The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, pg. 4, by Michael Chabon.

The amazing thing about Boo Berry is that it appears to be marketed as a “healthy” cereal by General Mills. Anything that turns your milk purple or was inspired by circus peanuts can’t be healthy.

Of course, with all of this talk about Boo Berry, obviously we are going to have to try Franken Berry and Count Chocula. It’s only a matter of time before all of the old forgotten cereals from our childhoods are rediscovered and sampled. Even some that I never had when I was little, like CoCo Wheats and
King Vitaman. We used to be able to get King Vitaman at Food Lion, but I haven’t seen it up here in NJ. Fortunately, even though Quaker Oats doesn’t acknowledge King Vitaman on their web site, you can buy King Vitaman through the Quaker Oats online store.

On the last trip or two to the grocery store, Mike and I noticed the addition of 3 cereals in the cereal aisle, each for the low price of $2.50. The items of interest were none other than the Boo Berry, Franken Berry, and Count Chocula. Not having seen these products all year only to show up the month before Halloween makes me think they are “seasonal” cereals.

So, we picked up a box of Boo Berry. As appealing as Boo Berry seem to be as a kid (I never had it then), it manages to combine the worst aspects of Fruity Pebbles and Lucky Charms. Not only is it loaded with those little cruncy marshmellows that Lucky Charms has, instead of the plain toasted oat bits, the “meat” of the cereal is little purple ghost-things. The marshmellows are enough to turn your milk colors; I can’t imagine what the Fruity Pebble-like powers the purple bits might have over your milk.

I must admit, we did eat the box, though it was eaten more like a candy. I couldn’t stomach the thought of actually eating it with milk during anytime of the day, much less first thing in the morning.

The Boo Berry link is of unknown quality. It is blocked here at the lab because it is in the “Tasteless” category according to Websense. Makes me wonder, since the Boo Berry Worship Cult is not filtered.

One thing I noted during my cereal research this morning was the lack of information about these products on the General Mills web page. Certain cereals on the page (Cheerios, Trix, Chex, and Wheaties to name a few) are broken out as brands, while all the rest cereals are stuck under the “Big G Cereals” brand.

Another thing I learned in my cereal research was the origin of Lucky Charms:

The cereal was invented in 1963 by then vice-president of General Mills, John Holahan. Holahan claimed to have gotten the idea for the cereal when he happened upon some orange marshmallow peanuts, a candy common in circuses at the time. Holahan cut up several of the peanuts and sprinkled them over Cheerios, another oat-bit cereal, and he “knew we had a winner.”

How disgusting is that? Circus peanuts…

That’s what I’ve been on lately. Seems like the only disc you’ll ever find in my player is by either Whiskeytown, Wilco, the Jayhawks, Barn Burners, Mindy Smith, My Morning Jacket, Son Volt, or Chris Whitley. (any of whom I reccomend.)

Sometimes, when I get stuck in these ruts, I like to think about lemonade.

Mmmm.

Sweet. Sour. Delicious.

Lemonade.

Kim helped me make this. Afterwards we ate lasagna.

Right now we’ve got a couple projects in the works. We are currently working on an EP that is slated at 5 to 7 songs and then a full length album of about 8 to 10 songs. There are a couple demos for the album recorded, and one completed song, while the EP similarly has one song recorded for it and a couple demos. Needless to say there is a long way yet to go on these projects. Periodically I would imagine over the next couple weeks we’ll be posting some of these songs in the MP3 area of the site for those who are interested.

The actual English translation is Freerunning but Extreme Walking sounds cooler.

Parkour is the freestyle sport that’s like skateboarding, only without the board. I got linked to flash of this and was more inspired rather than simply impressed. These are just simple moves that almost anyone can do. I’ve done martial art rolls a plenty, even from heights; but never done or seen them done from 20 feet up onto a building across the street like David Belle, frenchman and father of Parkour, does.

Belle has a philosophy of “natural” sporting or play, in which someone just uses their surroundings to get a workout. This I can relate to since after 5 years of formal sword training I still feel like I’m the kid in the back yard playing with sticks. This is admitted as the real strength of the sport: that nothing is formal, nothing is to be judged ala X Games and thus it’s pure underground. So underground that children running around like this in rural/urban areas later find out that someone in 1988 went ahead and gave this activity a name. After all, there’s no expensive gear to even market other than shoes.

From here there is alot of juvenile involvement, including gangs/clans putting vids of their tricks to Eminem backbeats. Will you find me doing any of that? Not likely. Will you find me doing stupid shit like jumping off (small) buildings? Maybe. Will you find me finally getting down that aerial that I almost perfected years ago and then forgot about? I’m already working on it.

Full vid of the flash here

Apparently, the Presidential candidate with the most popular Halloween masks wins the election. The split at Buycostumes.com is 57-43, with Bush in the lead.