Status Quotient

The Moderately Warm (or tepid-nay-not-quite-so-hot) List of Things We Insist Will Improve Your Status Quotient* *Only required if you actually care about what we think might improve said quotient.
	1.	Little Penguin Pinot Noir – $5.99. This fine South Eastern Australian red offers a much-needed respite from other South Eastern Australian reds. We would like to remind you, purchasing Yellow Tail is much like shopping at Wal-mart. (If you do it, you are killing babies.)
	2.	Feta cheese – This crumbly Mediterranean dairy delight is just the sort of thing to add much-needed dimension to the tired old frittata. The Greeks can’t be wrong! In addition to this fascinating flavor, they’ve introduced a system of government good enough for America (and anyone else we decide to force it upon).
	3.	Catholicism.
	4.	Flasks – All kinds, all sizes. You can fill them with damn near anything, and they fit pretty snug in your standard winter coat inside pocket. Plus, they can provide one with the confidence of ten well-dressed clowns (only for real).
	5.	Shibumi by Trevanian – There’s this part where he gets caught by the Japanese and is held captive, only he outsmarts his captors by playing a simple game of Go … you just gotta read it, man. You just gotta read it. If for nothing else, the 50-some pages pure on spelunking with his Basque buddy alone.
	6.	Holy water.
	7.	Walking through Strawberry Fields in Central Park without once even thinking about John Lennon or that bitch, Yoko Ono.
	8.	Ryan Adams.
	9.	The Bird Flu – For reminding us that Ebola is for pussies
	10.	Post Office Boxes – When you’re important, the mail waits for you.
	11.	Vinyl Records – Because how many times do you ask your best friend if he bought “that album” rather than “that CD”? Seriously. (Just keep it real, yo.)
	12.	Tomasso’s Thin Crust Pizza – If you’re ever in Cedarburg or Barton, Wisconsin, you’ll never find a more downright delicious pizza pie than you will at Tomasso’s. Granted, the bar is smoke-free, but we’re willing to forgive them on account’a their food is so delicious.
	13.	Alize – The glowing blue bottle should be more warning than invitation, yet we find it hard to resist downing copious amounts of this concoction prior to dry-humping each other to the sounds of Sly & the Family Stone.
	14.	Any word that – thanks to Snoop Dogg – ends in “-izzle.” Are we fo’ rizzle? Yes indizzle, we are. (Shizzle.)
	15.	Ryan Adams.
	16.	Mannequins – Perfect accompaniment for your next viewing of Brokeback Mountain.
	17.	Polaroids – Sure the film costs more up front, but what you gotta remember is it is processed immediately, and therefore, the preferred camera of pornographers and would-be writers getting stoned at a buddy’s cottage on the lake and wanting to document the proclivities thusly taking place.
	18.	Sudoku – That is, if you’re into wasting time.
	19.	Making lists – Because really, there’s nothing more self-important than sitting down and making a list and giving number to all the things you think belong on a list, or better yet, DON’T belong on a list, but are put there anyway by self-aggrandizing small press publishers of poetry who dig making lists if for no other reason than making lists.
	20.	The number 20
	21.	Marb Reds – Preferred nicotine indulgence of the Roman Pontiff.
	22.	AM 4:51– The time at which eyelids burn