REVIEW - Skully’s: The Retro Party

We’ve been going to Skully’s Ladies 80s night for the past eight years. It used to be that we would go twice a month. Then once every month. Then once every two months. After Dave left, we wondered if we’d ever go again. We got over that bullshit pretty quick and now we are back to once every six weeks.

For those of you who are unaware, Ladies 80s is held on Thursday nights at Skully’s in Columbus, OH. Girls get in free. Boys pay five bucks. They play 80s dance music. Most the time the DJ does a great job putting together the right mix of great dance songs with only a scrunchie’s worth of overplayed Madonna/Love Shack crap.

Our modus operandi is to go out to a nearby bar beforehand at 8:00pm get our drink on and chit chat. At 10:00pm or so, we’ll head over to Skully’s. At that time, the place is just starting to awaken. Usually there are six or seven teachers’ conference attendees that have been drinking since 5:00pm getting their 80s dance on. These folks will be gone by 11:00pm to make the mistakes that people at conferences make. We usually sit up front and drink beers, waiting on anyone who said they would catch up with us later. At some unspoken time, Aha’s “Take on Me” or something by INXS will come on and we will make our way back to our spot. You can see that spot marked here with an “X”.

We usually dance for a few songs and inevitably someone will show up with a handful of beers. We’ll dance some more and if a crappy song comes on, we will step out side and those that smoke will smoke and those that don’t will think about why they quit. Then back inside. Repeat as necessary.

By about midnight, Skully’s is packed. In the past three years, people have begun to dress the part, wearing pink leggings and jelly bracelets and sunglasses that weren’t even popular in the 80s.

We still play the guessing game: one person leans over and says to another, “I think X band will play next.” Person two will think for a moment and say, “I think band Y will play.” And then we wait to see who is right. If you are brave, you can guess song and artist. Saying Madonna’s Borderline will get you kicked in the pants.

At 2:15am, you cannot believe it is 2:15am and we all stumble out into the night, ears ringing with the memory of a keytar and reverb.

So a few weeks ago, Freckled Jen sent me a photo of Skully’s door:

No more Ladies 80s? We were aghast! How could they fuck with the formula!

But we are getting old. Really old at this point. I was old the first day I stepped into Skully's. We knew things would change over time. It's just no one wanted to admit it.

Recently it was Jenn’s birthday weekend and she wanted to get a group of folks together. When she called to ask about Friday, I had to decline as Miss Sally was going to be heading out of town. Jenn asked about Thursday and I said sure!

It was a few hours later that we both realized that we could check out Skully’s new Retro Party. We agreed that we would do a little light recon and see what was up.

We met friends after work at Surly Girl. We drank and bought Jen shots.

At 10:15pm, we headed over.

It was still free for ladies and still $5 for dudes.

Once inside, we expected to hear a mix of 80s and 90s. But it was still all 80s music.

So we danced.

And an odd thing happened. I’m not sure if it was the DJ or the new format, but the DJ started playing really good songs, back to back. Really good ones. Usually the DJ will choreograph the evening by playing a mix of good old dance songs and then pulling out a dead ringer that everyone likes. On this night, it seemed like the DJ was pulling out all the stops and playing back to back to back great songs.

And I was a bit disappointed. Call me a hypocrite, but I like the build up. I like a few good songs topped off by an ELO or Cure or Depeche Mode song that can’t go wrong. And then I like when the DJ plays a (what I consider to be) a crappy, stereotypical 80s song, so that I can take a break for three minutes and twenty seconds.

When we did finally step outside, we chatted with one of the bartenders. He seemed to help us do the math. The DJs will play the standard 80s music early on. As the night goes on and all those 30 somethings leave at midnight to go home and take Advil, the young kids start showing up. Then the 90s music starts to mix in.

And wouldn’t you know it. Around midnight, the 90s songs started kicking in.

Sadly, the 90s songs they played were not all that good. I know there are some danceable 90s songs, but we really didn’t hear to many. Especially since we left right after midnight to go home and take Advil.  I guess we will have to go back and do some more testing.

Fear not, friends. Skully’s is still the same. It was inevitable that the 90s were going to creep in to 80s dance night. They had been already. Every so often we’d turn an ear to the music and say, “Was that is the 80s?” and then continue with said dancing. There aren't bookends on the 80s demarking where good music starts and stops. I’m not sure there was good 80s dance music until late 1983 anyways.

So do not let the new name fool you. It is still the same fun. Still the same fun, dance music.

Still the same Terminator Guy.

Still the same Shake Weight Guy.

And the Old Guy.

The same Converse.

All and these fuckers:

And when a really good song comes on, we call Dave and leave a message on his phone to piss him off and remind him that even though The Retro Party is the same as Ladies 80s, it's never the same without him.

A Great Advertising Scheme

These lighters are handed out for free at a local bar. I assume they are paid for by the Law Firm on the lighter.

Resealable package: Choose Wisely

Freelance Whales

Stu and I were supposed to see the Freelace Whales when they were in Columbus. He had something else come up and I neglected to go. I soon forgot about them.

Luckily I remembered.



You should also check out this one:



And now I am missing Stu.

Peas!

Greg asked for more peas at dinner. I gave him more peas.

He said that was too many. I said, "How many is too many?"

So how many is too many?

I guessed 172.

Greg guessed 174.

How many do you guess? Don't count! Just guess.

Answer below!

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Keep going!





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I counted full peas and then went back and counted the bits that may or may not have been full peas.

Lies!

Creepy and Gross

I'm not sure what the back story to this is, but I assume it's pretty creepy and gross.

Skully's Ladies 80s is now The Retro Party

It was bound to happen. I even predicted it a while ago. I just never thought it would actually happen.

Skully's has dropped the name "Ladies 80's" and are going with "The Retro Party."

It's not like the dance music from all of the 80s was good. There was a good bit of crap through the early 80s. Yeah, yeah... and the rest of the 80s as well. There's some good stuff tucked into the early 90s. Skully's was starting to play 90s music as well. No one really cared as long as it was fun to dance to.

We are going to do some light recon and check it out. We assume it will be exactly the same. I just hope the Doug In Five Years doesn't stop coming. Nor the Terminator Guy. Guy in the Dress. Outland Girl. And who can forget Bump into You Drunk Girl. Hopefully they will all come back. Not creepy old guy thought. I think his position is being taken by someone else.

6 In 1 Sweet Sensations Baking Center Great at Creating Aneurisms

Ann wanted an ice cream maker. When the store didn’t have what we wanted and instant gratification kicked in, I bought her the “Cra-Z-Art 6 In 1 Sweet Sensations Baking Center.”

This colorful plastic contraption contained a mixing station, pouring station and decorating station. It came with cake and cookie mixes. The box did not mention that it would come with a heaping portion of suck ass.

Here is beautiful Ann glowing with the aura of cooking.

The plastic containers that are there for mixing and pouring do nothing but subtract from the amount of final product. The powder and water combine to form a sticky mass and it adheres to every surface it touches. It takes hours to scrape the sticky mass from the mixing area and then they want you to spackle it into the pouring device which does nothing but delay and reduce. It was frustrating to watch as Ann pushed down on the sticky mass only to have it ooze up and out of every crack, like a 95 year old man in a wet suit after one last night of Schlitz and White Castles with whole grain buns. Shit was coming out of everywhere.

What they say the goo dispenser looks like:

Here is an artist rendition of what it should look like on the package:

And here it is in real life:

When I went to do some post-purchase research on this product, I hit up Amazon.com. (You know what post-purchase research is, right? When someone buys the thing that looks good in the store and when it fails at home, they look up what all the other people bitched about and how crappy the product is and then the post-purchaser researcher probably adds their own review for the other post-purchase researchers to read after them.) We had thrown the box away after unpacking it and jamming all the plastic bits together. When I saw the photo on the website of all the "desserts" this product makes, I about crapped a cupcake.

Here is the product photo again:

Now let's take a look at these LIES!!

See this creamy cake mix pouring out?

The only way this cake mix could look this creamy is if you ate it raw and crapped it out six hours later.

See these beautiful cookies? (I'm not sure what the heck the flowers and crap are. They didn't come in the box.)

Here's what the cookies look like when you "bake" them in the microwave (not included):

Yum! We filled several holes in the wall with these spackle cookies.  Oh, and by the way... the little tiny box the refills came is says clearly that a microwave is not included with purchase.  Cheap bastards.

Brownies!

Ass cakes!

You can imagine what it took to get these out of their cups.

This is a great image because of several items:

1. There was enough frosting to cover the top of the cake... maybe. The sides? Never.
2. The frosting was not even close to being this smooth. It had a gritty consistency and it was lumpy.
3. Where the fuck did those flowers come from?
4. That's a nice placement of sprinkles, right?  Wrong!  When you unleash the sprinkles from the decorating station,  the lever releases about 14 tons of sprinkles in one small area of the "cake."  I assume if you got the cake spinning at about 350 prm, the sprinkles might be evenly distributed, but I also assume that the "frosting" flying off would kill small children.

Lastly, I had to include this image:

I love the photoshopped flowers and line of frosting on the top of the cake. There is no way that any of the ingredient or tools included with this kit could create such decoration.

In the end, we made the cakes and cookies that came with the box. We had bought a refill kit just so we wouldn't have to run back to the store. Real smart. Then threw this away. Or we recycled it, whichever you want to believe.

Don't buy this. Get an Easy-Bake Oven and your own sprinkles and frosting and crap.

E-mail Spam Revenge

Got this spam e-mail from someone. He fell for my reply. Don't go to the website in the e-mail, mom.

**EDIT** OK, no one go to that site.  Unless you like old men.  Three old men.  And love.  Because the three old men love each other.  A lot.

Knife Murder

Here is the scene of the crime where the knife was murdered.

After you exit the plane...

Piggy back ride!

The Bacon Pop - Popcorn Secret

I received this box of Bacon Pop - Bacon Flavored Microwave Popcorn as my Reddit Secret Santa Gift. I could not wait to try it!

There were three bags in the box.  

The directions were the same as regular pop corn except there were a lot more warnings about which side to keep down. There was also a warning in large letters, "Don't Burn Your Bacon."

I started to wonder what the secret to the bacon flavored popcorn was. The packaging said that there was no bacon in the product, only popcorn, oil and bacon flavoring. (It's actually a vegan product!)  So I decided to cut it open to see what was inside.

I pulled back the wrapping and found a bunch of kernels of corn with some kind of solidified oil.  It was exactly as you might expect.  before my disappointment set in, I felt something under my fingers on the side.

It was BACON!  Real, raw bacon!














I tried to pull it out, but it was stuck along the top and bottom edges.  There was a slab of bacon on either side.















I wasn't going to let this go to waste, so I taped the bag up as best I could.














And put it in the microwave.

In about four minutes it was done.  The bag barely held together with the tape.  The tape was a little stinky, but the bacon smell much more prevalent. 

I dumped the bag out into a bowl.

And for some reason, there was no bacon in with the popcorn.  I thought that maybe that is how they cook and flavor the popcorn. If the bacon disappears during cooking, then maybe it is not considered a food.  But then I looked in the bag.

There it was!  I tried to shake and crinkle it out, but it wouldn't budge.  So I got out a knife and scraped it out.

It took some doing and I ended up breaking it into pieces.



Upon further investigation, I found that the bacon had a very sticky substance on either end.  Closer inspection revealed that it was a highly concentrated maple syrup.  I think this is what kept it stuck to the side.

I think that because the bacon is part of the packaging, it is not actually considered part of the food, so they can still say it is a vegan product.  I mean, you don't see "aluminum" in the ingredients on a can of soda, right?

Well, that's all our investigative reporting for today.  Next week, we go searching for the palm and olive in Palmolive soap.