KISS Army Root Beer

I don’t think I’m very good with money. To be completely honest, I do fine. I have a good job making a fairly compensated income and I’m the sole breadwinner in the family. We live a comfortable life. We have a nice home that we are fixing up ourselves and all our necessities are covered. And on top of all this I have very little debt, a decent retirement account and some money in the bank for emergencies, so I’m by no means in dire straits. In fact, while I would likely fall squarely into the middle of the middle class nationally, I’m considered one of the richest people in the world in global terms (as are many of you, my dear readers). But I constantly feel like I just “get by” rather than thrive. We have used cars that are paid off and falling apart. We eat out one to two times a week and take family vacations a couple times a year. Truthfully, it’s all I really deserve. But any of my attempts to “get ahead” rather then “get by” are thwarted by events out of my control as well as my own poor money managing decisions. Let’s go back to our home that we are fixing up. Buying a fixer upper has out of necessity made me into a DIY guy. It doesn’t hurt that I have a bit of knack for it as well as a natural interest in fixing things and working with my hands. So when our washing machine started to go out, I dove into YouTube videos to diagnose and understand the issue in an attempt to be frugal and thrifty and to make do with what I already have, the main goal being to avoid spending $600-$800 on a new washer when this one was perfectly adequate at cleaning our clothes and shouldn’t be too hard to figure out for a guy like me. Cut to more than a month of weekends spent removing suspect parts and replacing them with new parts only to find out that the suspect part likely wasn’t the issue at all and ordering other new parts to replace other suspect parts. A few rounds of that and a lot of frustration and swearing led me to finally call in the experts and get a tech out to the house to officially diagnose the problem, which is what I should have done in the first place. This is the downside of DIY. Unless you really know, you don’t know, and in this case, I didn’t know. Now I’ve put around $700 of new parts and service calls into this 10 year old washing machine when I should have just gone out and got a new one. My latest replacement part was just delivered, the part the technician guaranteed will fix the issue. Well I installed it and guess what… it didn’t fix the issue. But when he came back out to look at it again he told me to try replacing the same things i already replaced. So do I keep dumping money into this garbage fire or just bite the bullet and sell this on craigslist and get a new one? Either way, I feel like a failure. 

Speaking of failures, this is another novelty branded "joke" offering from Rocket Fizz, this time capitalizing on the fandom of the 1970's glam rock band KISS, aptly named KISS Army Root Beer. I already mentioned this in previous posts but i am not a fan of the band KISS. I know they have a following, though i think their fans are likely dying off in droves by this point and i doubt they are on-boarding new recruits. I just don't get it. Some of the music is "fun" i guess, but i was too young to enlist in the KISS Army. Not to mention, with my religious upbringing i was told this band was evil because their name is an acronym for Knights In Satan's Service, though from my limited exposure to their music i can find no indication of Satanic symbolism or suggestive themes. I don't think my parents needed to worry though. Their music itself was enough of a deterrent for me to find interest in other things entirely. Not to mention the iconic face of the band, Gene Simmons, is a legendary whore in the sense that he will shill anything with KISS attached to it. Truly the Garfield of the rock world (shots fired, Jim Davis).  

My original plan was to review this next to the previous root beer i just reviewed, Jimi's Hey Joe Root Beer, because i had a sneaking suspicion that they are the same root beer. But when i went down to my local Rocket Fizz i was unable to find either of these root beers in stock, and it's been a few days since i tried the Jimi's. To be fair, i no longer think these are the same based on the distinct "Christmas" aftertaste i get from this root beer (think Dad's Root Beer). Nothing on the ingredients list indicates this has anything distinctly different from most basic root beers. It seems to be perfectly synthetic in flavor. And the pure cane sugar lends a sweet finish to the overall taste. I must say, it's better than i thought it would be and definitely better than the Jimi Hendrix root beer. You've surprised me on this one Rocket Fizz. Well done on not recycling the same fluid in different labeled bottles. Still, it's a derivative root beer flavor for sure, much like the music of KISS (shots fired, again. It's a regular shooting gallery around here).

My official review is that KISS Army Root Beer gets 6 (six) IBCs. I'm feeling generous for some reason with this one. It exceeded my expectations, so i bumped the score up to 2 more than Jimi's root beer. This in no way reflects how i feel about the music of each of these individuals/groups. If that were the case these scores would be flipped and pushed toward the limits in opposite directions. It's a shame the root beers don't reflect how Jimi is truly a rock legend and a god and KISS will be forgotten about entirely in the next decade or two. Sorry to any of you KISS fans out there. But not really. And you're too old to still be wearing that makeup, you freaks. 

Jimi's Hey Joe Root Beer

I don’t know if I mentioned this already but my wife and I invented a national holiday called Ice Cream’s Birthday. I have no idea when ice cream was really invented, and I doubt the internet does either which is why I refuse to Google it. We choose to celebrate the birth of Ice Cream on June 17^th every year, kinda like how Jesus wasn’t really born on Christmas. And wouldn’t you know it, that means Ice Cream’s Birthday is… TODAY! We just figured it should be during the summer time, which is peak ice cream season, and this arbitrary date holds a bit of personal significance to me that is completely un-ice cream related. It’s something we came up with 20 years ago this year when we were just friends and before we ever dated. We were hanging out at night in a park eating some ice cream and the conversation led us to creating this holiday that is now celebrated annually by a very small group of people. But I’m hoping to make it catch on, so please spread the word (all 4 of you that read this blog). This year we are going to a new ice cream shop that we haven’t been to before. That’s one of the more popular ways we have done this in the past, but I’ve also celebrated by bringing ice cream sandwiches to work and handing them out to people in an attempt to get this thing to catch on. And in case I need to say out loud what everyone already knows, it hasn’t. I’m not affiliated with any ice cream stores and I’m not plugging or shilling for anyone’s personal business. I’m not interested in being compensated or even recognized for creating this glorious holiday, I just want it to be celebrated. I’m just saying go eat some ice cream on June 17^th, people. 

Now, another completely un-ice cream related topic, Jimi Hendrix. Hendrix is considered one of the greatest (if not the greatest) guitar players of all time. His career was cut short when he overdosed at the age of 27. Still, his music is celebrated world wide and he definitely left his mark with his iconic appearances at huge music festivals like Woodstock. Still, for me he was only a passing casual listen. My best friend growing up was obsessed with Hendrix so i've definitely had exposure to most of his catalogue of songs, but even now i don't ever just throw on some Hendrix while I'm driving or working or what have you. 

So what does he have to do with root beer? Nothing, as far as i'm aware. This is another cheap exploitation of a famous person to sell sub-par root beer by the candy store we've all come to know and love; Rocket Fizz. They probably put the same generic root beer into the same bottles as all the other ones and then allocate which ones get which labels. Nothing about this root beer distinguishes it from any other run of the mill average basic root beer. It is flavored with cane sugar and has a thin, weak, watery root beer base flavor laced with a light carbonation. It also leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Truly a terrible root beer to disgrace this man's legacy. I say boo to you Rocket Fizz for this one. I'm about to review a KISS root beer that likely tastes identical to this but still seems more rightly fit for such a mediocre beverage.

My official review is the Jimi's Hey Joe Root Beer gets 4 (four) IBCs. I toyed with giving this a 3 because of how insulting it is to use Jimi's name on this, but on it's merits it's still not an absolutely garbage root beer. It's bad, but i've had worse. And do not be surprised at all when i review the KISS root beer and give it the same rating because i'm fairly certain it's the same liquid in both bottles.