i quit energy drinks
Nobody my age should be drinking this stuff.
My energy drink of choice was Monster Lo-Carb. I liked the taste, and it is truly low on Calories at under 50 per can.
I started drinking Lo-Carb years ago in my 30s and didn't stop until recently because I finally found a substitute that actually works for me.
This is not going to be one of those stories where an energy drink messed me up or anything like that, although I will say three things:
- I purposely limited myself to two cans a day because I learned the hard way that drinking more than that would make me dizzy.
- Sometimes it would taste great and other times just plain bad. This happened for the entire time I drank Lo-Carb. It was a total crapshoot whether I'd get a "good one" or not whenever I cracked open a can.
- Lo-Carb ruined the taste of other things. If I drank a Lo-Carb and chased that with a sandwich, I'd barely taste the sandwich. I'd have to wait a bit after drinking a can before eating or drinking anything else.
Did I experience any withdrawals quitting energy drinks?
No. None whatsoever.
I thought for sure I would feel some kind of withdrawal, depression or some other not-so good feelings. Nothing of the sort happened.
What happened instead is that my head cleared up. Whenever I drank a Lo-Carb, my mind would feel "busy". That's the best way I can describe it. That busy-mind feeling would sometimes make it difficult to concentrate.
And why didn't I notice this before? I was used to it. It was only after I quit energy drinks did I realize hey, my mind isn't periodically racing around for no reason.
What am I drinking now?
Three things for the most part:
Powerade ZeroI tried this stuff and found it really agrees with me. Some people hate the taste of this stuff, but I like it.
Powerade is leagues better than energy drinks because it has no carbonation and no caffeine.
I can count quitting energy drinks as also quitting soda, since Lo-Carb was carbonated. Nothing I drink has any carbonation in it now.
Coffee
I take my coffee weak and limit myself to two cups daily. And most of the time I just drink one cup a day.
Ice water
Generally speaking, I don't like the taste of straight water unless it's really cold. For example, I'll take a Powerade bottle, fill that all the way to the top with ice, then fill with water, and I'm good with that.
A Powerade bottle is nice to use for this since it has a wide-mouth top. Yeah, I know it's not as good as a proper water bottle, but it works for me.
What do I mean by "Nobody my age..."?
I'm a Gen X, and there's not a single one of us that's under 44 at the time I write this.
Nobody over 40 should be drinking energy drinks. Some would probably argue that it should be nobody over 30.
I was the idiot still knocking back energy drinks. Yeah. Me. This guy.
Again, energy drinks didn't mess me up while I was drinking them, but it's absolutely a good thing that I quit consuming that stuff.
I'm not saying everybody should go drink Powerade instead. I just happen to like it. Maybe you would like G Zero, who knows.
I however will say that nobody over 40 should be piling in massive amounts of caffeine and energy blends into their system. That's what I was doing, and that was dumb. I now know better.
Weirdest 2024 Fender Stratocaster guitar color
Oh, do you have to pay a pretty penny just to get this.
Take a look at the Fender 70th Anniversary Ultra Stratocaster HSS. It's expensive, and it only comes in one color. That color is called Amethyst.
Actual amethyst is quartz with a violet color to it. And yeah, I think Fender did translate that to a finish fairly well. The color does "move" as far as I can tell and definitely looks like something upscale. And yes, this is the kind of finish that does change color depending on how you look at it.
Is this guitar all about the paint? Of course not, and there's certainly more to it.
Loaded in this guitar is the Ultra Quadra Tap humbucker and noiseless middle and neck pickups. The neck is roasted maple and does have a compound 10-inch to 14-inch fingerboard radius. Frets are of the medium jumbo size (which I personally prefer).
The body is sculpted and contoured everywhere, front and back. And you get locking tuners.
For the electronics, it's the best of everything Fender has. That Quadra Tap humbucker can be switched over to a single-coil easily, S-1 switching is present, and so is treble bleed circuitry.
On top of all that, it does come with a black tweed hardshell case. If you haven't seen one of those, it does look cool. I actually like it better than the regular tweed case color.
In the end however, it's that Amethyst finish that sells the guitar more than anything else.
Amethyst is, by far, the weirdest Fender color for 2024. But at the same time it's also the most interesting. The color "moves", shines, plays with light and just does neat things regular finishes do not.
This Strat, again, is not cheap, but yeah you do get some seriously good exclusivity with this one. Nobody is going to be able to copy this color. It would be exceedingly difficult to make a fake of this. And that's a good thing.
Pearloid pick guards are dopey but cool
I think pearloid a.k.a. "mother of toilet seat" has come around to the point where it's cool again. It's still dopey due to it being an obvious fake fancy. But when I look at it now, I think yeah, not bad and I like it again. As you see on the Squier Classic Vibe '70s Stratocaster (only on the black one), it can work.
What do I mean by fake fancy? Let's talk about that.
A fancy that's real is abalone. If you look up abalone pick guards, you will see much more in the way of intricate designs, colors that "move", some very nice artsy-farsty things, and so on.
The whole "mother of toilet seat" joke comes from two things. There's mother of pearl, of which a ton of musical instrument stuff exists for that, and the fact decorative toilet seats did use a very similar pattern.
To the best of my knowledge, pearloid is just a way of taking cheap acrylic and fancying up the look.
I don't know what specific decade pearloid guards appeared. But I do remember that in the '90s, a pearloid pick guard on a Stratocaster was considered quite the upscale option. Every other Strat guard was just a plain color, but pearloid, ooh ahh, now we're in fancy pants territory.
The pearloid guard was around for a time and then went away. Now it appears on the Squier guitar seen above, and that one is supposedly a '70s inspired design.
Is it?
The headstock is definitely '70s-era Fender, but as far as I know, pearloid isn't a '70s-specific thing.
Seeing more wood on electric guitars is absolutely a '70s thing. And, sure enough, the Squier '70s Strat has a natural finish version.
But black finish + pearloid guard? Not really '70s.
I'm not saying it's a bad look, because it totally works. It's teetering on the edge of being cheesy/ugly but stays above board just enough to hold that fake fancy look without appearing ridiculous.
What I'm saying is that I like it. Ten years ago, no. But now? Yes. Pearloid has come around.
How I made my sneakers fit correctly
A while ago (possibly about a year?), I bought a pair of Skechers Vigor sneakers because they offer a wide size and have a nice unassuming appearance to them.
The sneakers arrive in the mail, I put them on, and they fit but at the same time they didn't.
I figured these things are new so they have to be broken in. I tried wearing them for a few days but they still felt wrong.
I made a decision at that point.
They went back in the shoebox and in the closet.
Even though they didn't fit the way I liked, I figured I'd keep them anyway as a backup pair for when my tried-and-true New Balance 608's wear out.
Recently, the time finally came when I had to retire my 608's. They were very used, beat up, starting to fall apart and looking terrible.
I was going to put on a new pair of 608's, but then remembered I had the Skechers in the closet.
My thought was okay, money was spent on those sneakers. I'm going to try an experiment to see if I can make these things fit correctly.
I took out the soles.
What I figured was these would make the sneakers feel even worse...
...but that didn't happen.
I put on the Skechers and now they felt great.
Perfect? No. But way better than before. NOW I can wear these things.
What I realized is the memory foam sole used in the Skechers Vigor is way too thick, so much to the point it felt like I was walking on putty. Those memory foam soles also made my feet sweat like crazy. I have no idea why. They just did.
Without the soles, my feet breathe properly and I can wear these Skechers all day comfortably.
It's probably true these sneakers will wear out twice as fast without the soles in them. I'm okay with that since they didn't fit correctly before anyway, so getting them into a wearable state is a win. I saved these things.
Small victory, but I'll take it.
Eating ridiculous cookies, Oreo Space Dunk
I rarely buy Oreos or cookies in general, but when I saw the Oreo Space Dunk cookies, yeah I had to get them.
It was actually the appearance that sold me on them because it looks like an '80s arcade. You've got the packaging with the big 3-D SPACE DUNK letters on it, starry night in the background, and so on. The cookie itself has a spaceship on it. It totally works.
Is there a difference between regular Oreos and Space Dunk? In fact, yes.
The creme is different in look because it's blue and purple even though it tastes the same as the regular creme.
The taste is the same as regular Oreos, however, it has a small amount of popping candy added in. Think of it as a light sprinkling of Pop Rocks.
You'd think this would be a bad combination, but it surprisingly works because the popping candy was kept to a reasonable level. The popping doesn't happen immediately but it's definitely there.
Ridiculous cookie? Yes. But they're fun, and that's the whole point...
...and fun enough to where it actually got me to get some, which is saying something. I've passed by Oreos many times in the candy aisle at the supermarket and never given them a second thought. Space Dunk Oreos got my attention, so yeah, the packaging worked and the cookie delivered.