Christmas Miracle

I had a little mishap with a gold filling when I was 15. You see my childhood was peppered with many memorable things. Summer trips to Wildwood, sneaking Virginia Slims out of my mother's purse, laughing at the way Hispanic people said "pistachio", winter trips to Wildwood, and eating those little chocolate coins wrapped in gold foil. And, like most kids, I had my fair share of cavities. But unlike most kids, all my fillings were gold.

Now during one of those trips to New Jersey's land of magic, thrills, and unprotected stranger-sex under the boardwalk, I bit down hard on a stale deep-fried Zebra cake, and knocked out one of my gold fillings. At the time I was riding the Teacups with Sally Vesuvio, the hottest broad in school, and I wasn't about to pull out my bloody filling, especially if I had any hopes of kissing her and feeling her ample manigots!

So I did what any reasonable kid my age would do. I swallowed it. And when the ride stopped, she threw up on me. Goddamn Teacups. But, she felt really bad so she let me look down her shirt for a count of eight mississippi. It was dynamite.

So after a busy Christmas season, and a special extended Christmas Eve mass where my daughter Jenette's CCD class reenacted Mary's entire 21-hours of labor during the birth of Christ complete with her botched C-section, and successful O-section, my family and I sat down to a delicious 7 fishes dinner. Shortly after dinner I made my way up to the bathroom and prepared for a peaceful 15 to 45 minute BM while catching up on why Esquire chose Kate Beckinsale as the sexiest woman alive. Shortly after they convinced me, I stood up and this is what I found sitting atop the mound of Christmas aftermath. (see above)

It was a friggin' Christmas Miracle! The Dentists told me I would never chew with that tooth again. They were wrong. I beat science! And I'm happy to announce that I am having the tooth re-implanted in my gums behind the tooth that replaced it so many years ago.

And in case anyone is wondering, yes, I will in fact have one extra molar on the right bottom side of my mouth. I'll be sure to chew any and all dried sausage on that side.

A Soft Drink that fell on Hard Times

Anybody remember 7up Gold? Well I do. It had such promise. Such potential. Released in the spring of 1988 with great expectations, the most regal of all sodas quickly lost it's fizz. This is what happened...

As you can imagine, the prospect of a Gold soda excited me so. So much so, that due to an insider tip, I went in and bought a thousand shares of 7up, specifically the 7up Gold shares, in late 1987. I wasn't interested in any other 7up products, just the Gold ones. Everything was looking good. In my mind, it was a can't miss! But I should have paid attention to the warning signs of failure. Here's what went wrong:

1. The taste.

To start things off, it tasted like someone backwashed a cinnamon apple jolly rancher into a can of caffeinated ginger ale. I was there for the one and only taste-test marketing session and I knew just by looking at the test panel, something wasn't right. First of all there was an old lady who had lost the sense of taste well over twenty years ago, sitting next to a kid who had recently burned the inside of his mouth on some pizza, and a Mandarin Chinese man who didn't know how to say "Tastes Bad" in english. They really thought they had a decent demographic spread. 

I should have spoke up...but I was so sure...

2. The can.

Look at the design here. There's one overwhelming flaw. The color. It should be black, not red. Everyone knows that! The color that goes best with Gold is always black. (Look at my friggin' blogs!) Here are some other obvious examples of gold going best with black:

Watches-

Iphones-

Black People-

3. Homoerotic advertising.

Here's the biggest nail in the mausoleum. The commercials. Take a look at this:

Is that the gayest shit you've ever seen? I mean I got no problem if you're a dude and you want to do another dude, just don't do it in a 7up Gold commercial! There's like one shot of the chicks, and the rest is these two jaggoffs acting like a-holes and paying a homeless guy to deliver to them what should be a premier soft drink product! It's all wrong!

And then to finish it all off, you got one guy exploding his can all over his own face while his partner reaches in to get a taste and then licks the precious fluid off his finger! And again, no broads in sight! Super-homo stuff going on here. Straight people drink soda too you know! 

Combine all that, and you've got one doomed product.

Rest in Peace 7up Gold.

P.S. If anyone is interested in a few hundred boxes of unopened 7up Gold, please email me at gusmusterino@gmail.com or leave a comment below.  My goal is to someday be able to park my car inside the garage.

Anyone have any other products they thought/wished had made it but didn't?