1) Go to bed the night before with a space heater, blankets, and cats. No point in heating the entire house. If no cats are found, just plug in a space heater or an electric blanket: they will sprout up like mushrooms.
2) Get up the next morning at 7am, 15 minutes before sunrise. Go outside and slip into the hot tub. Sit there for about 15 minutes until the shivering stops and the pins and needles leave the feet. Relax and wake up as the sun rises.
3) Once it's light enough out and the body is warm, get out of the hot tub. There is now a narrow window of about ten minutes when the body is impervious to the cold. From there to the outside shower, lathered up good with old spice red zone.
4) Run back in the house and put on big fluffy bathrobe. Go from tub room through cold house back to warm bedroom. Dress for work. Go back to bathroom and shave. Wipe excess shaving cream off face and shit. Go to work.
It sounds complicated, but its not, and its actually a rather nice way to start out the morning. Of course, I could simply take a bath the night before, but what's the fun in that?
My weekend was so-so. Puttered around the house. Fudged with the drywall in the ever-so-slow progressing bathroom. Went to my folk's house on Sunday for my uncle's birthday. I was broke so I gave him a military MRE of meatloaf and mashed potatoes. He seemed tickled by it. My cousin and his little kids were there. They are cute kids. The little girl runs around all the time with a plastic target bag with all her stuff in it. She does this so her brother cannot get to it. Smart kid. Or neurotic.
In other news, the other day I was browsing myspace profiles when I came across this picture of this girl... and this amazing beer. I was in awe of this beer It's the biggest beer I have ever seen.
The girl lives in central Florida, so I wrote to her and asked about it. She said she got it from a bar called 'benchwarmers'. I had never heard of it so I looked at the website. Some sort of sports bar. I did not see any giant beers on the menu. Of course, the girl might be nuts and is afraid I want the name of the bar so I can come stalk her or hide in the bathroom and lick her ankles while she is in the stall or something. I'm too lazy to stalk anyone, however I will go on great quests and voyages in order to find gigantic beers. I will even put up with yuppie-slathered and guido infested sports bars.
Does anyone know anything about Benchwarmers and their giant beers?
Dialing the infernal machine back to January 29, 2007, where Florida's 30 degrees counts as a polar expedition and giant beer is a holy grail.
Ah, 2007 Ed. You slept with space heaters and cats, treated a hot tub like a survival pod, and trusted a ten-minute imperviousness window before sprinting to an outdoor shower. That whole routine reads like a cryptid's morning ritual now. In 2026, every one of those choices has been replaced by something smaller, louder, and subscription-based: smart thermostats argue with us, heated floors are sold as luxury, and nobody would risk hypothermia for Old Spice when a phone can order an overpriced pour from a delivery app while we stay cocooned under a heated blanket that texts us back. You asked strangers on MySpace for bar intel; now we demand answers from maps and review threads, then still show up and find the giant beer is a social media mirage. Your broke birthday gift was a military MRE—now that same MRE is a boutique snack sold for inflated prices between artisanal pickles and ghost-pepper jerky. And the sports bar you braved? It's probably a faded banner above a vape shop or a “premium watch party experience” with velvet ropes. You navigated the world through whims and hunches, Ed. We navigate through micro-transactions and anxiety.
“2007 Ed, did you ever find the giant beer at Benchwarmers, or did the yuppie-slathered, guido-infested quest consume you before you could ask for a straw?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2007 Ed: Ahh, Beelzebubba, you give me too much credit. I haven’t actually made it to Benchwarmers yet. I keep telling myself I’ll go, but then I remember the yuppie-slathered, guido-infested part, and my lazy bones win out. Plus, my weekends have been eaten by drywall dust and my uncle’s birthday MRE. I did look at their website again, though. Still no giant beer on the menu. Maybe the girl was nuts, maybe she was just messing with me, or maybe the giant beer only appears after you’ve downed three normal ones and started seeing things. Either way, I’m not giving up. I’ll put on my bravest cargo shorts and a shirt without holes, head over there, and ask for a straw and a map to the monster. If they kick me out, at least I’ll have a story. The quest continues.
