Beer Battle Four

Vs

A Spewtacular Green Bottle Jam

Holland evokes many images, pretty windmills, fields of tulips, hot young whores outside hash bars. A paradise in Europe you might say. A land of good times and simple pleasures, an enlightened bubble of humanity. It only stands to reason that their beer must be a superior drop, right?

After tuning in to the cricket (where the brilliant, unstoppable Kiwi's slaughtered a hapless Australian side) Cheesey and Alice, our intrepid Reviewers, decided to see if the hype was true, for this evening's beer battle is none other than Heineken vs Hollandia.

Both Reviewers purchased a dozen 330 ml bottles of the beer, Cheesey and Alice were looking forward to a typically fun evening of Chess, sysop abuse, TA and perhaps even a trip to the Cremesaver Lanes for some bowling.

The evening began in a very promising fashion with both Reviewers enthusiastically drinking their first litre of beer in very good time. It was decided to test powers of concentration first in the Checkmate arena, a few games of serious Chess.

A familiar pattern emerged with Cheesey winning narrow victories. Perhaps the Hollandia was giving Cheese an edge in the mental stakes. Another game followed with a similar result. Both Reviewers reported at this stage they were 'feeling gut'. A brief urination break followed, the first of many throughout the evening.

After several failed attempts to attract the eye and ire of the sysops, a battle on Sail Away was launched with Hollandia taking the initial honours after a beautiful Gimp raid on Alice's base. During the game both Reviewers experienced an extreme 'come on' from the beers, both were pretty plastered by the time the game ended. There was some serious squinting going on, and both Reviewers reported severe 'head list' of between 20 and 45 degrees, well outside the normal range of 7 to 15 degrees after six bottles. What was going on here? Both our Reviewers are well equipped and hardy, this was strange indeed. These were worrying signs, perhaps they should call it a day?

Nein! Our Reviewers are made of sterner stuff, they decided to up the consumption rate to see if the negative effects are only an anomaly, a preparation for some higher ground of intoxication.

Unfortunately this was sadly not the case. Alice decided to have one more smoke while listening to an infinite repeat of "Roam" by the B-52's at high volume in the backyard. This turned out to be a fatal mistake. Alice did not return for quite some time but eventually returned and both reviewers started their eighth bottle. But instead of powering on, Alice suddenly found himself laying on the floor with a horrific case of 'room spin'. This was a clear indication that something quite foul was afoot in Amsterdam. Suddenly Alice was in a mad dash for the sink to release the hordes of angry Dutchmen coming back up to greet him in a tidal wave of technicolour yawn. After, he somehow managed to type well enough to inform our other reviewer with "man, i just threw up in the sink". Cheesey unfortunately failed to unravel the mysterious warning nature of this statement and continued to drink, while trying rather unsuccessfully to chat up Wack0_Angel.

Cheesey, still trying in vain to get Angel to send him a photo, awaited the return of his collegue. Alice was once again on the floor riding the Heineken merry-go-round until he realized the angry Dutch weren't finished with him yet. This time he ran to the great white porcelain flush-monster as he knew this time around was going to be far too much for a mere sink. He managed a brief return, once again to describe the horrific vomiting to warn Cheese. Too late I'm afraid, shortly later it was Cheesey 'talking on the big white telephone'.

During a consultation the next day both Reviewers reported severe dehydration and hangover symptoms, Alice was quoted as saying 'I feel like the back of my head has been blown off' Both Reviewers wish to warn readers to be very wary of these 'beers', and say that a Jihad against the Dutch probably would be in order. Our reviewers did discuss a few details about the proposed Jihad but then realized they both felt like they had been severely beaten by several burly Dutchmen with large sticks. They wisely decided to cut their losses and not risk greater punishment in a poorly-planned revenge attempt.

Final Analysis:

Vomitus Maximus: Heineken comes away with the supreme victory in this category by making Alice "taste the beer again" not once, but TWO times before passing out. Hollandia gets major points for masterminding a sneak attack, letting our reviwer calmly think all was well then suddenly blasting its way out at a weak moment. Heineken: 3 Hollandia: 2

Hangover Severity: Both of these beers, to put it quite frankly, are not to be fucked with. They left our reviewers in a deplorable physical state with a slight case of post traumatic stress disorder to boot. Though it is hard to gauge, Hollandia comes out on top here as Cheesey felt like doing nothing more than getting a few glasses of water and eventually going back to bed. Alice on the other hand was still in well enough condition to eventually make breakfast and collect the peices of his head to slowly nurse himself back to semi-normality. Hollandia: 5 Heineken: 4

RoomSpin Ratio: It appears that Dutch beer is specially formulated to simulate the effects of watching a windmill on a breezy day. It's so highly advanced that all you need to do is consume a reasonable quantity of it and then the world will start spinning by itself without you ever having (or being able) to do anything. Heineken seems to have a slightly more effective "bottled carousel" formula than Hollandia but the difference is almost undetectable. If you would like to go on a free amusement park ride without leaving your house (that ends with a run to the bathroom), feel free to choose either of these wicked potions. Heineken 1.5 Hollandia: 1

Loss of Cognition and Emotional Control: Both these beers floored our reviewers in record time and minimal effort. There is no clear way to decide which was more powerful in this respect. Heineken seemed to debilitate Alice in the strategic planning area causing him to lose handily at both chess and TA. However these losses proved inconclusive when he single-handedly angered the entire TA chatroom enough to start a long, nonsensical and pointless argument only aimed at getting banned. Extra points for creative cusswords here. Hollandia not to be outdone, caused Cheesey to bravely attempt to acquire photographs of female TA players and shout menacing obsceneties to any TA players within reach, especially Sysops and Australians. Several incidents of playing music at high volume, making lewd remarks to female TA players, smoking excessive amounts of cigarettes to the point of nausea, and shouting at Cricket broadcasts that couldnt actually 'hear' you also took place indicating that these beers both have intense control destroying potential. Heineken: 10 Hollandia: 10

Overall Power: After such an intense and perilous experience, our reviewers believe that this beer battle was actually fought between the reviewers and the beer. This being the case we can only come to the conclusion that Dutch beer is manufactured as some kind of bizarre terror experiment designed to test the limits of human chemical endurance. This battle started with the misguided expectation that these beers would be easily conquered with little effort, but ended in shock when it was found that the beer, in fact, won. Heineken/Hollandia: 1 Cheesey/Alice: 0