Salt versus Pepper

Our homes are not safe. Our children are not safe. Our bakes potatoes haven't got a prayer.
Salt and Pepper have infiltrated the sanctity of our homes. Intimately cozied up to our dinner tables. But like two cats forced into the same apartment - who ever asked salt and pepper if they wanted to spend eternity next to each other? Scratch that. Who ever asked salt and pepper if they wanted to spend eternity next to each other at every kitchen table?

Take a peek at a good old US dollar bill. Nothing more ubiquitous, no? Everyone's got one - maybe 4. Even if it isn't one's legal tender, it's still iconic. Most people in the world could identify one. I wonder how.... maybe it's that goofy eye pyramid on the back. Maybe it's George W. Maybe they're both giant flaming symbols of the Illuminati and Freemasonry. Maybe every American is walking around carrying these symbols unknowingly. Maybe these (this) group has infiltrated every aspect of modern living. Maybe... Maybe we don't eat money.

Even more ubiquitous and perhaps more sinister are salt and pepper. So commonplace that they have ingrained themselves into our rituals of good luck and worse yet: digestion. Salt. Seducing people and dogs and deer with its sultry allure. And pepper! Never far away. Lurking in the shadow of salt and indeed within shadows everywhere. Comfy in its night time camouflage. They know oneanother's secrets. They know the best ways to cut one another down. Variety is key. What better way to outstrip an opponent than to parry with a variety of incarnations. I suppose there's sea salt and there's iodized salt and there's table salt aaaand that's about it. These salt "incarnations" might as well be thought of as salt deformities. They are all perversions of the one true NaCl.
Pepper on the other hand. Well. just look up Wiki's friendly little "list of capsicum cultivars." ZING!

Pepper does seem to be in something of an identity crisis though. What with




and
Hm. Perhaps all that means is Pepper's got his M.D. And ya know what? I say good for him.

But this is no easy battle. This is one that has been raging for centuries. And lets not forget (and ponder) how long these foes have lasted and will last.


Both sides have plenty of firepower but they must get exhausted at some point. For salt that would be when all the mine-able salt and all the salt in the oceans is used up. Ok so peppers just gotta wait around for oh something in the ball park of 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 some odd years. Can it wait that long? Well lucky for pepper, that shit is a plant. And no matter how hard we try. Those pesky green things just keep on keepin' on. Plants are renewable. The reproduce asexually. Hell, they even regenerate. REGENERATE did you ever see Heroes? that shits the key. You can never die! Salts got plenty of nasty little tricks too. Let us not forget about. Um. Hypertension! No, or drymouth! Yeah. Two things that don't matter shit for plants. And luck for them, cause I hear salt fights dirty.



get your head out of your ass.

So, when I finish this glass of bourbon or maybe the one after that. I won't be reaching for the chips and salsa. No no, friends. I will be headed toward the saltines. Or better yet - the Gold fish. But you better believe I'm going to bring a club and turn on all the lights on my way. Cause if it came between running into salt or pepper in a dark alley, I'd prefer the former.

Coffee vs. Espresso

Forgive me if this seems like just another game that schoolboys play during recess. But believe me, it’s not. This isn’t another round of Star Trek vs. Star Wars or girls vs. boys – no my friends, this is an entirely different battle – one that is deeply seated in ethnicity, the class struggle, and hatred. On the one hand, we have coffee, the choice drink of millions of hard-working Americans; and on the other hand, we have espresso, the infamous choice of European dandies, writers, artists, etc. Does the question still seem a bit plebeian? Well, that’s pretty much what it is.

So let’s take a look at coffee.

It is drank by most people in the US, but more specifically, it is the beverage of choice for American factory workers – the badass dudes that drink away their wages after work, smoke cigarettes, and get into fights without even thinking twice. And then we have espresso, the drink sipped so delicately by European dandies (as all Europeans are dandies to some extent) and artists. Where factory workers get into fights and don’t think twice, the artists over here tend to over-think the entire thing – turning a punch to the face into an allegory for the connectedness of the world or the human condition or some such rot – though they do love cigarettes just as much as their blue-collar nemeses.


At first it’s hard to tell which drink would win in a fight, but after some thought, one is led to the inevitable conclusion. There aren’t too many differences between the two – they do come from the same plant, after all, but the differences exist, and they do matter. Coffee is generally seen as the drink with the most street cred – you can drink it black, or if you don’t like hair on your chest, you can drink it with some cream or sugar or both, but at the same time it isn’t very pretentious. Espresso on the other hand, can be made into a thousand different variations – cappuccinos, lattes, macchiatos…all of which carry some pretence and imply a weak character. Hot milk and little dollops of froth? Come on. However, and this is one of the major points, straight espresso is blacker than the blackest coffee, and is often criticized as being “too strong” for many a man.

Moving on, one might notice that espresso drinks are stereotypically had by the upper class of society, while coffee is one reserved for the middle and lower classes. This next bit should have been obvious from the start: the battle between coffee and espresso is a manifestation of the class war prophesied by Marx and Engels. You might be inclined to proclaim something like: “Oh, so coffee is the clear winner!” but your naiveté would soon collapse as you realize that the battle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie has not often been favourable for the working man.

Sure, there have been advancements in health care, social security (which isn’t looking so hot nowadays), and labor unions, but I think that we all know who’s really winning the war so far: the bourgeoisie. Point one: the bourgeoisie have always been winning. Point two: the gap between rich and poor is getting bigger – meaning that society is regressing back into the glory days where men were men and serfs were serfs and the source of much hilarity.
Not that I oppose some good old fashioned communism, but really, the end of the Cold War was pretty anti-climactic.

Well, that’s about–wait, you’re wondering about the proletarian revolution and the brutal violence that will be done to the enemies of the people? Breaking the chains of oppression…? Yeah, I’ve heard of it. Ah, I see, you’re looking for street brawls. Well, in that case, coffee might win a fight or two, but when espresso calls in the National Guard (you might be thinking of a reverse kind of Tiananmen Square right about now…) the fight will get pretty straightforward.

Apple vs. ¡Español!

Here it is, my friends: a court battle between Apple and the Spanish language. The two bitter rivals haven't been on trial together since the beta release of iTunes.

Prosecuting Attorney: For years now, Spanish speakers the world over have been heedlessly encroaching on Apple's copyrighted territory, using exclamations as if they were rightfully theirs. "What do you mean?" you might ask. "Spanish seems so innocent and so...fun!" Yes, Spanish is fun, but this fun comes at the expense of their innocence. When Spanish gets "fun", copyrights get lost.

You still don't know what I'm talking about? Well, let's have my client here make this a little bit clearer for you.

Apple Representative: Listen, Spanish, we come out with the iPod, we spend millions on trying to find the cutest, most fun sounding name. Then we spend more millions on advertising our new product, our "iPod" - attempting to invoke a positive image of our company whenever a lower-case "i" is placed directly in front of a word. We have "iTunes", whose pronunciation you butchered, "iLink", "iStore", an "iPhone", christ, we even had an "iMac" to combat McDonalds' Big Mac. And then, all of a sudden, we have these...these minorities in the streets shouting "¡Musica!" whilst listening through our sleek white ear-bud headphones. Sure it looks innocent, but look again. And then get someone careless in there who doesn't care about his exclamation point and whether or not it goes adequately past the "M". And, dammit, it has the simplicity...the symmetry that we were looking for.
[Apple Representative breaks down in tears, holding out exhibit A]



[Another Apple Representative steps in]

Apple Rep 2: As you can clearly see, sir, while 1) and 2) look deceptively different, when circumstances change, they can look very similar indeed. Note numbers 3) and 4) and even 1) and 3). Virtually the same thing.

Judge: Yes, well, this looks rather convincing. Español, what do you have to say in your defense?

[Spanish looks up, still twirling his large, curly moustache. The sombrero he wears casts a shadow over his tanned and naturally dark skin. His hair is the color of ground coffee. Good lord. He speaks slowly and with an unheard of and almost unimaginable passion. Unheard of, that is, until now.]

Español: Cuando el café es tostado en las ollas grandes--

Judge: Español, speak in English or you will be held in contempt of the court and declared guilty by default.

Apple Rep. 2: And keep in mind we'd be willing to license an inexclusive use of the upside-down exclamation point if you agree to a certain set of conditions and stipulations renewable every 5 years...

Español: Mi amigo, Juan Valdez, fue un hombre muy respetable. De nada él vendrá, y por la gracia de la divina providencia--

Judge: Alright, this is bullshit. Spanish. You lose. You are no longer allowed to use exclamations of any sort.

Español: ¡Aiie! ¡Dios mio! ¡La belleza del hombre que hecho una tassa de café perfecta!

Apple Rep 1 [screaming]: Arrgh! An iDios! Brilliant!

Judge: That's enough, Spanish. Take 'im away, boys.

Español: Cuando una buena tassa de cafe esta preparado, la aroma se viaja por el nariz y...
[Voice fades as Español is dragged away]

Billy Bob Thornton vs P!nk

Rockstars kick ass. They drink. They fight. They screw a lot. And they dont give a fuck. Right? Thats what I'd thought being a rock star meant. But both of these individuals I think highlight how lame being a rockstar really is these days. Anyone can see that they both seem a little flacid if we compare them to the likes of say – Axyl Rose or The Boss. Can one proclaim themselves a rockstar? I don't think a real balls to the walls rocker would really care to...

So, can an actor turned musician really capture rock star attitude or is his ego just inflated? Can a pop princess whose image has been manufactured really have the gumption to back up the rockstar attitude she claims to have or is she just...acting?

Let us not forget the bottom line here though – which of these notable faces could pound the most shit out of the other one were they to brawl?

Lets start with P!nk. She seems solidly built at least and she has her youth as well. The question we should be asking ourselves though is if this badassitude runs to the core, or if it's a marketing device, similar to the “darkening” of all the other MTV vixens we all loved so much in the nineties.

Exhibit A:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bNDr1A6dTU (embed disabled)

Ok so shes a rock starrrrrr. We've got drinking, careless destruction of property, and a soaring-empowering-cliche'd late nineties/early 00' chorus.

Two more things worth pointing out -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FehBgQeVKFQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFJl46v776c

The former shows what this rockstar attitude has common origins with – wanting to grow into their old audience's newfound pubescent desires (for the record if u seek amy is a brilliant song, the P!nk one is rather limp). And the latter shows a very un rockstar esque performance (I thought that stage rats were responsible for the synchronyzed dancing... not the actual errr rockstar).

Ok so now billy bob... heres the obvious:

alright. We get it. Hes a rock star. And hes got that entitled/diva attitude. Cool. Wait... would I ask Tom Petty what? Since when does billy bob make music? (Thanks for asking some reasonable questions there Jian – I was curious about that, since im only listening to billy bob talk because of his acting career). But perhaps he can still kick ass -

Rock and roll, right? Looks like the christmas single's in the bag. Though its a bit put on, I'll give him that his marriage record has rock star sex maniac written all over it. If not a little overly theatrical (vials of blood on the neck?)

Now lets get down to ass kicking. Perhaps these two would have a row at some sort of red carpet event. Thats not terribly fun. Say they're at some sort of dive bar in the middle of nowhere Arkansas or Pennsylvania. I guess the state doesn't matter terribly, since neither one seems to have kept up with their roots to have a home team advantage. P!nk looks fun. Shes got some cheekiness, but I think only to the extent that other people think it'd be cute. Its more likely we'd see her kissing her knuckles after the first punch or so. Billy Bob on the otherhand looks like taking more than 7 steps might easily knock the wind out of him not to mention whatever kind of nudge P!nk might provide.

Now, how about after a few drinks? Billy Bob I think has some finesse, and if he is, in fact, a drinker (I can't seem to find much) has over two decades of experience and tolerance built up on our feisty little trouble maker. That, with his reach, might stop P!nk before she even got close.

Now how about at 6 am after a night of drug and sex fueled debauchery? Oh, it seems they both went back to their hotels at around 11 or so. I guess they had early mornings...

Will Smith vs Rubik's Cube

easy.

LETS GET READY TO C-RUMMMMBLEEEEE

welcome.

everyone.

Let the Brainstorming begin!