Dude. The 90's. It Happened.

By chance, I stumbled across a short musical number,

And it was like being hit in the face by a 1994-shaped lightning bolt. I was like, fuck 2011. Where's my flannel? Where's my dial-up 28.8kbps modem? I'm doing it, man. I'm going back.

I've been posting this blog for, what, a week now? As far as I'm concerned it's old and crusty and nobody wants another article on the ending of Assassin's Creed 2. Screw that trope. It's been done to death.

It's time for a themed week.





The first week of February, 2011 will be 90's week. Mortal Kombat will frighten parents. Nintendo will release all those Zelda games that everyone says are better than the ones that came later. The Jaguar will still be on sale in department stores (or at least it was for a month. Do the math).

Arcades will be open.

And there will be absolutely no history lessons. I didn't care what was on the news in the 90's and I'm not going to start caring now.

Join me. Join me on this journey. It isn't nostalgia that paints the 90's so brightly. It really was that good.

I'm just like Stallone in Demolition Man: trapped in a time not my own.

And that show, Portlandia, could pass for a documentary. I visited Portland last year and the place blew my mind. Where I come from everyone is over 70 (you're a kid if you're in your 60's). In Portland everyone was, like, my age. It was weird.

Their public transportation was incredible. Their tap water was better than any bottled water I've ever tasted (god, I miss that water). And they have the biggest bookstore I've ever seen. And then there's that fucked up doughnut shop...

Voodoo Doughnut. It's easy to find, being located right next to the Paris Theater, which, judging by their advertising, was playing a lot of Hentai during the time of my visit. The line for the doughnut shop went around the block. After I finally got my peach fritter I made sure to run outside, stand in front of everyone and take slow, slow bites while yelling shit like, "Mmmmm! Omigod, this is so good!"

Nobody thought I was funny.



The weirdest thing that happened to me during my visit to Portland was when a government vehicle came down a residential road, stopped, and then painted a giant biker symbol across the pavement.

This is one from Berkeley. It sorta looked like this.

I guess it made sense. There were more bikers than cars in residential areas.

And it seems like an appropriate warning, not for the cars but the pedestrians. These Portland bikers aren't your kick-back, moving-target-for-leftover-McDonald's roadies. No way. They come down 15 MPH streets at a minimum of 50 MPH, aiming for you, your grandma, your dog; and then they'll go meet up with their roadie buddies and laugh about it while picking your teeth out of the spokes of their titanium-alloy 3lb death machine.


But yeah, 90's week. Get stoked.