Mike Literman - 1759 Reviews

Jay is back from tour and that means that we are in the market for Sum Poosie. Poor, lonely Jay. On the road with two dudes. Yeah, they're good dudes, but dudes none-the-less. So now it's time for Jay and myself to get Sum Poosie. Normally, we aren't the type of guys interested in this type of thing, but sometimes you just need Sum Poosie. Along with the powers of ginseng, our minds will stay intact as we go to town with the ladies. There is also the need for methyl sulfonyl, which is methane. We don't know what it really does, but we crave it every time Jay gets back from tour and its step towards the debauchery that will take place is the never-to-near future.

By now you should know that I am talking about the drink called Sum Poosie. It's an energy drink that loves the ladies and encourages you in every way, shape, and form about trying to get some or see nude girls. As a drink, it's not bad. As an energy drink, it's better than most energy drinks. It doesn't have an energy drink taste and actually tastes a little like cherries, or cherry bubble gum, or cherry lemonade. If I didn't know this was an energy drink, I wouldn't know that this was an energy drink.

If you love the ladies, don't want to stop partying, and just want to spend all of the day at a strip club eating low price, lower quality lobster and shrimp scampi, this is the drink to you. If you like energy drinks and don't mind looking at false stats about one particular women who is on the side of the bottle while you get energized, this is the drink for you. If you are a stuck up women hater who wants to sleep and would never step foot in a strip club and hate the taste of cherries, this is not the drink for you.

Starbucks. There's one not too far from my house and I try as hard as I can to not go in there. Only reason I do is when my girlfriend needs to get a coffee and she yells at me when I want to stay outside. I never want to go in anywhere. My epitaph might say, "Do you want to run in while I stay in the car?" I was in Starbucks last week and she forced me to get a hot cocoa. It was great, but I didn't want it. I don't drink coffee so for the sake of me (and the sake of an establishment that doesn't want people it can't sell to) I don't go there. No offense.

Something happened inside of coffee shops and I don't think that it's a wanted or desired thing. Fifty percent of the seats have been taken over by people on laptops. I don't believe they were just checking email, either. I feel they were doing some sort of work that takes an adequate amount of time. Every food place I've ever worked has basically tried to get you in and out as quickly as they can because quick turnover means more money. You on your laptop write a thesis on how the Cosby show portrayed Black America in a good light at a coffee shoppe means that while you're there taking up space, no one else can come in, sit down, drink a cup of coffee, and scoot. You who are reading a book about how the harvesting of the ivory tusks of elephants to make chopsticks is a thriving but illegal business is not allowing a tired mother who has schlepped her crying kid around all day and just wants to sit down and enjoy a chai latte a place to sit, as she is entitled to do.

I hold a grudge towards those people who do this sort of action and it is not something that happened a little. I have completely written off coffee shops that sell decent food because jerk college kids think that a coffee shop is actually the common room in the dorm where they can stretch out and work on English 101 homework with their study group.

I believe for this reason, Starbucks has created this drink. For the inconsiderate person on the go. It's got that coffee name you can trust, plus coffee, plus some cocoa, plus mint, in case you decided that you would rather drink a drink that is horrible for you, albeit delicious, instead of brushing your teeth. Now, I know that last part isn't true, but if Starbucks brick and mortar stores have just given up and are alright with housing people on computers all day, then they needed to create an outside revenue resource. The Frappuccino was born. Now, the baristas can make seventeen drinks in one eight hour shift for eight people while no one can get in and out because the middle of the establishment is so full of power cables running to and from people's computers, that it looks like a rubber and plastic spider has been created as some sort of garbage "art as an installation" piece in the center of all and every Starbucks.

Starbucks. You don't need me to come in. Do not be sore at me for I do not hate your establishment. Your mint mocha Frappuccino is delicious and I've got three more to keep my mouth pleased. You do need to start charging for Wi-Fi and/or electricity to start getting some people out of your shops.

It seems like just yesterday I was complaining about the specifics of what truly makes a smoothie. I argued that seeds, thickness, and stuff make a smoothie and this is way closer. It's also not made with coconut milk so we are closer still. This also tastes delicious and would be loved by all if given the opportunity to take a swig. Oh, the diseases that would go around if everyone shared a bottomless bottle of this drink. Everyone would be ill.

This is good. Get it. It's at Target.

I enjoy drinking things shaped like a baseball. It's completely awkward and it makes me want to market something that is fun to drink because it's shaped like a pirate ship or light pole or spoiler off a Honda Civic. People would love it because it's delicious but I would make it so it doesn't really fit on any shelf and doesn't stay where you put it because there isn't a adequate flat surface.

This was an impulse buy that was made because of the flavor and the shape and the price and the fact that the name of the company was Cuties.

I expected a bit more smoothie and less coconut puree, if I may be honest. The flavor was good to start; tangerine fighting strawberries and then who breaks up the fight? Fat old coconut. It not bad, I just thought it would be thicker, perhaps with seeds or something. There is a bit of "stuff" in there, so it is technically a smoothie, I just would have liked more, you know.

There are other flavors and we will eventually get to them, but for now, I know what to expect, and it's thick, coconut Juice in the shape of America's favorite past time.

I don't know what is going on here. It's quite possibly the worst half and half I have ever had. Why? I will tell you with bells on.

Simply put, this does not taste like tea or lemonade. It tasted like burning and possibly lemon flavored drink. It's got a low-grade flavor that you would find in one of those gallon "flavored drink" drinks you find everywhere. Not enough of anything to call it tea or juice so it's in this purgatory of grossness.

I cannot believe that this is our first Nestea and even with how low grade it is, we'll do more. We're gluttons for punishment.

I thought I knew what Mud Pie was but to make sure, I had to Wiki it. It was just what I thought it was. Chocolate with crispy chocolate. One place said that it had whipped cream in it, so I thought it would be like a chocolate cream pop. My mom said that she used to make it by putting chocolate pudding in a piecrust. All of these options sounded great and I had to get this pop in me.

First sip was a bit awkward because it tastes like there is a coffee taste to the pop, and two other people agreed. The chocolate is a good chocolate taste, and that in itself, although not technically "mud pie", would have been good. This tasted like a chocolate, coffee drink. It was good, but I wanted a bit more chocolate, no coffee, and maybe some cream. I wouldn't have been mad if there was cream in there. Much like in real life, if there is whipped cream on a dessert; I'm not going to get mad at you.

I remember very vividly the day Jay and I bought this root beer. It has half awesome, half speeding home. I'll tell you the story.

Jay and I and my six-month (at the time) son Max went to a handful of stores to get drinks. We went to a discount store and found this and were both surprised that we hadn't reviewed basic root beer. We bought a four pack and continued on with out voyage. We went to an Asian market that we both know and love, and my brothers and mom were telling me about another one that I should check out in the area. On our way to the new, secret one, we passed another one. Once we went in, Max started to get a little whiny. We sped everything up, went to the new place, got a handful of drinks, and the lady behind the register started talking to Max and he was holding back tears. As soon as we left the store, he exploded. Guttural screams. Throat shredding screams. So mixed between that an Everything But The Girl's "The Language of Love" I sped home to get him changed and fed and napped. All the while, Jay and I were sipping on one bottle of this root beer. It was alright, at best, given the circumstances.

Now, three months later, I am testing it again. It's better than it was that dreadful day, but it's still just "a root beer." It's not moving me in any way. There's a small hint of a licorice or anise, but it's nothing that I would say to someone else, "Hey, this is great. It tastes like root beer with licorice or anise in it." It's a good root beer, but that's about all it is.

So I don't know if Max doesn't like the smell of Asian markets, the soothing sounds of Tracey Thorn, or the sound of Jay and I discussing the irks of today's society, but that day was a bad one.

Seeing this say cider and be in an Asian grocery store made me need this. I also saw that it said "lemon lime" so I was already bummed out by it but I still had it in my hand and since we had not reviewed it, I had to continue with my original intentions to buy it.

This tastes like most lemon lime pops. I don't know why the call it anything cider and I don't know who or what Chilsung is, but their definition and our definition of a "cider" is nothing alike. Apples make a cider. Lemons and limes getting together to re-create what was done a thousand times is not a cider. This isn't bad, but you've had it if you've had any Sprite, 7-Up, Sierra Mist, and everything in-between.

Jay and I also got cantaloupe popsicles when we were there. Those were absolutely delicious and they made the trip unforgettable. I wish I was there again, eating one of those delicious popsicles. Oh, the memories. I'll buy that all of the darn day.

I've got a headache. I wish I could pour this drink on my brain. I've watched enough doctor shows on television to know that when you do things to the brain, it makes you do funny things. Poke here and you pick your nose. Poke there and you'll recite the alphabet in Spanish. If I poured a caramel milk on my brain, I think that it would be bad, number one, but before I went into an inevitable, caramel induced coma, I would hope to do some all encompassing spastic dance and spit out some unintelligible gibberish. I guess that I would be making a big mistake and it would not be funny or worthwhile.

If I were to miss my giant open head cavity and make some in my mouth, or have some drip out of the crevices of my brain and into my mouth, I would say that it was delicious and calming and perfect for a headache. It's just a very smooth, very caramel drink. You know those little, plastic wrapped caramels that both your grandma and myself love? They taste like that if you ate one and chased it with milk, or, better yet, drank milk, held it in your mouth, and chewed one of those caramels.

It should be known that I didn't remember that it was Halloween when I was talking about brains and stuff. That came to me naturally.

Number one: I have read the title of this product well over a dozen times and I still, in my head, read something about dolphins.

Number two and so on: I saw this at a discount store and due to the price ($1.50) a few emotions came across my mind. This being a company I had never heard of, I assumed that it would be a company I would never hear from again because that's what graces the shelves of stores like that. Bad ideas, poor judgment, and excessive inventory. Thing is, black cherry isn't something I hate, nor are probiotic drinks and Reb-A stuff. Cash in hand, and a ton of baby food later, I purchase my items and headed home.

Side topic: Remember ten years ago? 2001. Great year minus that one thing that happened in early Fall. Think about this, though. No one back then knew or cared about things like probiotics, prebiotics, free radicals, and antioxidants except maybe scientists. Everything was made from either cane sugar or corn syrup and there was no scare or wondering what was going to happen if you OD'd on one or the other except for inevitable tooth decay. We didn't know about ADD or ADHD and things like autism were in their infancy of knowledge. Only hippies and gardeners are organic and we all had a lot more money in the stock market than we do now. What a frightening world we live in now though, in retrospect. We didn't have to worry about anything it seemed. We didn't care where our food was coming from or worry about how it wasn't wise to buy a $450,000 house on a secretary's budget. Everything was A-OK. Look at all the stuff we have to worry about now. Drinking probiotic drinks filled to the gills with new, antioxidant-rich fruits to help avoid getting sick. Taking all our money out of the stock market and investing in cold, gold ingots. Frightening. I don't think I've changed much except I've become deader inside and more cynical than ever before.

Back to drink mix. It's really good. It's a powder that you stir in a tall glass of water. It stirs up nicely, tastes nice, and got me to easily put down two, sixteen ounce glasses of water today. It's good for you, contains no calories, and you can carry it with you. Thumbs up. I really do hope that you come through with your website's promise of new flavors. I'll try them when I see them.

Blackberry is sacred between Jay and myself. We used to go to Chili's all the time. Alright, maybe once a week, tops, but that's not the point. The point is that every time we would go, and this is probably still true, we get the unsweetened blackberry tea. It's quite marvelous and I believe bottomless. When the person who runs L3 Home sent us this flavor, I was pretty psyched.

I've had these samples at my house for a while but they're so small, they often hide behind even the smallest cans. I put my hand in what I thought was an empty space and found them and decided that I would review them, finally. So here goes.

You've got MiO, and that's cornered the market. It's a great product. It's small, able to be carried in a purse or something, and comes in an array of flavors. The only unfortunate thing about Crazy Drops is that you may have never heard of it. You can buy all their stuff on their site, which is nice and they've got like twenty flavors, including CinnaCherry, which intrigues me to no end. Onto the flavor...

It's not bad. It's a titch diet, but between a diet Pepsi and this, I'd rather have this. It doesn't have a sting and actually tastes like a lightly diet, watered down juice. Also, there is no color to it which is nice considering it's a concentrate and all that colors got to come from somewhere and therefore also has to go somewhere.

If you've had all the flavors of MiO and you crave more options and you like to help out a small business, try them out. They've got to have a flavor you are curious about.

Derek's daddy went back to Taiwan and brought back more goodies. This is, apparently, a hot ticket item. Does "hot ticket" mean that it's hard to come by or that it sells like hotcakes? Let's assume that it means the latter and continue.

I didn't know what to expect, you know, because most of the can is not in English. I knew it was carbonated and that's about it. When translating the site from Chinese to English, the product title actually came through as "Victoria vigorously soda". I can only assume that it's a bit of Engrish but it could also mean that it's an energy drink. "vigorously", and adjective which seems like a strange word to use in that context, would, to me at least, mean energy.

It tastes a bit energy and a bit cola and a bit citrus and a way bit sweet. It's not bad, just very candied. If you could carbonate a sugar stick, this is what it would taste like.

This could not be a more disgusting drink. I mean it. This is hardly drinkable. I took one sip and essentially signed off on the whole thing. I love aloe. This has so much chunk in it that you think that you're drinking something else. It's downright thick. Second, it's got coconut water in it which I am not the largest fan of, but I thought that since it's got fruits in there, both prefixed with "mango" ironically, it might be alright. Nope. It stood out like a sore thumb. I can taste the fruit but it's so masked by chunks and coconut that you'd be better off just not adding flavor, or more flavor. This drink is a Frankenstein of all things bad and no, I'm not using that phrase because it's a week away from Halloween.

How many times have you spent your lunch hour alone in an near abandoned city mall, eating a bag of black licorice jelly beans, slowly burning up your taste buds? If you say more than nonce, then I have the perfect product for you. Rocket Fizz black licorice pop. Now, you no longer have to look like that strange kid in school that eats black jellybeans. You never understood them and they never understood you anyhow. If you like the taste of black licorice, then you know the way to succeed, otherwise, you know the way to suck eggs. Now, whenever your desire for more than ten but less than twenty ounces of pure, unfiltered, ungelatinous, pleasure arises, you know where to go.

For those of you that think that only crazy people enjoy the taste of black licorice, Dillinger Escape Plan wrote a song called Black Bubblegum and no research and full assumption points to the truth that a product such as that would taste like black licorice. Skinny Puppy's Too Dark Park was written not only about crazy Canadian animal rights, but titled after the place with Ogre and cEvin Key used to go to avoid adolescent persecution and eat jellybeans which were “too dark” for the rest of the kids.

How does it taste? Well friends, I'll tell you. The smell is as familiar as the darkest Halloween night and the taste is much like that, but lighter. More of an early morning, November 1st taste. Now that you know it exists, I would expect it to fly off the shelves. It's the perfect drink from at any time from last fall to early spring. The perfect time to quench your darkest, most depressed thirst.

************************************************************************
We originally reviewed this for a Halloween drink article we did for Auxiliary Magazine. To read the full article and to check out the awesome magazine go to
auxiliarymagazine.com.

You know Max, right? He's been a real jerk lately. Let's pull a prank on him. Yeah, he has been a jerk, Charlie. He put all those thumbtacks on your chair last week. Who does that? Hasn't he heard of tetanus? I don't want that. We've got to get back at him, but with what? Oh, I've got it. Go grab that tea over there, I've got a great idea. There isn't enough to fill this bottle. This prank is going to rule. Now, take those Fritos, crush them up and put them in this washcloth. I'll show you. I've got this water. I'm going to pour water on the corn chips to kind of give the tea an "essence" of corn chip but with none of the grit so he can't tell. Oh man, it smells like corn chips but you'd never know what we did just by looking at it. Quick, put one pinch of sugar in there so it keeps him coming back.

This will teach him. He'll never play another practical joke on us again.

In an attempt to appease me with my request for non-colored drinks, Bot has come out with this concord grape water that isn't at all purple. That's a good way to differentiate between a cherry, lemon, grape, chocolate drink; just change the labels.

In all honesty, this drink came out way before I mentioned that novel idea to save companies money and save people's tongues from becoming blue when they drank/ate anything blue raspberry.

If you've never had Bot water, it's good, low calorie, and pretty flavorful. This grape is no different. No, it's not as good as that Blue Plum one I had a while back, but it's good. It does taste like concord grape, but I would say smells more like it than it tastes. They're all about light flavoring and optimum refreshment so this drink is right on par with their little schtick that they're running with. Water that tastes like concord grapes. You want it? Here it is.

Here in Buffalo, we have an event called "Italian Festival." One street, one week, everyone is Italian. Like St. Patrick's day where "everyone is Irish" type thing. The air is filled with the smell of onions and sausage and every other stand sells "Buffalo's Best Cannoli" which is probably a made up term since, and I could be wrong, there is no committee of people going around, charting and graphing the stats behind one city's cannoli.

Since I don't care about anything, including the festival I actually went to, I went to an Indian bodega to see if they had any strange or different drinks. I left with this drink, which isn't from India at all, but from Turkey. Whatever. Who cares, right?

It took me about three months to actually open this carton but when I saw "rosehip nectar", I had to spring into action and slap $2 down and buy it. I've got a pretty good track record when it comes to nectar and although some aren't my favorite, I understand and appreciate their role in the juice family.

This was thin as far as nectars go. I'm not too familiar with the rosehip, but I am familiar enough with nectars to expect more seeds and/or less viscosity. This was seedless and free to flow. I especially noticed how thin it was when my girlfriend cleaned the house and dropped my glass with it inside and I got a very close and intimate inspection of it running under the couch. It was a light flavor that was different that any fruit I have had, but if I had to say it was like anything, I might say that it is half cherry, half watered down and bitterless cranberry juice. It was good and I don't know why they don't make more drinks here the these United States using the...whatever rosehip is.

I needed this drink like some might need a beer. I had a baby keeping me up all night with some undiscovered thing, then a dog that sucks to no end barking and waking him up, and to cap it all off, I was doing a killer job carving a pumpkin and then more crying. Not everyone's best work, I've got to say.

I saw this, threw it in the fridge, for I knew that sometime soon, like two hours later, I was going to desire it to no end. Two hours later, as anticipated, I desired her like one would a new video game, toy, car, and so on and so forth.

It was worth the two-hour wait, too. It's crisp, has a strong birch taste, but isn't dark and complex like a lot of root/birch/sarsaparillas. It's got a good bite and the colder the better. I've been milking this bottle for a half hour to forty-five minutes and I've noticed it's gotten a little drab, but it's still good.

Jay got this in Canada, which is good because it's made in Massachusetts and that means it's available outside of the little town it looks like it's from.

Remember that thing about your grandma that I wrote last week about her being awesome? Everything I said still stands. The baking, the cooking, everything. I love my grandma, but I would not lick her. I mean, if I had to, I would. She's my grandma. I would lick her to save my life or her life. There are other reason I would but they would all be very strange situations if I had to lick her to accomplish any sort of end goal.

This drink is strange. It's like your grandma, who still wears the same perfume she did 70 years ago as a young lady, had a glass of lemonade and did her makeup and was having a rather smell morning and had to apply extra and didn't bother covering the glass with a doily or something and all the perfume and stuff got inside and infused the lemonade with "old lady smell." It's not terrible. It's not something I would drink again because it really tastes like if I filtered lemonade through an old woman's hair.

Well that wasn't a good way to sell a product.

Troops. I've got some bad news. No, you're not being deployed to Afghanistan again, it's worse. You know all the Muscle Milk you've been drinking? Well due to the economic climate, we can no longer provide you with an "All You Can Drink" supply, regardless if you are saving the country or not. Fortunately, our milk supply was replaced by Mountain Dew. Now, before you scoff if you don't like Mountain Dew, this is Game Fuel Mountain Dew which might contain more zip or zazz or whatever the kids are saying nowadays. It's also the tropical flavor so can feel like your deployed in California rather than here in Watertown New York.

On top of all these facts it's sponsored by Call Of Duty 3, a video game I've heard is very popular involving an army killing bad guys. What they probably don't capture in the game is the unfortunate loss of Muscle Milk. They only capture the unfortunate occurrence of shooting bad guys. There is more to war than shooting bad guys. We're fighting a war with milk and the lack of funds we need to replace that milk.

What did you say, Private? Oh, the taste. I don't know. I didn't actually have any. I've had pop before in my day, but none of it has been so...forest green. Well son, this tastes like a mix between Mountain Dew, a product I have had in my day, and fruit punch, what we drank when I was your age. It's better than the Mountain Dew I remember, son. I can tell you that.

So once again, your precious milk has been replaced with Army themed pop and you should search for your calcium elsewhere. A travesty, I know.