The Official Cracked Blog

Ross Wolinsky is taking a personal day today. Filling in for him will be his grandfather, Pappy Wolinsky.

Hello, internet! How are you all doing? I’m doing fine, thanks!

You know, back in my day we didn’t have much scratch, but that was a different era - one where men wore hats, women wore dresses, and there was never any confusing the two!

We’d do all kinds of things for kicks back then - if we had the dough, we’d get dolled up in our best glad rags and head to town for some giggle water, but more times than not we were left flipping eggshells and spinning nuts - if you could get your hands on them! Hoo wee! We didn’t have the cable TV and Nintendro machines driving us all bugaboo back then! Heck no! All we needed was a bottle of hooch and a dame in the struggle buggy, and anything beyond that was just padding the butler’s ankles as far as we were concerned!

Things were a lot cheaper back then, boy I’ll tell you what! Back then you could get a gallon of milk for a penny, and a gallon went a lot further than it does today - we didn’t have those big fancy drinkin’ glasses you kids have today! I used to drink milk out of a rusty old tin can! There was only one tin can in the house that didn’t have any rust on it, and everyone knew that one belonged to Pa. It’d be coolies bending the trolley tracks if you drank out of Pa’s tin can - he’d box your ears but good!

Pa was a man who was hitting on all sixes for sure, and he could be tougher than a Chinaman’s mule on a hot Tuesday morning, but every once in a while he’d take us to town to see a talkie. Back then talkies only cost a nickel, and they were better than the garbage you get in the movie houses nowadays! That was when entertainment was on the level, boy! Now you’ve got your hotsy-totsy computer effects and your Iron Men and whatnot… horsefeathers! That ain’t entertainment! Nobody knows how to make a good movie anymore! Bah!

Back in my day, we didn’t need all these fancy effects and flashy cars and rap music to make a good talkie! All we needed was a good story - preferably one about a group of dogs having a party together, and if one of the dogs tried to rape one of the other dogs, all the better! If you could get a couple of dogs, some tiny evening wear, some string, and a jar of peanut butter together, why, you’d have a plum-ducky film on your hands!

And boy, those dogs were disciplined back then! We didn’t need some Spanish poolboy “whispering” at them to get them in line, no sir! But like I said, it was a different era back then: one where men wore hats, women wore dresses, and dogs knew their place. These films nowadays… applesauce, I say! Applesauce!

Yes, Florida is actually trying to split into two, with one half (presumably the one with Disney World) remaining a part of our glorious nation and the other (Universal Studios) sinking into the sea where it belongs.

And readers, I implore you: if you live in Florida, SUPPORT THIS MEASURE. Then move to a less shitty state. I hear Wyoming’s got room.

Let’s face facts. Florida is the wang of the United States for a reason: it’s a magnet for disease, usually smells bad, and at times (Spring Break, Mardis Gras, any other Girls Gone Wild-related calender event) it’s filled with wriggling white creatures who are just passing through.

Well, I say enough. Florida, don’t let Cuba hit you on the ass on your way out.

And believe me, I don’t take hate lightly; until now the only things I’ve hated are the chips and salsa at Mexican restaurants in Europe, dogs who act like they want it and then are all “yip yip yip” when it’s time to get down to business, and Judd Apatow (Grr! I hate him so much! Grr!). So when I say “I hate Florida,” I say it as someone who’s never gone near the hellhole and never will.

“But Michael,” you ask in your effeminate voices, “why so angry?”

“Shut up,” I answer, and then I ride away on my Harley.

But okay, just to humor you.

First off, if the liberal media I subscribe to is to be believed, you fuckers and your goddamned butterfly ballots stuck us with an idiot President and an expensive, highly fatal war in the Middle East, rather than just a boring, inoffensive President who invented the Internet. By my calculations, that means you owe us 500 billion dollars (and counting), the execution of Jeb Bush, and a public apology.

Secondly, they want to teach their ugly, incestuous kids Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design is about as intelligent as the people in Florida, which is to say not very. Until religion can do any of the following things:

Then it has no right being taught as science or, for that matter, even being presented to our children. Yes, that’s right; I am firmly against children even being exposed to religion at school.

Middle School is a place to lose all faith in a higher loving power, and taking that experience away from our young people is just plain unfair. If I had to go through it, so should they.

Religion and school are like milk and gin; you can mix them if you want, but you’re just going to end up with a terrible taste in your mouth and a clogged kitchen sink. Alright, maybe that’s not exactly what it’s like, but I didn’t want to use a metaphor that would shoot over the heads of the mongoloid Floridian “readers.”

Bottom line: Get the hell out, God. And if you’ve got a problem with that little scenario, I’ll be waiting. You know where to find me (I presume).

Lastly, I was never that close to my Grandparents, and old people make me uneasy. What do they know that I don’t?

So do your duty, Americans (while you still are ones) and vote for Floridian secession.

It’s the right thing to do, and if you’re stupid enough to follow the advice of a Cracked blogger, you deserve no better.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael makes enemies states at a time as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

I love ice cream. It’s the only dessert that when I eat it, it somehow gets into my stomach and pushes all the other food out of the way to make room for more. I’m convinced that if I were ever in a sitcom-style situation in which I were trapped in an ice cream warehouse, the paramedics would find me dead in the morning, stomach ripped open like the fat guy in 7, face down in a puddle of pralines and cream.

Thus it is with great sadness that I report to you the death of one Irvine Robbins, without whom we’d have to choose from a measly 15.5 flavors at our local Baskin.

Oh well; making it to 90 is quite a feat for a guy who spent his life constantly surrounded by cookie dough.

And in the interest of honoring the man, I think it’d be a good time to point out how crucial his life really was. Without people like Irvine, there’d be no filter between the vast uncharted territory of ice cream flavors and those 31 gleaming tubs in the ice cream parlor. There would be no one to delineate what is delicious and what is sacrilege.

And lest you think such delineation is unnecessary, I’d like to direct your attention to:

10. Wasabi Ginger

First of all, it actually burns your sinuses, like eating wasabi. Whatever points that earns for accuracy, it immediately loses for unpleasantness, which is the same reason jelly belly samplers always have jalapenos left over. And surprisingly, this flavor is from Cold Stone, the kind of class act you wouldn’t expect to make such a rookie mistake. For shame. What am I supposed to mix in, chunks of fish?

9. Fish

What am I supposed to mix in, wasabi? I actually saw a guy on Iron Chef make this when the ingredient of the day was fish. When the judges asked him why the hell he would do that, he said he was “just curious.” You know, that’s the same rationale Mengele gave at the Nuremberg trials. In case you didn’t guess, he lost the title Iron Chef and was driven from Kitchen Stadium by an angry mob.

8. Black Licorice

Hey, I know! Let’s take a “candy” that everyone hates and use it to fuel an ice cream flavor equally disgusting and black as the night! Then lets all stab ourselves in the face with our letter openers!

7. Wheat

The retarded cousin of green tea ice cream, wheat manages to be even closer to tasting like dirty ice. The hint of grain suspended on a thin bed of shit will make you wish you weren’t the kind of ignorant tool who buys wheat ice cream.

6. Pit Viper

Yes, eating it makes you badass, but is it worth it? I haven’t been able to determine whether this ice cream is flavored like the venom of the snake (incredibly deadly) or from the actual meat (incredibly putrid), but either way I’d rather prove my manliness by forcing the angry viper into the ice cream maker than by actually eating some.

5. Raw Horseflesh

IT IS WHAT IT SOUNDS LIKE. MOVING ON.

4. Tomato

“Ketchup” would probably be a better descriptor, once you add in the liquid component. It makes me wonder if anyone’s ever made a whole ice cream burger by putting ketchup ice cream and mustard ice cream onto some beef ice cream between two layers of wheat ice cream. Then I wonder whether a situation could ever arise in which I am expected to eat something like that. Then I wonder if I have enough aspirin in the house to kill myself.

3. Charcoal

This one is a standout if only because it’s the only item on the list that you would never eat normally, and yet are expected to eat just because it’s ice cream. That’s like me dropping my car keys into some Rocky Road and expecting you to choke it down. And on top of everything, this stuff even coats your lungs with carcinogenic coal dust. Now you too can live the life of a miner!

2. Viagra

It’s ice cream that’ll make your dick hard. I’m not sure what the flavor is like, but at least it’s got that built-in endorsement going for it. On the other hand, it takes a pretty smooth operator to break off foreplay long enough eat an entire scoop of ice cream. That, and I’ll bet it makes free ice cream day at the little league game really awkward.

1. Salad

Look ice cream makers; this isn’t “cute” or “funny.” We eat ice cream because we’re not eating salad. The two are mutually exclusive, and tossing some cucumber into the vat doesn’t make it healthy. It just makes it the most retarded thing you could ever try and market to fatties. And by doing the exact opposite of what we want, you have officially made the worst ice cream flavor ever. Worse than charcoal and raw horse flesh. That, my friends, is something to be proud of.

So thank you, Irvine Robbins, for a life dedicated to shielding us from the horrors of the ice cream world. And for the record, eight out of ten of those flavors are from Japan, so if you want to solve this problem once and for all, you know who to bomb.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael waits for Cold Stone to restock Cake Batter as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

Dear People With Very Specific Skills Who Put Repetitive Videos Of Themselves Showing Off Those Skills YouTube,

First off, I’d just like to congratulate you all: You’ve created a new artform for the internet era, and for that you should be proud. I’m not going to deny that your videos are amazing, but I can’t help but wonder: What did you guys do before YouTube? Did you backflip into your pants whenever more than a handful of people were in the room? Was it hard to do it live because you didn’t have the luxury of editing out all the failed attempts? Did your friends & family get sick of you always trying to backflip into your pants at parties, or did they accept it as part of what made you a beautiful & unique snowflake?

Either way, you guys must be loving this whole YouTube thing, huh? You know - what with all the millions of people out there who haven’t seen you showing off your very specific skills. The view counts keep rising, the comments keep rolling in, and you’re left sitting there, watching it all happen and thinking to yourself, “Gosh! These people love me! They really love me!” I’ll be honest with you, people with very specific skills who put repetitive videos of themselves showing off those skills on YouTube: I’m not entirely sure why we, the YouTube viewing public, eat shit like this up with such a voracious appetite. Yes, your videos are impressive, and no, I don’t think I could backflip into a pair of jeans if I wanted to, but does that really explain why these videos end up being viewed by millions of people? Are we all just jealous of your unbelievably specific skills? I don’t think that completely explains it.

So why then? Why do the guys throwing bottles and sunglasses and jumping into pants get all the internet fame while more deserving characters (like the naked Japanese guy cooking mushrooms) fall by the wayside? I’m going to take a guess: It’s because people are more likely to forward a video of some guys throwing sunglasses onto each others’ faces than a video of a naked Japanese guy in a horse mask cooking mushrooms. People feel comfortable sending their parents and coworkers a video of some guys doing backflips into Levi’s, but a naked Japanese guy cooking mushrooms? Ehh… not so much.

So I have a challenge for you all today (and now I’m talking to all Cracked readers, not just the people with very specific skills who put repetitive videos of themselves showing off those skills on YouTube): I want you all to email the naked Japanese mushroom chef to a parent, relative, or coworker today with a message that says “Thought you would enjoy this LOL!” Let’s give the weirdos their due today.

When is the world going to end? That depends on who you ask. Scientists say the sun will burn out in a couple billion years, Nostradamus had it down to an exact date (December 20, 2012), and Jehovah’s Witnesses have struck out numerous times, predicting all-out apocalypse in 1914, 1918, 1925, 1941, 1975, and 1994. I appreciate all of their efforts, but guess what? They’re all wrong. I can’t give you an exact date, but I can easily tell you what year the world is going to end.

The world is going to end in 2022.

Why 2022? It’s not Peak Oil, global warming, or terrorism that I’m concerned about. No - 2022 is the year that kids who are 7 years old right now will be turning 21. That means that 2022 will be the year that today’s 7-year-olds will be legally allowed to drink alcohol, which means that 2022 will be the year that bars become overrun with people who have fond childhood memories of seeing Beverly Hills Chihuahua.

Will they remember Terminator 2? What about Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure or Back To The Future? What will they say of these movies? “Oh,” they’ll say, “Aren’t those, like, old movies? I don’t like old movies.” Then they’ll ask the bartender for some crazy futuristic drink that I’ve never heard of, and then they’ll turn back to their friends to wax nostalgic about that movie they saw when they were 7 years old with all the rapping CG chihuahuas, and I’ll return to Gladstone’s birthday party (89 years young!) and stew in the corner, nursing my whiskey and muttering to nobody in particular about how the world has gone to hell in a handbasket.

But then God will be like, “What the fuck?!” and smite everyone, because CG chihuahuas?! COME ON. He must have said SOMETHING about that in the Bible, right?

Always quick to act, the Church of Scientology has officially revamped their Youtube channel, mere months after the Internet collectively made wet fart noises at them.

Their tiny number of subscribers, huge number of channel views, and disabling of comments and ratings kind of gives you an idea of where the CoS’s net cred stands these days. I guess they aren’t equipped to handle the kind of soul-crushing and surgically-precise criticisms the Cracked Bloggers must grapple with every day (ie, “gayyyyyyyy”).

In any case, I for one will be scrupulously poring over all the videos they post, as I’m still intensely fascinated by the giant sideshow they call a religion. So far, the most interesting one I’ve come across (okay, redubbed) is the below vid outlining the basic precepts of the faith, and the magic powers generated therefrom.

Now at least if I fail in Hollywood, I can always blame it on ticking off the Scientologists.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael gets retarded in here as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

If you’re like me, you’re sick and tired of watching stuff on a regular TV. In fact, if you’re like me, you’re fed up with even HAVING a TV at this point. I don’t care if it’s an old CRT with rabbit ears or one o’ them fancy-pants LCD whatsits hangin’ on the wall; either way it’s time to call up the Salvation Army or Goodwill or whatever and have them haul that embarrassing hunk of garbage out of your house. It’s 2008, and regular TVs are for poor people. You have discerning tastes, you have disposable income, and dagnabit, you deserve a projector that’s shaped like R2-D2.

And we have the technology. Thanks, Nikko Home Electronics.

Complete with inputs for a variety of analog & digital signals, built in speakers, and a projector that can crank out a 260 inch-wide picture, the R2-D2 Digital Audio & Video Projector is 100% guaranteed to fill that void in your empty apartment that your ex-girlfriend left when she moved out on you because you bought an R2-D2 Digital Audio & Video Projector. Gut-wrenching loneliness got you down? Try the Millenium Falcon remote control. Crippling depression and abandonment issues bubbling to the surface after years of suppression? Did I mention the iPod dock?

The R2-D2 is also able to recline and project a signal onto your ceiling. For example, if you had a home movie of you and your ex having a picnic together, and you wanted to project it onto the ceiling above the bed that the two of you used to share so you could watch it while crying and masturbating at the same time, the R2-D2 Digital Audio & Video Projector could TOTALLY handle that without a problem.

You could also use it to watch one of the many fine Star Wars films. Or Terminator 2, Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol, or Look Who’s Talking Too. Or any other movie you wanted to watch, really. They would all probably work.

If you were in Cuba this weekend, you may have been treated to the sight of happy Cubans proudly buying computers. Here in the real world, where some of us have computers in our shoes and marital aids, the purchase of a new computer might not raise any eyebrows, but in Cuba it qualifies as a very big deal indeed. You see, Cubans haven’t been allowed to have personal computers until now. (One can only imagine what primitive technology they use to keep their feet warm or to pleasure their wives with.)

The one snag is that most Cubans still don’t have access to the Internet yet - the government has long restricted access. Even if those restrictions were lifted somehow, there’s also the small matter of the trade embargo between the US and Cuba - one of the consequences being that we don’t ever ship any Internet too them (I don’t really understand how the Internet works.)

What I do understand is that computers aren’t much fun without the Internet. Sure you’ve got your word processing and your minesweeper and your disk defragmenter. I guess there’s also spreadsheets, but considering that the average monthly income for a Cuban is something like $20, I don’t imagine their personal finances are that complicated. Truthfully, computers can get boring pretty quickly. When was the last time you processed some words for fun?

However, given the recent reforms the Cuban government’s been implementing, Internet access for Cubans is at least marginally likely in the future. Which means that Cuba might actually become reconnected to the rest of the world soon, and find out what a shit-show we’ve turned it into. So in preparation for that moment, I’ve compiled some useful info for any current or future Cuban Internet pioneers (here I’m imagining that when first getting online they’ll Google “Holy shit, I’m Cuban and am on the Internet” which will lead them to this page.)

As I see it, the main problem with getting to the Internet twenty years late is that you’ll be really far behind on all the Internet meme’s that have come and gone, so you won’t get any of the references on our T-shirts. Seeing as amusing T-shirts make up something like 5% of the U.S. GDP, this is a pretty serious problem, so to ward off any chances of the demise of our sponsors, below I’ve cataloged the biggest Internet fads of the last 20 years.

Mouse Balls: If you were on the Internet back in the days when ASCII graphics were cutting edge, you probably saw this fake IBM “mouse balls” memo in your email inbox. To this very day, testicle humor remains the pinnacle of human achievement on the Internet.

Hampster Dance: Audio recordings were mastered over 60 years ago by Vikings, yet to this day, very few sites on the Internet have sound or audio content of any kind. And the reason is this fucking site.

Bert is Evil: One of the first photoshopped gag sites, it taught us some interesting facts about that Sesame Street mainstay, Bert. Hint: He doesn’t come off very well.

That Dancing Baby: An early example of 3D graphics, and an effective advertising spokesperson for the vasectomy industry.

Mahir: In 1999, Mahir wanted to have sex with you, and made a webpage about it. At the time this was revolutionary, and as it occurred at the height of the Internet bubble, I believe the site was eventually purchased by Yahoo for $5bn.

All your Base Are Belong To Us: In Japan they don’t write English very well, mainly because no-one there reads it. This unlikely confluence of events caused one of the most irritating trends to sweep the Internet.

YTMND: This stands for “You’re The Man Now Dawg,” which you Cubans probably won’t recognize as one of the most tin-eared pieces of dialog to ever be written, and the nadir of Sean Connery’s career. This site soon spawned a host of similarly themed pages - including this face melting example.

Star Wars Kid: Making fun of dorks being dorks is a little like shooting fish in a barrel. Honestly I always felt bad for this kid, and hope whichever one of his buddies put this video on the Internet lives in constant fear of being beaten to death with a golf ball retriever.

Chuck Norris Facts: This was a site full of made up facts about Chuck Norris, a martial artist who made some hilariously awful movies in the 80’s and some just regular awful television in the 90’s. No-one knows why he became suddenly popular again a couple years ago, as for the last 10 years he’s been coasting on his past success - a notion that radically redefines the meaning of the word “success.”

Snakes on a Plane: This was a poorly conceived, poorly executed movie that unexpectedly failed because it was poorly conceived and poorly executed. That it was championed by the Internet probably says something about the business and critical acumen of anonymous imbeciles.

LolCats: This is the current big Internet fad, although hopefully it will be something else by the time I finish typing this sentence.

I hope you enjoyed that, respected Cuban reader. As you’re new to the Internet, I’ll let you know that if you enjoy an article, it’s customary to provide your bank details on this page here.

The fame that comes with being a Cracked blogger has its pros and cons. I can always get a reservation at fancy restaurants, I get into all the most exclusive night clubs, and thousands of women email me pictures of their junk on a daily basis. That’s great and all, and yeah, I’m filthy rich and everything, but it’s not all cash and clubbing and ill-lit close-up jpgs; the schedule can be exhausting, the gossip mags say the nastiest things, and I can barely walk down the street anymore without a dozen women throwing themselves at my feet. It can get to be a little much sometimes, but hey

This gig is my Different Strokes (Gladstone is Willis, Swaim is Kimberly, and Daniel O’Brien is the maid). That being said, what’s going to happen to us when it’s over? Swaim will end up doing porn and OD’ing (but we all knew that was going to happen anyway), and Gladstone will knock out Vanilla Ice on Celebrity Boxing, but what about me?! Will I be making diaper rash cream commercials and making fun of myself on any show that will take me? Will I run for Governor and get 14,242 votes? Perhaps most importantly, will I end up on Divorce Court with my beastly ginger wife and talk about my inability to get an erection on national television? Is that’s what’s going to happen to me?!

How much money could Gary Coleman have possibly received to appear on this show, and at what price does it actually become worth it to tell the world you’re packing a limp noodle? My guess is that he got paid $10,000 for this. Times must be rough for Gary Coleman.

You know what he should probably do with that money? Go to community college and get an associate’s degree. Something practical. Data processing, or maybe stenography or something. Anything to get this guy a steady paycheck and some dignity. Seriously, Gary - get it together.

I know DOB only started telling the rest of you last week, but for months now he’s been going on about how he’s going to be the new host of Late Night.

“Segments, Gladstone,” he keeps saying. “I need segments! I can’t keep picking fights with Hannah Montana. That’s going to get old.”

“Going to get old?” I thought, but I felt I owed it to Dan — much in the way you still give money to a homeless woman pretending to be pregnant— you feel so bad that she’s delusional enough to believe she could fool anyone with a pillow under her shirt that you just have to reward the effort.

So I grabbed a recent news story —Tiffany Shepherd, the Florida High School teacher who was fired for working part time as a “bikini-mate” on a charted fishing cruise— and put it through my previously tested numeric hate machine to create a new segment: