to worry it is chemically or super-harsh like, let's be honest, most energy/performance-enhancing beverages are.

EFFECTIVENESS: 15 minutes in, I feel little to no "outlook" change, but I certainly feel no worse than before, which in my life these days is a small victory. After about half an hour and half the drink, I do think I feel more chilled out than I might normally. Or I'm getting naturally tired, but we all know that doesn't usually  happen before 6:00 a.m., so it seems to be doing something for me.

It took me about an hour to drink the whole thing, and it was generally pleasant-tasting. I can't say that I feel giddy joy or like I just got a full-body massage or something, so I'm not sure I can specifically vouch for the strongest of BLISS's claims. I do feel relaxed, but perhaps to really know if it's seriously "working," I should drink one when I'm in the throes of anxiety. Alas, M80 only sent me one free BLISS drink to try, but you can win several that may come in AN ATTRACTIVE BOX if you enter my goddamn contest.

So anyway, recommended, though further research is necessary to see if it can replace my Prozac.


*Seriously though, why haven't you entered this contest yet? It is not a scam. In fact, if you enter said drink giveaway (for either the case of BLISS or the case of SONIC), I will color you a picture in one of my myriad coloring books and mail you that shit, even if more than one person enters and you don't win the drinks. MY COLORINGS ARE FAMOUS, PEOPLE. Usually I add sarcastic captions and poorly-drawn details that will fill you with horror/glee.

Anti-Energy Drink Review: Neuro Sleep

A while back, I positively reviewed the Neuro Sonic energy drink. I recently acquired one of the company's sleepy-time beverages because for science and also a lifetime of insomnia/nightowlishness. Also, my brother said they work pretty well, and since I usually sleep from about 6:30 a.m.-3:00 p.m., maybe I could drink this and get myself to bed earlier. Or whatever, I just want to see what it feels like and it is already 4:30 in the morning and I am only marginally tired. Though I would be getting ready for bed right now anyway and would probably just go do crossword puzzles in bed for at least an hour, but only after my rigorous dental hygiene regime. I no longer have insurance, people, I have to take extra care!

I call bullshit if I don't have dreams about laying on a hammock between two bright orange palm trees.

IMPORTANT NOTE: I had a Diet Coke at like 10:30 earlier this evening and my caffeine tolerance is quite a bit lower right now than usual since unemployment/not ever having to be anywhere, and also I've had some booze. Results with fewer chemicals in one's system will inevitably vary.

This beverage will apparently help me have a more restful sleep and "normalize" my sleep patterns (HAHA NICE TRY EVERYTHING NEVER GONNA HAPPEN), also relieve muscle cramps, and also help me relax. This bev contains melatonin (heard of that), magnesium (heard of that), and L-theanine, which I am too lazy to look up. Let's try this shit and see what happens.

FLAVOR: The drink itself is non-carbonated and orange in color. First sip reminds me of not just simple orange juice, but perhaps something tangerine-y. It's got a good tang to it, though not thick and icky like Sunny Delight or something. Fact: I think one of the reasons I've always hated SunnyD is because my parents used to bring it on road trips, so it just reminds me of being carsick. The screwdriver was my default cocktail at home for many years, but I usually didn't order it at bars because they often used some sort of gross knock-off SunnyD instead of legit orange juice. Which is all to say that this drink tastes okay.

EFFECTIVENESS: Ten minutes and about 30% in, I feel slightly more tired. But it is 4:45 a.m. and I did go on a kind of epic bike ride today. So it is hard to say at this point, is what I'm saying. Ten minutes later and slightly over halfway through, I'm feeling pretty good about the direction of my sleepies. Though I have to say I do actually like doing crossword puzzles before bed, and I don't think it's going to happen tonight. I'm contemplating whether I can floss right now. I'm mostly concerned about mint/orangey taste clash I suppose, but I'll let you know how it goes. Boy, I really am getting sleepy. Update: the combo of flavors is kinda weird, but I'm getting tired enough that I don't care. It's now 5:05 and I'm just going to chug the last 25% of this so I can get my teeth brushed too before I crash.

Next day update: This drink made me get pretty sleepy much faster than normal, and though I stayed up writing about it, I fell asleep earlier than I probably would have reading or crosswording in bed.

Overall, I'd recommend it as a sleep aid, though drinking it and brushing my teeth in a short time span was a real concern for me because of flavor-clashing. However, I slept solidly for several hours before waking up for the first time this morning, which thanks to alcohol and anxiety, can sometimes be a problem. Obviously I went back to sleep until 3:00 p.m., and I can't say that I feel any sort of Neuro hangover. Or you can just try the new "We all know why you really use Nyquil, so let's just stop pretending" stuff. Whatever.

From the Late Night Cable Movie Files: My Bloody Valentine

Apparently this shitty remake came out in theaters. In 3D. I will concede that those mining masks are pretty fucking creepy.

Guys, I watched this movie a couple of nights ago with Isaac on the Syfy channel. We missed the first ten minutes, but its terrible/awesomeness sucked us in. I should say that I was too lazy to blog it at the time and apparently this is a 2009 remake of a 1981 film. But I will blog it ANYWAY. I will Google some photos, but mostly I will recall the highlights from my own (now) drunken memory and I am sure it will fill you all with magic and you will be like, "Netflix, send me this shit!"

Soooo, apparently ten years ago a disgruntled mine worker named Harry went crazy or something (I didn't see the beginning, so sue me) and killed, like, a bunch of people. The police shot him a lot maybe and/or he was buried alive in the murder mines. Teenagers like Tom and Axel and a redheaded woman and some other chick barely escaped with their lives. Okay fine, the redhead is named Sarah.

FLASH FORWARD 10 YEARS: Tom, whose father owned the notorious mines, comes back to town following his padre's death to sell the mines to the highest bidder, who will probably bring in some out-of-state hardcore miners to replace all the townspeople who RELY ON THE MINES for economic stuff or whatever. People are pissed he is going to sell the mines. Also, that he ran away immediately following that time when that crazed miner almost killed him. But Sarah is like, "Oh, hey." And they used to date ten years ago, but now she's married to "Axel," which is not a name outside of Scandinavia, and they have a little boy and also he's a philanderer and the town's sheriff. OBVS.

Shortly after Tom reaches town, some dude gets killed, and then another dude, and then a gratuitously naked lady whose nipples have been tastefully edited out for the cable viewing audience. With a PICKAXE, which was old Harry's weapon of choice. Blahblahblah don't remember, suspicion falls on Tom pretty early. FACT: about 36 minutes in (including commercials), I said to Isaac, I says, "It seems pretty clear Tom's the killer, but it's too early for that, so there's got to be a twist." SPOILER ALERT: Tom is the killer. Tom is played by some generic CW actor and I didn't want him to be the killer, but apparently he's been in lots of mental hospitals because of, like, PTSD or whatever, and/or the evil spirit of Harry is possessing him?

Note: Harry is dead. He is totally dead and not killing more people now.

I could explain all the shit that happens in the movie or whatever, but this is all you need to know. You figure out the killer super-early and though there are a few spectacular deaths (one early on involves mid-skull decapitation with a mining shovel), it's mostly just shitty but compelling enough to keep watching. Even though Axel is cheating on his wife and has sketchy facial hair, do not be confused. He is just a terrible husband, not an actual killer. And Tom is super mentally ill, so it's not even fun in an evil kind of way. Oh also, the original massacre took place on Valentine's Day. Hence the title and all the chocolate boxes that sometimes have human hearts inside, etc.

Whatevs.

Final rating: 3/5 ironic thumbs up. Fun enough with all the cartoonish violence, but the real killer was way too obvious.

From the Late Night Cable Movie Files: Tales from the Darkside: The Movie

Spoiler alert: we're having Debbie for dinner!

Tonight, the midnight Lifetime Movie Network movie sounded basically like The Vow with reversed genders and probably more sordid murder, so I was pleased to see a real American Movie Classic playing on AMC: Tales from the Darkside: The Movie, a suitably terrible-looking substitute. Apparently Tales from the Darkside (yes, oneword) was a shitty '80s Twilight Zone ripoff produced by Godfather of All Zombies George Romero. And then in 1990, there was a movie with a shocking number of recognizable actors in it. Well, they're recognizable now anyway. Let me tell you a little bit about the premise of this film:

In the "wraparound" story, Debbie Harry from Blondie is a suburban witch (like black magic witch, not just mean) who is prepping for tonight's dinner party. The main dish for tonight is to be the middle Lawrence brother (the one that was on Boy Meets World), who is locked in her dungeon/pantry. She is upset little Not-Joey doesn't like the scary story book she left him to keep him entertained while obtaining other ingredients at the grocery store, but he changes his tune and promises to tell (read?) her some really good ones from the book to stall her from vivisecting and cooking him. Witchy Debbie loves the first story and puts off cooking him through two more. I will do you the favor of summarizing the content of each of these stories within the story.

1. "Lot 249"
In this spine-tingling tale, today's critically-acclaimed stars act out a plot nearly as cheesy as a David Duchovny-written episode of The X-Files. Basically some poor man's Cary Elwes is a rich snob whose girlfriend Julianne Moore writes him a scholarship essay that will let him pick up a Maserati while traveling in Europe this summer. Julianne Moore's brother Christian Slater goes to the same college and lives in a creepy old apartment building being passed off as a dorm with giant fireplace-containing apartments. His downstairs neighbor is a somehow even skinnier than now Steve Buscemi. Buscemi's "part-time" job involves trafficking antiquities while he's not writing his master's thesis in somethingorather. OBVIOUSLY.

Long story short, Buscemi figures out the blond guy and Julianne Moore set him up so he would lose the scholarship, which he actually needs because, like, he needs money even though he apparently has enough to buy a genuine 3000 year-old Egyptian sarcophagus complete with resurrectible mummy! He also has it delivered to his apartment by regular moving guys somehow. Buscemes can of course read and translate ancient hieroglyphics from some magic scroll to make the mummy wake up and kill his enemies. Christian Slater thinks he gets Buscemi back for killing his sister and best friend by burning up the mummy piece-by-piece and what turns out to be a phony scroll. But Buscemi actually turned the murder victims into new mummies that will do his bidding and get Christian Slater. Highlight: when the mummy crams Julianne Moore's boyfriend's funeral flowers into her cut-open back while she's still alive.

2. "Cat from Hell"
The senile father from Forget Paris is a rich old man in a mansion who hires a hitman to kill an evil black cat. The cat kills everyone. AWESOME special effects.

3. "Lover's Vow"
Some struggling artist witnesses a monster kill some guy in an alley, but the monster will spare the artist if he promises to never tell anyone about what he saw. A mysterious new woman appears in his life and helps turn everything around. On their tenth anniversary, he tells his now-wife about the secret monster, who of course secretly IS the monster and now turns back into it. Haha! It looks like a giant gremlin. Haha! Their two beautiful daughters are also little gremlins now! And they've turned (back?) into a gargoyle. Highlight: understated Gremlins cross-marketing.

Back in the witch kitchen (witchen?). Oh, little Timmy got abducted while out collecting for his brother's paper route. Paper routes are so rife with dangerous magical beings. Anyway, Timmy plays a trick on the witch with marbles and she falls on her sharp child-cutting tools and he manages to unlock himself and he shoves her in the oven "Hansel and Gretel"-style. The actual end.

Overall rating: 3/5 ironic thumbs up.

Still awake at 8:00 a.m.: random ramblings

Since returning from the west coast homestead, I have been hit with a nasty bout of insomnia. No, not the kind where you can't sleep at all, but the kind where you can't go to sleep until some ungodly early hour of the morning like somewhere between 6:00 and 8:00 a.m. But then I don't get out of bed until 4:00 p.m., and I'm sure the caffeinated alcoholic beverages I hold so dear don't help matters much. I've taken to coming out to the couch to read so as not to disturb the slumbering boyfriend (or sometimes reminding him that he has his own house). Doesn't seem to be working today. Maybe I'm just super-excited that we will be doing a real-life tour of a presidential museum tomorrow (AKA this afternoon)! Have I mentioned that Isaac gave me this awesome 3-CD set, Of Great and Mortal Men: 43 Songs for 43 U.S. Presidencies, which is pretty much the best idea ever, if nothing else. I haven't gotten to volume 3 yet, but so far I really dig the songs about Tyler, Taylor, and Arthur. God knows I love me some obscure one-term nineteenth-century presidents! Gaza's burning. So, that's awesome. On BBC news on PBS earlier, we were depressed/unsurprised to learn that not only are the vast majority of casualties civilians, but the Israelis won't let more doctors and humanitarian workers in to help. Luckily (somehow-dear lord, seriously?-STILL) President Bush ♥ Israel! So we're totes not going to do anything until they're good and done defending themselves. In other news, apparently the Frankenmeister has probs won the Minnesota senate race. Douchebag McColeman's gonna sue, but hopefully that won't pan out.