#127 - i ♥ contras.

hey nicaragua! happy friggin independence day! you've been independent for 188 years now! it's no 233 years, but well done nonetheless. back in the early 1800s, when you finally told the mexicans to take a hike, you were but a tiny central american country roughly the size of new mexico, a country that had endured countless years of rule by outside influences, a nation just hoping for a brighter future. these days things aren't all that much different, but it's cool. take your time developing. managua may have been destroyed in a day, but rome wasn't built in one.

sorry about that thing back in june where we stopped giving you $60 million in aid. you've got a $15 billion GDP as it is, so we figured you wouldn't miss it. i don't know if you heard, but our financial system's a little effed up these days, so whereas we here in america are more than willing to help you out, we could really use that $60 million. after all, alabama needs a bridge. i know that things have been sort of rocky between us in the past, but we promise that once we get back on our feet & decide to give you money again, things will be different. we sort of had to stop giving you money though. a marxist guerilla president? really? the marxist part is intriguing, but the guerilla part? we couldn't have our president palling around with terrorists. you know? don't make us send in the mighty contra commandos in the interest of fomenting. obama is all about change, mr ortega.

now that i think about it, i can't believe they haven't made contra into a movie yet. don't agree with me? go play the game for ten minutes & come back to me with a new answer, please. actually, i have to be honest with you. i like the game a hella lot, but i don't know how i'd feel about a movie adaptation, so if you're pro-contra movie, you probably shouldn't look to me to be your leader. you should look to this guy. he's got a petition signed by 22,000 people & is hoping that they make it with arnie & sly in the starring roles. since schwarzenegger's almost done being the governator & sly's back in shape, i say go for it. get michael bay to direct & blow shit up!

in celebration of the contras, today, indie darlings vampire weekend announced that their second album is coming out...four months from now...like in a whole different year. the name? contra. the concept? ten songs of twee pop with a closing song called "i think ur a contra." the album features a girl in a polo shirt on the front cover, so you can probably expect an album of songs you can wear a collared shirt to, something you can play over & over again at your frat house next semester. i kid though. i'm actually interested in hearing it. i just have a snarky reputation to uphold.

#127 - i ♥ contras.
snack: viveli happy snack bag o' snacks
drink: nieto senetiner 2006 malbec



in honor of our friends who exist below us, i decided to have myself a little south central fiesta. earlier this summer, amy, the bro's aforementioned girlfriend, went on a little vacay down nicaragua way & when she returned, the bro was all "amy brought you back a treat." when he told me that, it made me so happy that i can only explain it in this way...a few years back, one of my ex-girlfriends traveled to italy & visited vatican city. whilst there, she picked up a set of rosary beads blessed by the pope himself & brought them home for my mom, who's still a devoted roman catholic (but not in some sort of creepy way). it was a totally unexpected gesture & i'm a big fan of those. amy's gift turned out to be a happy snack bag o' snacks from viveli, a company based in nicaragua.

it comes in a neat lil' yellow mesh bag that's stylishly tied with a matching yellow bow. tastefully done. inside, there are a total of thirty-two wafer rolls. half of them are chocolate & come in blue two packs with a smiling yellow fish on the front. fish love chocolate. the other half are four packs with chocolate (again?), fresca, limon & vainilla flavors. i'm not sure what "vainilla" is, but i bet warren beatty would like it. amy picked up a bag for herself as well & warned me ahead of time that some of them might be stale. luckily, i didn't detect that much staleness. amongst the non-chocolate flavors, i prefer the limon. the vainilla's a close second, but true to its name, its showy-ass flavor lingered in my mouth for quite some time after.

for my beverage, i went classy with a bottle of nieto senetiner 2006 malbec that i took home as part of my bountiful snack party doggie bag this past saturday. it's made by an argentinian company, so i'm going to act all retroactive & consider it my two-month, six-day late tribute to argentine independence day. a bottle goes for under $20 & as far as i could tell, it was well worth it. if i was independent myself & bought my own bottles of wine, i'd pay up to $21 for a bottle of this stuff.

since it's a malbec, it has a really dark red color to it. after years where i shunned red wine, i can say that i'm finally more of a fan of red wine than i am of white wine. so yeah...this one's dark. i tend to characterize dark wines as extremely rich & often harsh, but this one was rather smooth. according to their website, it spent "a year in french oak barrels," which sounds like it's probably a good thing to do to wine. i finished it over the course of three nights this past week & can safely say that if you drink dark red wine every night for three nights in a row, you definitely notice it in the mornings. since i'm a gentleman, i'm not going to say how you'll notice, but i will say that you'll be quite surprised.