My Superpowers

  • November 26, 2024

Flying? Super speed or strength? Invisibility? Teleportation? These are the sort of superpowers everyone always picks. But I’ve always had a very particular list of desired powers, and here they are.

The Punch Through Time would allow me to punch the writer of any letter sent to a newspaper of magazine, regardless of the time that has passed since they initially wrote the missive. This one was devised years ago after reading some of the insane letters printed by Dragon magazine back in the early 1980s. It’s a mysterious and uncharacteristically (for me) violent power that I probably never would have actually used.

With the near-death of print this power could be updated to include online comments, which could certainly keep a wielder busy considering the toxic ‘discussion’ so prevalent online these days. Writers of such comments may think again if a superhero with this power existed.

The Telestrator Of The Devil is a power that would give me the ability to draw on a TV screen so every viewer could view your creations. At the least you could send funny messages to millions, and at best you could strike a blow against untruth, deception and propaganda. While this one was developed after watching too much shopping TV back in the 1990s, it would certainly be more relevant and useful today.

Given that TV is also essentially dead, and that no-one under 50 seems to even know what a telestrator is, this one has also upgraded over the years to the reality-warping ability to change the words on any signs or billboards in the real world. Imagine the fun!

The last power – Franchise Teleportation – is the one I’d most like to have in real life. It’s a simple one: I could teleport between franchise locations. Walk into Maccas in the USA and walk out in Australia or Japan or anywhere else I’d been. This cosmic power had an important restriction: I would need had to have visited the target first. So I couldn’t teleport to any McDonald’s (or Starbucks, or KFC, or Walmart), only between the ones I’d ever visited. If I had this power I’d probably use it almost every day 🙂

Alas I’m no superhero. I can’t bend reality or punch through time or take daily trips to arcades in Japan. But wouldn’t the world be more interesting if I could?

Ramen 30: What Hath Man Wrought

  • November 21, 2024

A slight departure from chicken ramen this time, to venture in a nightmare world of food science gone wrong. Three new and limited flavours of ramen were released this past year, and it’s finally time to try them all…

Cup Noodles Everything Bagel

This is ramen noodles in a cream-cheese flavoured sauce with ‘everything bagel’ flavouring and poppy seeds for that extra bit of realism.

As soon as the hot water was added the stench of cream cheese filled the room. It was repellant to one such as myself, but my fellow ramen tasters seemed intrigued. I went first, and the taste was so off-putting I couldn’t even swallow my meagre portion. It tasted (to me) exactly like cream cheese, which is a taste I despise. This was no normal poor ramen: this was a new level of terror.

Four of us tasted this evil thing, and here are our comments:

RS: Absolutely inedible.
KLS: Smells better than it tastes.
JK: Really tastes like bagel and cream cheese!
DH: Not bad but I wouldn’t buy it.

Our collective review: 3 thumbs up (out of 8)

Cup Noodles Breakfast

This one had everything: sausage, eggs, pancakes and maple syrup. A full unhealthy breakfast then, in instant ramen form. It also contained real sausage, so vegetarian KLS sat this one out.

Much like the previous as soon as the water was added a strong smell filled the room – this time maple syrup. After letting it steep the requisite time the eggs and sausage pieces seem to have rehydrated well, but the taste of maple was so sweet and overwhelming it was difficult to interpret this as anything more that noodles in sweet hot water. I couldn’t taste eggs, sausage or pancakes at all. That said, I was able to swallow my bite 🙂

Our verdicts:

RS: Simply tastes overwhelmingly of maple.
KLS: (Sat this one out and silently judged)
JK: I wish it wasn’t so sweet.
DH: This one is good! (He ate several forkfuls)

Our collective review: 2.5 thumbs up (out of 6)

Cup Noodle S’mores

For the Antipodean readers, S’mores are a mysterious campfire snack made by melting marshmallows and chocolate onto a cracker. Naturally they’re a terrible idea for a ramen product, and after the sweet bomb of breakfast what could this be like?

Uncooked. the noodles were covered in brown powder we took to be chocolate, and as you can see tiny marshmallows were included. Unlike the others, this one didn’t smell of anything as it cooked, and even once it was ready it had almost no scent at all. But it definitely tasted, and it was bad. My best description would be a serving of ramen noodles served in hot Milo. But even that hardly conveys the dreadful experience of tasting this one.

The reviews:

RS: Should never have been made.
KLS: Just because it can be done doesn’t mean it should be done.
JK: As soon as it touched my tongue it made me angry but the moment of swallowing was even worse!
DH: Just like Swiss Miss. (Swiss Miss is a brand of hot chocolate drink.)

Our collective review: 1 thumb up (out of 8)

And there you have it! If you see any of these at your local store, it’s probably best to turn and walk away 🙂

  • Posted in Food
  • Robert

Elongates: Final Thoughts

  • November 16, 2024

It’s time to put this too-long series to rest, but not before a few last words on this pressed penny collection.

I sorted the 271 coins by where they were obtained, and this was easy for about 90% of them, challenging for another 9% and – so far – impossible for these three:

The top left features an unidentifiable design with no words, and was pressed onto a 5 euro cent coin, which means Scotland or the UK. Perhaps it was somewhere in Cardiff? I’ll probably never know. The top right is a misaligned penny and from a snippet of writing on the back was made in Santa Cruz. As for what it was supposed to show, who knows? The bottom is a real mystery. The Pamir was boat that sunk near The Azores during a hurricane in 1957. The origination of the ship suggests a German coin, but it’s pressed on a US penny so I have no idea where I got it.

The location of where I pressed this one is also unknown:

Isn’t it remarkable? The entire Lord’s Prayer pressed onto a tiny penny! It’s very detailed and easy to read and I imagine many of these have lived a happy life in purses and wallets over the years.

Let’s move on to ‘bad’ examples. The truth is most of the collection is forgettable – even arguably trash – and since I was always pressing for Bernard I tended to prioritize outrageous or ludicrous designs. Of the 271, these are the ones that raise my eyebrows the most:

On the left we have a penny showing the comic character Storm, which was pressed at Universal Studios. The detail is good but unfortunately the character is almost unrecognizable and you need to gaze very closely to even understand what you’re looking at. The next is a Pez character and I don’t think I need to go into details as to why it should never have been made. The third is a ‘likeness’ of Bruce Springsteen so bad I very much doubt anyone could identify him without the name at the bottom, and the M&M’s NYC fireman penny makes the Pez example look desirable 🙂

As for my favourites, after some consideration I decided on these four:

The top was obtained at Hirose Game Center in Akihabara and shows the player ship from the classic arcade game Darius (I assume you don’t need explanation as to why I love this penny). Then we have a Tardis obtained at the now-closed Dr Who Experience in Cardiff, Wales. The Ned Kelly one – pressed somewhere in Melbourne – I love for its ludicrousness (a penny featuring a criminal?), and of course I’m going to treasure a Nessie penny obtained at Loch Ness.

Now sorted and catalogued here, the pennies all live happily in a special dedicated book I bought for them, and this will now sit on a shelf or in a box forever. I’m not planning on adding to the collection – so no, you don’t have to press pennies for me if you find any! – unless I find a truly special or unusual design. But there’s enough nostalgia in this collection that I’m happy I own the ones I have 🙂