When I was in high school, one of the service trips that I was lucky enough to participate in was a week in the Appalachian region of Tennessee. A gaggle of grumpy, sleepy teenage boys got up every morning at what seemed like the pre-asscrack of dawn to get ready for a day’s worth of hard labor. What gave us all the strength to forge onward, to make it through those roughest first few hours? Donald Duck Orange Juice.

1. This Schaefer Keg - Really, after evaluating this, my only question is, “Could I be fired for wearing this to work?”
2. Automatic customizable typing - OH SWEET MOTHER…how did I live without this? On my Mac I’ve been using TextExpander and at home I started with Texter. Seeing as how most of my days are spent reusing snippets of code or writing the same customer-servicey emails, all I do now is type a few shortcut letters and hit Tab and BAM! Full blocks of pre-determined text! A little scripting will also get the macros to position the cursor in a place after dropping in the text, or automatically paste in whatever is in the clipboard (like a URL). I can’t sit still I’m so excited about this.
3. Parking meter gift cards - Who the hell thought of this? I got one for Christmas and it’s the handiest damned thing ever. I never have change on me when I have to go to the other campus for meetings, and thus street parking becomes a game of “will I get caught by the meter maid?” Now I just keep it in my wallet and never have to worry. If this thing works on parking garages too, I’ll pass out.
4. Music Video Principles Applied To The Real World - Sad, but true. It takes a second to figure out the dynamic and who/what is being criticized, but once you get it it’s priceless. And sad.
5. This Old House - Is there a dude out there who can’t watch this show and learn something? I say “dude” because that’s who usually gets the shaft pleasure of doing home repairs. I catch episodes of this all the time while running or when The Wife™ relinquishes the remote, and every time I’m entranced (and schooled). Even the ones from 1985 still teach me crap I never knew, and give me reason to giggle at Norm Abrams flannel. I wish these guys could follow me around all the time.

To a 16 year old boy, having your breakfast drink named after a cartoon duck who refused to wear pants was probably the funniest thing I’d ever heard because it was just so…generic and illogical. Hell, to an adult me it’s still absolutely hilarious. Therefore, I petition that more mundane things in life be associated with random pop culture references. For example, I’d like to think that this morning I had some Bernstein Bears oatmeal and a hot cup of My Little Pony coffee. Wait, can we make that something cooler? Like Decepticon coffee? That sounds more badass…