1) The Most Surprising Thing I’ve Ever Seen in New Jersey – Come along as I uncover a little known event in New Jersey – a farm animal auction.  You’ll see a cardboard box full of roosters, miniature horses, and an Amish auctioneer.

2) My Latest Obsession: Teresa Guidice – This past year, I got hooked on Real Housewives of New Jersey.  And what was it that drew me in?  The crazy-eyed train wreck that is Teresa Guidice.

3) ArmpitNJ.com Exclusive: Snooki’s First Draft! – Snooki became a best-selling author this year, but all the credit should go to her ghost writer.  I managed to get my hands on Snooki’s original draft for A Shore Thing.

4) Killer Klowns from Outer Space: A Review – Sure, the movie doesn’t really have anything to do with New Jersey.  But it was so krazy I couldn’t resist writing about it.

5) No Escape from “Escape from New Jersey” – What better way to spend a night than playing a drinking board game?  This simple game just proves that there really is no escape from the Armpit of America.

It tastes like burning...and Snooki

Due to a certain show on MTV, the Jersey Shore is more popular than ever.  To appease a public hungry for all things Jersey Shore and to capitalize on it, companies are selling anything related to the shore in one way or another.  So, this holiday season, you can buy the guido-wannabes in your life all sorts of Jersey Shore merchandise, like ornaments and perfume.  Just put the words “Jersey Shore” on something, and you’ll have a bunch of idiots willing to by it.

I am one of those idiots.

While at the liquor store the other night looking for something to bring to a Chanukah party, I saw a bumper-sticker-like Jersey Shore label stuck on a bottle of vodka.  Being the fanboy that I am, I snatched it up and brought it to the register without giving a second thought.  After taking it home, I realized that some things are worth deliberating.  Jersey Shore branded vodka is one of those things.

This Jersey Shore vodka has nothing to do with the MTV show of the same name.  It doesn’t really have much to do with the real Jersey Shore either.  Though the perimeter of the label is lined with the names of various party towns on the Jersey Shore, there is one glaring mistake.  Among all the locations known for their bars and crazy nightlife, like Seaside, Pt. Pleasant, Wildwood, and Belmar, appears Spring Lake, a town known for rich old people and little else.  Why Spring Lake would be included on a bottle of vodka is beyond me.

Turning around the bottle, it started to make sense.  The company that produces it is located in Philadelphia, which, last time I checked, was in Pennsylvania.  And though the front of the bottle proclaims it to be “Extra Premium,” the only details we’re provided with is that this Jersey Shore vodka was “Distilled from grain.”  And that’s really all the details you get.  There’s no other text on the bottle.  No story about how Jersey Shore Vodka came to be.  No suggestions for partying it up Jersey Shore style.  No recipes or anything else.  Just a label with the words “Jersey Shore” and an ill-advised list of shore party towns.

But enough about the bottle.  How does Jersey Shore vodka taste?  I’d have to wait for the Chanukah party to find out.  The day soon came and after getting drunk on latkes and brisket, it was time to get drunk on something else.  A few of us decided to take a shot.  Now you’d think Jersey Shore vodka would taste like the Jersey Shore – a distinct mix of saltwater, latex, stale beer, cold pizza, tanning oil, and sweat.  And how did Jersey Shore vodka taste?  Like vodka.  Cheap vodka to be precise.

And then it struck me.  I finally understood the connection.  Jersey Shore vodka left me with a stinging feeling in my throat and the rest of my body, and I had immediately regretted taking the shot.  And if a night at the Jersey Shore doesn’t leave you with a burning sensation and an overwhelming sense of regret, then you haven’t been to the Jersey Shore.

Last week, the day finally came for me to earn my own Pete & Elda’s shirt.  Though my friends who have completed the challenge told me it really isn’t that hard, I still expected it to be difficult.  Eating a whole pizza definitely isn’t something I do every day.  When the pizza came, I realized I had nothing to be worried about.  The crust was paper thin, crispy, and slightly charred.  Just like matzo!  I knew I had this in the bag.  Check out the video below to see how I fared.

The challenge was a lot easier than I ever expected.  Despite the name “Double Extra Large” the pizza wasn’t big at all.  Now for a real pizza eating challenge at the Jersey Shore, I suggest eating a whole large pie at Three Brothers in Belmar.

Like the slideshow above?  I have more!

Celebrate an either late or really early Halloween by watching as I create a scale replica of Snooki out of pumpkins.

The New Jersey Turnpike isn’t a total waste – it has an IKEA!

As you can see above, Escape from New Jersey isn’t technically a board game.  It’s more of a laminated piece of paper that comes in a cardboard tube, so you’ll need to weigh down the corners to keep it from rolling back up.  And rather than having real game pieces, you just get cheap plastic cowboys and Indians that can’t even stand up on their own.  Yeah, the whole thing is pretty flimsy.  Flimsy, but fun.

Escape from New Jersey is a lot like any typical drinking game; you’re expected to take drinks, force other people to drink, and make up dumb rules that if not obeyed cause you to drink even more.  But what makes the game special is all of the Jersey-centric items on the game board.  For instance, land on the Governor square and, just like Chris Christie, you get to make up your own rules.  Get stuck at the DMV and lose three turns.  Enter a traffic circle and go back two spaces.  Encounter a toxic spill and everyone loses a turn.

As the game progresses, though, it gets kind of annoying with all of the different rules.  And the drunker you get, the harder it is to follow all those stupid rules.  You get to the point where you just want someone to win so the game will end.  However, you soon realize that winning is pretty much impossible.  The last stretch of the game ensures that no one will ever reach the final square.

All in all, the lesson learned here is that, whether a game or real life, there is no escape from New Jersey.  Ever.

I was wrong.

So what’s with all the dramatics?  Well, I recently visited a part of the Armpit of America that I thought existed only in my nightmares.  No, not a Jersey City whorehouse.  Not a crack den in Camden either.  Not even Chris Christie’s private bathroom.  The place of horror was a farm auction.  In New Jersey.  About 20 minutes from cosmopolitan Princeton and at the confluence of three major highways.

The place is called the Camelot Horse auction, located in Cranbury, New Jersey.  Despite being surrounded by the Jersey Turnpike, Route 130, and Route 33, one arrives at the auction by traveling over a deteriorating road through a dark cornfield to get to a gravelly parking lot.  It’s still hard for me to believe that such a place could exist so close to the typical Jersey landscape of highways and strip malls.

I was invited to such a place by some friends who are just a tad more country than I am and certainly fit in better than I do.  After meeting up, we went inside an old barn to see the animals up for auction.  The barn was full of little stables, each holding a variety of horses, ponies, donkeys, sheep, and goats.  In another room were a bunch of cardboard boxes containing various smaller animals, like guinea pigs, rabbits, and pigeons.

Something tells me this guy ended up as someone's dinner that night.

But the main attraction of the farm auction was, appropriately enough, the auction room.  This section of the barn had bleachers along the walls, a big, rusty truck full of farm equipment, and a podium in the middle of the room for an Amish-looking auctioneer.  Adorned with a straw hat and a big, bushy beard, he presided over the bidding on items like shovels and feed buckets with the typical auctioneer gibberish.

When everything on the truck was sold off, the auctioneer led everyone outside to bid on some larger items, like trailers and animal crates.  And hay.  Yes, there were three giant piles of bales of hay.  As exciting as it was to watch a bunch of rednecks bid on hay, this was nothing compared to what happened next.

Everyone piled back inside to the auction room, as they were about to start auctioning off the livestock.  The rusty old truck was removed, and the animal auction was underway.  They began with the little animals; guinea pigs were going for a dollar each and a box of roosters (yes, a box of roosters) for as little as $10.  Then the goats and sheep were paraded in.  As these animals made their way to the auction floor, there was a burley guy in a John Deere hat cracking a bullwhip behind them, muttering to himself about how dumb the sheep were.  Again, this was all happening in New Jersey.

Justin Timberlake could write a song about this pic...I'll let you figure out the title.

After the smaller ungulates, it was time for the stars of the show, the horses and ponies.  One by one, the animals were ridden into the room and made to run and jump around as the auctioneer rattled off the bids.  It was just so surreal…sitting in a tiny barn watching a horse prance around to the tune of an Amish-looking guy speaking in tongues.  But don’t take my word for it, take a look for yourself:

I hope you all appreciate these pictures and video; I pretty much risked my life to take them.  You see, the people at the auction were real farm people who take their farm auctions seriously.  Along comes along this nerdy-looking, skinny-jeans-wearing, quasi-hipster desperately trying to hide his goofy smile caused by the utter ridiculousness of the whole scene.  So, yeah; each time I took out my camera, I scored quite a few dirty looks.

Though it wasn’t exactly my cup of fine herbal tea, it was a fun, and eye-opening, way to spend the evening.  On top of that, admission to the place was free.  Of course, if I wanted to spend a couple hundred dollars, I could be the proud owner of a shiny new pony.  Maybe next time.  But what I appreciated most about this adventure was that it was something I never would have expected to find in New Jersey.  While it wouldn’t shock anyone to see such a scene in Oklahoma or Kansas, you just don’t see stuff like this in the Armpit of America.  And the fact that I can still be surprised in the state that I’ve lived in for 28 years just makes me love New Jersey so much more.

Are there any odd places in New Jersey you think I should check out?  Let me know with a comment below.

As the movie progressed, it hit me.  Killer Klowns from Outer Space may very well take place right here in the Armpit of America.  The evidence?  Well, although the movie is set in the fictional town of Crescent Cove, the characters make reference to neighboring Marlboro, a prominent town in central Jersey.  Also, if clown aliens ever really came to Earth to kill as many people as possible, it only makes sense that they’d land in New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the country.  Besides, it wouldn’t be the first time an evil clown has wreaked havoc in New Jersey…

Now that I’ve justified my stance, let’s jump right in.  Like many a B-movie, this one starts out with a bunch of horny teenagers hanging out at the local make-out point.  It’s here that we meet our protagonists, Mike and Debbie.  While coming up for air, the two lovebirds see what they think is a shooting star fly across the sky.  They make the fateful decision to walk into the woods to see where their shooting star has landed.  Before long, they encounter a creepy circus tent in the middle of the forest.  Upon entering, they discover that it’s no circus tent at all.  It’s an alien spaceship, full of dead bodies being held in cocoons of cotton candy.  Again, what’s not to love about such a movie?

Before they can explore any more of the spaceship, one of the clown-aliens discovers Mike and Debbie and chases them around while shooting them with seemingly harmless popcorn.  Narrowly escaping, those crazy kids hurry to the police station, where they try to convince a skeptical cop about what they just saw.  Complicating things is the fact that Debbie and Mr. Cop used to hook up.  Awkward!

As this drama goes on, we see a montage of the killer clowns going around and charming the townspeople with adorable circus tricks to lull them into a false sense of security.  That seemingly innocent puppet show turns out to be a deadly puppet show.  What looks like delicious pies being thrown into some guy’s face turn out to be skin-melting, acid-laced pies.  And the cute dummy that one clown uses in his ventriloquist act turns out to be a dead corpse!  And what about that popcorn the clowns shoot at everyone?  Turns out that it’s really evil popcorn, with each kernel hatching into a baby killer clown!

Pictured above: A horrible beast with ridiculous hair, and an evil baby clown.

And what are our protagonists up to?  Well, Debbie has gone back home to take what must be the longest shower sequence in movie history.  Meanwhile, Mike keeps trying to convince Mr. Cop about the clowns.  Mr. Cop doesn’t believe him until they drive up to make-out point and he opens an abandoned car to find it covered in some sticky substance.  While that might not be out of the ordinary at make-out point, the substance is actually pink cotton candy.

When he gets cornered by a clown, Mr. Cop tries shooting at it but with no luck.  Finally, he aims right for the clown’s big, red nose.  Sure enough, that does the trick – but not before Debbie is kidnapped from her bathroom and placed inside a giant rubber ball!  It’s never explained why the trigger happy clowns who kill everyone else chose to keep her alive.  Then again, she wouldn’t be much a protagonist if she were killed right away.

Mike and Mr. Cop sneak onto the clown’s spaceship to rescue Debbie.  Upon entering the room where all of the corpse-containing cotton candy cocoons are kept, they discover the reason the clowns are killing everyone.  One of the evil clowns walks up to a cocoon, sticks a crazy straw inside, and sucks up the blood.

What dead bodies? This is just a giant furry pink lightbulb factory!

In the final scene, Mr. Cop shoots as many clowns as possible.  But before he can finish the killing spree, Jo Jo, the clown’s gargantuan leader, emerges and grabs Mr. Cop and is about to put him in his mouth.  Though Mr. Cop aims for Jo Jo’s nose, he’s out of bullets!  Thinking on his feet, though, Mr. Cop takes off his badge and uses the pin to prick Jo Jo in the nose.  With Debbie free from her rubber prison, the three of them escape from the ship, just as it takes off to go back to whatever planet the clowns came from.

Now that I’ve explained it, do you understand how this is the best movie ever?  And all I’ve given you is the dumb plot.  Words can’t express how creepy the clowns really are…especially their voices, which sound like baby gibberish run through a synthesizer.  However, the clowns aren’t the only scary things about this movie.  There’s the horrible acting, bad dialogue, and, of course, Debbie’s big 80s hair.  If you haven’t seen Killer Klowns from Outer Space yet, I strongly encourage you to do so.  It really is the best movie to possibly take place in the Armpit of America.

The cast of "Jersey Shore" wishes everyone in New Jersey a Happy Halloween!

I’ve successfully survived my first summer living at the Jersey Shore.  Though that’s not to say there weren’t a few close calls – like a hurricane, a tornado, a slight altercation with a bouncer, etc.  That being said, I’d like to share a few pictures.

Let’s start with this one:

I was lucky enough to attend a bonfire party on the beach.  That really was quite an experience.  The only bad part?  I was under the impression that a fire at the beach would attract Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon, but no such luck.

This next pic is a turtle I stumbled upon (not literally) while hiking at Allaire State Park.  I also saw a snake that day.  I would have taken a picture, but I chose to run away screaming like a little girl instead.

I don’t know what the object in the next two pictures is supposed to be, but I found it while walking on the beach one night.  Is it a piece of art?  Did some old pirate come and build it as a shelter during the hurricane?  Is it Snooki’s secret lair?  The possibilities are endless.

Finally, these next few pics are from a suite at Harrahs in Atlantic City that I had the privilege of staying in for a night.  Any guesses as to how much money such opulence cost me?  I’ll tell you after the pictures…

So, the price tag for this suite?  A mere $15.  It was a combination of being a loyal customer and making a reservation a couple of days after Hurricane Irene shut down all of the Atlantic City casinos.  I guess so many people had to cancel their AC plans on account of the storm, they were just giving suites away.

And those were some of the highlights from my summer living in Belmar.  There were a lot more, but these are the only ones I have pictures of.  Or pictures that I’m comfortable posting here…

Moonrise:

And…

Sunset:

So why Italy?  You know, because everyone in the cast always brags about how Italian they are.   Despite half of them having last names like Farley, Ortiz, and Pivarnick or having an Italian name but being of Chilean ancestry.  Whatever.  I’m Jewish and I’m confident that I know more about Italian culture than even the real Italian members of the cast do.

"Watch out, Italy, you's about ta get smushed!"

Now let’s check in and see what our favorite guidos and guidettes have been up to, and what they hope to get out of their free trip to Italy:

Snooki – Oh, my dearest Snooki.  She’s now dating some guido named Gionni, though we find out that she already cheated on him – with Mike “The Bitchuation” Sorrentino no less.  While in Italy, she hopes to get an internship with the American embassy and pursue her career goal of becoming a foreign diplomat.

J-WOWW – WWhat the hell happened to her?  Do already-attractive 24-year-old wwomen really need to get Botox?  And be that skinny?  WWhatever.  J-WOWW is still wwith Roger, that kinda creepy but kinda nice guy she started dating last season.  Wwhile in Italy, she hopes to follow in the footsteps of Sophia Loren and become a classically trained actress.  She’s already catching up to her in the plastic surgery department.

Ronnie – Ronnie claims to be single for now, but we all know he and Sammi will get back together at some point.  He prepared for the trip by trading in the faux-hawk for a Julius Caesar haircut, which makes him look like even more of douche.  While in Italy, he hopes to become a gladiator and fight in the Coliseum; he’s been getting in shape by using Sammi as a punching bag.

Sammi – Though she says she’s finally done with Ronnie, she admits that she still has feelings for him.  Ugh.  Why the hell would her parents even let her go to another country to live with that abusive piece of shit?  Whatevs.  While in Italy, Sammi plans on studying the paintings of the old masters for her dissertation on how Italian Renaissance art has influenced 20^th century American pop culture.

The Situation – Still a man-slut trying to get with as many girls as possible until his dick falls off, and that’s pretty much all the Bitchuation has ever been and will ever be.  While in Italy, he hopes to get an apprenticeship at a trattoria, so he can learn the best techniques of Italian cooking and open his own restaurant back in the states.

Pauly D – Still working on becoming the most famous DJ in Rhode Island, which is kinda like trying to be the smartest person in Staten Island – it means nothing.  He sees this trip to Italy as “an international panty raid.”  Which is his way of saying that, while in Italy, he plans on studying how the female form has been represented in Italian sculpture from the Roman Empire through modern times.

Deena – Angelina’s replacement is as desperate for attention as ever.  She’s still trying to popularize and trademark her dumb catchphrases, like “I’m a blast in a glass!” and “This is a bad time.”  While in Italy, she hopes to learn the finer points of oenology (winemaking for you n00bs), so she can eventually start a vineyard and produce wine under the “Blast in a Glass” label.  [Holy shit, that’s actually a good idea.  Deena, you better not steal that, bitch.]

Vinny – Since the last season, Vinny grew a beard.  And thinks he’s hot shit because of it.  Uh, I think that’s about it…he’s still boring.  While in Italy, he hopes to learn how to speak better Italian and to get in touch with the culture and his roots.  No, snark here, that’s for real.  He’s the only one who seems to understand the wonderful opportunity these brats are getting.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about the first two episodes.  While it’s no surprise that the people on the show are dumb, these episodes have exposed new levels of their collective stupidity.  Either that, or the producers convince them to be as dumb as shit.  Most likely, it’s a combination of the two.

You couldn't possibly fit any more douche into this picture.

On the first episode, the boys meet up to travel to Florence together, and the girls meet up to go as well.  All the while, each group is constantly saying how they have to get there before the other group.  Why didn’t MTV just have them get on the same plane?  The whole fabricated “we have to get there first” drama is so stupid and unnecessary.  Anyway, after much suspense, we see that the guys got there first – I know!  I don’t believe it either!

What about the girls?  They were shocked to learn that their plane didn’t land in Florence, but had a stopover in Dusseldorf, which I’m sure they all thought was a character from Lord of the Rings.  No, I take that back.  I don’t think any of these dumb bitches have read or seen Lord of the Rings.  Maybe if it was titled Lord of the Cockrings.  Otherwise, not a chance.

Back to the plane drama.  The gals make their connecting flight, but apparently the pilots made a bad mistake.  As the girls explain, they get off the plane and are in Milan, not Florence.  This is the perfect example of the “are they really this dumb vs. does MTV tell them to be this dumb” debate.  How can you be on a plane and not know which city it’s going to.  It says it on your ticket!  The pilot says it on the plane a million times!  So it’s hard to believe they didn’t know where they were going.  Then again, I’m sure they weren’t paying attention.  They were probably too busy trying to squeeze J-WOWW’s boobs into the seat and trying to find a high chair for Snooki.  Not to mention the trouble they had fitting all of Sammi’s emotional baggage in the overhead compartment.  Zing!

Eventually, they were all reunited at this beautiful mansion in Florence that they will inevitably tear apart.  Have I mentioned how much I hate these people?  Well, everyone except Snooki.

<3<3<3 So cute! <3<3<3

I don’t feel like doing a full recap of two episodes, so here are some of the highlights:

Mike is still a drama queen, bragging to everyone how he hooked up with Snooki despite her having a boyfriend.

Ronnie and Sammi saying over and over again that they’re not getting back together.  And then Sammi telling Ronnie she wants to get back together.

A conversation between two of the girls (not sure which ones since we only heard their voices), in which they walk past a random church in Florence and one asks if that’s the Vatican.  The other responded, “Yeah probably.”

Later on, the Situation said something about seeing the Vatican from a rooftop restaurant.  Vinny’s all like, “Uh, the Vatican is in Rome.  We’re in Florence.”  Seriously, how come only one person among the eight knows where the Vatican is???

Upon learning that they’re job will be working at a pizza place, J-WOWW gives a spiel about how when she’s 80, she’ll be teaching her kids how to make pizza, and that if they give her any lip about it, she’s gonna say, “I learned how to do this in Florence, bitches!”  Woww.  So many things wrong here.  Why will she be giving her kids a pizza-cooking lesson at the ripe old age of 80?  And she already knows that her kids won’t have any respect for her…even when they would presumably be in their 50s?  And I’m sure she has no clue that real Italian pizza comes from Naples, not Florence.

No, she's not surprised....that's just the Botox

Sammi holding up a plastic container of raspberries and saying, “These strawberries look funny.  What’s wrong with them?  Are these strawberries okay to eat like this?”  To which Deena, in a rare stroke of genius, responds, “They’re, like, raspberries.”

The crew going grocery shopping and lamenting how all the packaging is in a different language.

The Situation being shown receiving oral sex by some bimbo.  How did they get away with showing that?  And how do I sufficiently sanitize my eyes after watching it?

Finally, seeing Deena and Pauly D kiss.  So romantic, right?

Dear Italy, They're your problem now. Love, America

Below you’ll find some of the Garden State’s most famous and polarizing characters.    So let me know your thoughts by choosing who you would want to get rid of.  If your choice isn’t listed here, share your choice by leaving me a comment.