Friday, October 19, 2012

Laundry List of Reviews - Part 1

I've been promising myself for quite a while now I would start reviewing things. Over the course of this time, I've come up with a long list of things to review. Some of which I noted in my last post.
In this post, I'll go ahead and get those reviews out of the way. My next post will include a few other reviews I wanted to catch up on, too. Then, I'll start posting a one-product review post. So many products, so little time! :)

*Subway's Turkey Avocado Sub*

When I first saw the commercials for this sub, I was so excited to try it. They showed the regular turkey sub upgraded with slices of avocado. I love the turkey sub AND avocados, so I figured I couldn't go wrong! A couple weeks after the commercials started airing, I finally went and got one. Boy, was I disappointed.
The employee started making my sub, and I had to remind him twice to add the avocado to it. When he finally did, he picked up a bag of green slop and over-generously "piped" it on my sub. Just the sight of it was unappetizing. I was still determined it had to be decent. The green slop looked like unseasoned, over-pureed guacamole. I figured with the tomatoes and spices on my sub, it might taste decent. After one bite, I wanted to gag. The "avocado" mess was disgusting. It did not taste like avocado at all. I ended up wiping all of it off my sandwich to try and save what was left. It was bland and the texture was disgusting. No amount of seasonings on my sandwich could have saved that horrendous paste.
I've since noticed the commercials no longer show avocado slices on the subs. They now actually feature the green paste. BUT, in the commercials, the paste is chunkier and does not look as hideous as it did in person. I'm telling you, this stuff rivaled a middle school lunch line. Never again will I get anything from a "fast food" joint that advertises any sort of "avocado" anything!!

*Pepsi Next*

I'm one of those people who loves trying different things, especially in soda form. Pepsi Next was no exception. I was thoroughly impressed with Pepsi Next - it was actually a refreshing soda! You know how most of them can make you even more thirsty than you were when you first started drinking it? Yeah, I did not have that experience with this beverage.
Pepsi Next soon became a staple in my house. I almost threw a party in the grocery store when I found 2 liter bottles of their Cherry Vanilla and Paradise Mango flavors! I just wish I had been as happy with the actual products as I had been with the idea of them. The flavors were sickeningly sweet. To me, they defeated the purpose of the reduced-everything soda. It was no longer a refreshing beverage, and the only way I could manage finishing off what I had purchased was to load a glass with ice and let the ice melt into the soda, watering it down. My husband had the idea to mix it with regular Pepsi Next to try and help, but even that did not cut down on the sweetness as much as I would have liked.
Even though I didn't enjoy the flavored options as much as I wanted to, I am still a huge fan of Pepsi Next and hope it doesn't meet the fate of Crystal Pepsi!!

*The "50 Shades" Trilogy*

I have a tendency to jump on bandwagons when it comes to books. I waited and waited and waited until I couldn't avoid it any longer to read the Twilight Series and fell in love with it. The same thing pretty much happened with the Hunger Games series. After seeing so many people reading and loving the 50 Shades series, I figured I'd reach the same conclusions. Oops.
While I did find the series to be entertaining, it was, in my opinion, poorly written. I could have overlooked that, but I made the mistake of reading some reviews and other information about the author and the series before reading the books.
One thing I read stuck out and plagued me throughout the entire trilogy. The author originally started the series as Twilight Fan-fiction. It had been posted on a message board for Stephanie Meyer fans and so many people told her to continue the story and get it published. Of course, she had to change the names of the main characters, but everything else remained the same. Knowing that, it was hard for me to look at "Christian" and "Anastasia" as anything other than "Edward" and "Bella" knock-offs.
I also felt the description of the books I read was deceiving. It said something about the books having tones of the "supernatural." If you've read the series and found these "supernatural" references and nuances, please, please point them out to me!
The series wasn't bad, but I was disappointed with the ending. It felt like the author got to a certain page number and was like, "Oh, crap! I only have x number of pages to wrap things up in!" and just kind of threw it all together to put an end to the series. I dunno, maybe the hype was just too much for what it was. I might have liked it more had I not paid attention to any of it!

Well, that's it for now! I promise, not all my reviews are negative! And don't hesitate to ask any questions for further information - I'll answer based on my experiences! ~All images courtesy of Google Images~ Ciao!