Korean Snack Reviews #3

 Well it's been about 3 months but now there's another one of these. How are you doing? How's the family?

1.

Translated Name: King Sura

Review:

I didn't take a picture of the snack because what you see on the package is pretty accurate. The only thing I would say is that they look orange on the package but they're more brown in person. These are like thick Frosted Flakes with a thin crispy crust - not just what they look like but what they taste like - but then at the end there's a subtle flavor of something like sesame seed. I immediately was wondering how popular these are. I can see myself being at work and being in the mood for cereal so I'd get these out of the vending machine.

2.

Translated Name: White Heim - White Hazelnut

Review:

So with a name like "White Heim" you'd guess that it's probably the product of another country but perhaps popular in Korea but AskJeeves tells me it really is from Korea. Perhaps they give it a European-sounding name for flair. They look like this:

When you were a kid, did your grandparents give you Sugar Wafers? These are like a fancier version of that. This was excellent, although it's not so exotic, it's one of the best things in the whole collection. If I'm being really critical, there is a strange aftertaste that isn't pleasant. Perhaps strange, more complex flavors come with attempting fanciness. I don't know. Really good.

3.

Translated Name: Sweet Red Bean Jelly

Review:

Well with the name "Sweet Red Bean Jelly" I think the review writes itself. In some sense it tastes like nothing but yet it somehow tastes really gross. How is that possible? Buy some for yourself. 

I actually took a photo of the actual food but this post has been in development for 4 months. So I recently looked at the photos on my phone, saw the photo of this, didn't remember what it meant and said "What the heck was that?" - Delete. Just imagine a rectangle of dark jelly substance.

4.

Translated Name: Banana Kick - Banana Puff

Review:

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to combine the form of cheese puffs with the taste of banana? No? Well here it is:

What you think of these hinges on how you feel about that artificial "banana" flavor. I love banana flavor so I'm onboard.  Did you ever wonder why artificial banana flavor doesn't actually taste like banana? It's because the "banana" flavor was originally based on a type of banana that no longer exists. The banana that is most common today has a flavor that's more chemically complex and harder to replicate so candy producers keep using the old one.

Puff snacks with the taste of banana - that's pretty much it. Every once in a while you may hit a vein of salt but not much.

Generally going through all the snacks, there's an apparent tradeoff between exotic and good - the things I'm tending to like are things that have American analogs - but this is one of the few things in the entire collection that is both really weird and pretty good.

5.

Translated Name: Syrup Coated Rice Senbei

Review:

So, first off, "senbai" is a Japanese word meaning rice crackers. So this is a Korean product with an English transliteration of a Japanese word. And not only that, it also has Chinese writing on it. It's tri-lingual.

Just picking it up, you know something's different. There's a certain heft that comes with a cookie whereas this is very, very light. Aaaand, true to form it tastes like the other rice cracker I ate (See: Korean Snack 2.2). Rice crackers be not my thing, yo.

So that's everything. Was it worth the wait? Perhaps we'll have another installment in another 4 months. We can have up to 3 of these per year and this can go on indefinitely.

Conan Says Farewell

 

It's the "end of an era" or whatever... I don't know.

If you'd like to see the remote where Conan met his wife, it's this one:

The Song Remains the Same Review

 

According to him, the highlight is "Dazed and Confused" but for me, it's "No Quarter." And I forgot all about the gangster shootout - I always skip to the music.

RedLetterMedia Makes It Onto 3 Emmy Ballots

RedLetterMedia reports that they have made it onto 3 Emmy Ballots. 

I don't know the full process of how people are nominated and how those nominees are whittled down or anything. I expect they probably won't be a finalist even though they're better than the other nominees.

The Best of the Worst episode that's up for nomination is the Halloween episode. You can see that here:

Interestingly, the Half in the Bag nomination doesn't list a specific episode. That doesn't make sense to me but like I said, I'm no expert.

Never Been Kissed

"Never Been Kissed." Have you seen this movie, I mean, have you SEEN this?

I had never seen this movie. I vaguely remember when it came out and I never saw it on tv reruns or at a friend's house or anything. I recently decided to check it out since it stars Mike Stoklasa and Rich Evans.

This movie is insane. It's not of this world. It's like aliens tried to make a romantic comedy using fragments of knowledge gleaned from watching other movies, not knowing how human society actually functions. It's like the latter works of Adam Sandler if they were filled with real actors. "Adam Sandler" is probably the best way I can describe it - it's like no one in the movie acts like a real person and nothing that happens would really happen. It's like a dream.

I was completely unable to watch this movie in one sitting, which is not as bad as it sounds. See, I watched it in 10 minute increments across many days as if it was a fantastic tv series and I didn't want to run out of episodes. Many days I wouldn't watch it at all because I didn't want it to end. And 10 minutes was about all I could take at any given time before my head would explode. Nothing in this movie made sense to me and I was completely entertained.

I wanted to know, is it just me, was I in a weird mood, is it just the era of the 90s? I mean, I don't remember specifically, but I remember this being a standard 90s movie. If I watched "Edtv" or "Miss Congeniality" will they all be like this? I'm almost afraid to find out. What did Roger Ebert say? Roger Ebert gave this a positive review! I'm so lost.

There isn't a "How Did This Get Made" episode about this movie but there needs to be.

Old Man Cries at Clouds

 

I've gone down the rabbit hole of "People Seeing Color for the First Time" videos. Youtube keeps suggesting and I keep clicking. In case you haven't seen them, there are two rules: 1) it's (almost) always a man and 2) they always cry "get emotional".

This guy telling everyone how much of a tough guy he is is perfect... a little too perfect. But I don't want to be cynical. I have to assume it's genuine.

The idea of crying at the blue of a sky or the green of the grass is so novel that it's entertaining. But I suspect (and it can only be a suspicion) that they are correct and it's the rest of us who are wrong. But it does seem impossible to reverse world-weariness. It's very difficult to not take things for granted when we so lack the imagination to picture them being any other way

A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. - G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy