July 3, 2009 | lists

We are both Canadian, as those who are close to us and those who update our driver’s licenses every 10 years know (these two groups are, for now, mutually exclusive… but we’re working on buttering up a few of the people who give the eyesight test).

However, we have enjoyed numerous benders throughout the United States, most memorably in New York, San Diego, New Orleans, Nashville and Memphis, and have made our dollar stretch in taverns a fair number of ports of call in between. Every Canadian’s first vacation is across the southern border, so as a tribute to our US friends, we’d like to share some Independence Day gift offerings.

While the 44th president’s mug is slapped on mugs, plates, shirts and practically anything you can think of, we figured we’d adopt a non-partisan approach to tracking down gifts for those hard-to-please folks who’d most likely salute the flag pole and would not be impressed by a very unpatriotic expiry date gift card.

The merch we’ve compiled here can certainly brighten a Fourth of July (literally, in some cases as your retinas might be singed with Old Glory His & Hers Waistcoats) but as with Christmas lights on the house in June, it’s never too early to get ready for the Yuletide shopping season as well.

1) Stars and Stripes Guitar-Shaped Belt-Buckle and Bottle Opener: This product, which can be yours for the low-low price of $15.99 (or your best offer, on Craig’s List, EBay), is quite possibly the greatest patriotic item in the history of mankind. Are we exaggerating? Short answer: No. This is for the patriotic citizen who is looking to spend his Independence Day kicking ass and chewing bubblegum, but who suddenly finds himself lacking bubble gum. Not only is this item rock n’ roll by its very shape — tell us you don’t think of Jimi Hendrix’s version of the Star Spangled Banner when you clock your eyes on to that — but it’s also an extremely versatile product.

• First it will help hold up your pants, and if you’re going to be cutting loose on the dance floor on Independence Day, you don’t want your your top half independent from your bottom.

• Secondly, you can open your beers with it. What’s more, you can make friends, and possibly win a future wife, by letting others open their beers on your belt. Of course, any bar where belt-buckles like this are the norm might be the kind of place where a broken nose and a fist-fight are part of the floor show. That is where it’s third use comes in: as a weapon. What better way to celebrate your country’s birthday then by leaving the impression of Ole’ Glory on some idiot’s forehead?

2) Old Glory Bed Spread. Politics makes strange bedfellows and now strange bed accessories. Honor 8 years of Bill Clinton in the Oval Office by polling your own electorate on an Old Glory Bed Spread.

Reenact geo-politcs with hard and soft power and show the French who’s boss with tri-coleur under sheets.

3) American Flag-themed rolling papers: While marijuana is still illegal under US federal law, several states have decriminalized in it. In California, you can get a medical permit to access enough of the stuff to make Snoop Dogg want to throw up from the smell. Celebrate the great freedoms in the US that only promise to get greater as the decriminalization of pot continues by sparking up an Independence Day joint that is the size of Shaq’s middle finger using these appropriately-themed rolling papers.

4) Budweiser American Eagle Beer-tap Handle: Frank Zappa once said “You can’t be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer.” America’s beer (in a manner of speaking, as a Belgian mega-brewer has since taken it over) and a surprisingly popular choice in Ireland where there is better beer like Beamish on tap, is Budweiser.

We cannot trash talk this brew too too much as we have our own similarly piss poor beers in Canada, thank you Messers Molson and Labatt. This ornamental beer tap however can be put on any sort of brew and you can put a piece of masking tape over the Budweiser name. Drinking draft beer is about the most pleasantly patriotic thing we can think of doing, and what better way to do that then by tapping the symbol of American freedom, and the motif for many a bad tattoo, the bald eagle.

5) Red, White and Blue Playboy Briefs: The whole publishing industry should’ve used Playboy as a watermark as they were among the first casualties of the internet revolution (Since followed by, well, everything else). Now, Hef & co. are reduced to selling the practically treasonous undergarments shown here. So tasteless the guy who plays guitar in his underwear at Times Square, signed up to join the Marines.  Salute July 4th the proper way with our list of US State Songs.

6) Story of the American Revolution Beer Stein: You’ve sat through hours of history class in school and made a concerted effort to forget what you were learning the moment it hit your ears. You watched the HBO John Adams miniseries and enjoyed it, but couldn’t reconcile one of your founding fathers being played by that guy from Sideways who slurped wine out of a McDonald’s super-sized cup.

So how do you keep up with a conversation on patriotism and the American tradition on this auspicious day? By guzzling beer from one of these handsomely decorated beer steins. Running along the sides of the beer steins are four of the most important battles of the revolutionary war — the Battle of Bunker Hill, the Battle of Princeton, the Battles of Saratoga and the Siege of Yorktown. Remembering these four names and remarking, “Ah, it really gets to you when you think of the fine men who fought at [insert name of battle depending on position of stein at the time of utterance].” If you’re drinking with fellow patriots, and you are drinking in public (the latter unlikely unless you are the kind of guy who brings his own stein to the bar, in which case we salute you) someone may even buy you a round.

7) US Military Pool Cue Set: Americans may not have invented the game of billiards, but they have certainly produced some of its finest champions, invariably dubbed ‘Fats’ and they most definitely have made the best movies on the sport — we’re talking “The Hustler”, not its inferior sequel which Martin Scorsese made to pay off creditors. The cues can be purchased separately and there is one each for the Army, Air Force, Marines, Navy, Coast Guard, and the U.S. Flag. This is the ideal way to support the troops on Independence Day, acknowledge the sacrifices made by past generations so that you could enjoy your present freedoms, and win 10 bucks by hustling some rube who thinks you can’t play worth a damn.

8) Stars and Stripes Nunchucks: As the saying goes, “It’s better to have some chucks than nun chucks at all”. If you party the way you should be partying on Independence Day, chances are the neighbors are going to get upset. Raising a ruckus and getting all the neighborhood dogs howling in unison is what freedom is all about. The perfect gift for the partier who lives on the wrong side of the tracks, these slick-looking nunchucks will most certainly club the nearest beat cop investigating a disturbance into quick submission. They have “don’t tread on me” written all over them. It is recommended when rapping someone across the knees with these babies that you say something along the lines of “And that, came from the good ole’ U, S, of A”.

9) His and Hers Stars & Stripes Waistcoats: You won’t be called a pantywaist ever again (at least not to your face) with this most dashing haberdashery. Suggestion: well suited to horrible musical comedy on public television, preferably on a piano. Top hat optional.

10) Old Glory Surgical Cap: While in revolutionary times, it’s unlikely to have been donned while lopping off a gangrenous limb, you can perform impromptu living room gallbladder removals or, if you’re actually a saw bones, atrial septal defect repair in the more sanitary confines of a surgical suite, while winking at the surgical nurses who’d no doubt delight in your youthful love of country exuberance.

11) Stars & Stripes Guitar Pick Earrings. Have you ever been at a party where you’re asked to rock out on someone’s axe, and you demur with a ‘uh, I don’t have a pick?’ (or even a Mexican peso, famously played by Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top) Well, now you don’t have to empty out lint-riddled pockets with your very own, guitar pick earrings. Also works well with a Hendrix, playing-guitar-behind-your-head impression.

12) Red, White and Blue Cat Collar: Make Fluffy easier to find if she makes a mad dash for freedom.

13) American Flag Purse. Spend your way out of the recession with your very own Stars & Stripes purse, a ‘Kelvin Chen original’. For those of you who haven’t heard of Kelvin Chen (until we downloaded the picture, neither had we), he is  self-described “whimsical photographer, painter, illustrator, web designer, musician, coder, programmer, creative consultant and a professional glutton”. You can’t top that.

14) A Hat That Will Give you a Standing Ovation: This item (top left) speaks for itself, as does the pained expression on the model’s face, who looks like she’s being asked to ‘pull my finger’ rather than the string that makes the hands clap.

15)  Mickey Mouse Pin. Show up Euro Disney from the comfort of Epcot Center with your Stars & Stripes Mickey.

PLEASE SEE OUR TOP 10 BEER FASHION DISASTERS!