I was cleaning my George Foreman grill when everything went dead. I don't even think I turned it on. But when I went back to the computer it was off and so was everything else.

So I figured a fuse was blown. But where's the fuse box? I called the landlady. She didn't know. She said in the basement but couldn't be more specific. I looked and couldn't see anything. So she called British Gas. She has a home service plan with them.

Anyway, seven hours of waiting later, some heavily-tattooed guy comes in and says that the fuse box is in the flat. Flips the switch and that's that.

Oh, and I was waiting so long and had to take a crap so bad that I finally broke down and let loose like 15 minutes before he said he was due to be there. It was the fastest crap of my life. Didn't even wait for the urinating effect to take place. Just dropped a load of diahrea, cursory wiping, and I was done. Total time: about four minutes.

Then the guy gets there and the place smells like faeces.

Anyway, in that seven hungry, boring hours I decided to check out a Playboy that I had. Let me see if I can find a picture online. Yeah, here we go.



That picture is from an Ebay auction so I don't know how long it will last or if it even works now.

Victoria Silvstedt is on the cover. This is the 1997 Playmate of the Year issue.

Starts with the letters page. A lot of people complaining about Faye Resnick posing in a recent Playboy. Remember her? I certainly don't. Friend of Nicole Brown, OJ Simpsons's wife. Let's check out the photos online...oh man. Terrible boob job. Not even Playboy's lighting and airbrushing and filters and whatever else can help.

But more interesting is that people are starting to put their email addresses in the letters. I wonder if any of these are still valid. I don't think some of these companies even exist any more. A couple of Juno address, a BigFoot address, and an AOL. It seems weird to put your email address in a publication as widely-read as Playboy. "Hey fellow porn fans. Please email me." And anyone can email. Spammers and whatnot. I guess in 1997 the internet wasn't so popular so not so many problems in this regard.

Here's a little section called "Killter Apps". But it's about people who say stupid things at job interviews. "Apps" being the applicant for the job.

Here's a little column on up and coming actress and former Miss Teen USA Bridgette Wilson. She's 41 now. What has she done...nothing since 2008 and not a whole lot before that. The three films they mention were the highlights of her career.

And here's a few pages of People magazine that I ripped out. I didn't understand why I had them in here at first. This from 2002. There's Kelly Clarkson (American Idol contestant) in a little pink top. But...I can't imagine masturbating over this. I don't even remember this.

But there's also from the same copy of People a multi-page story on Britney Spears. I took ripped this out for one reason: there's a picture of Britney adjusting her tank top which barely covers her boobs. That's hot. But the true reason I enjoyed this photo was Britney's mother is also walking with them and she's quite a top-heavy woman and wearing a little blue top.

Was I masturbating over this? I have a vague recollection of doing so. But why? This was 2002. I had the internet by then. I also had pornographic magazines.

So back to the Playboy. Here's the music section. Nerf Herder is the big new pop punk band. Never heard of them. According to Wikipedia they had a popular single in 1997 called Van Halen but that's it. Checked it out Youtube. It's not good.

I don't actually recognise any of these bands. I suppose the grunge/alternative scene was going away by this point. And that's what I listened to.

Fountains of Wayne. No idea.

The latest UK import is Morcheeba. Never heard of them either.

Butthole Surfers drummer started an internet show called Brainwash. The page still exists though in all it's 1997 glory.

http://www.buttholesurfers.com/brainwash/

I think the shows are gone, though. I guess they were audio files. Like podcasts.

Pat Boone did some Metallica cover. I remember that.

Now the technology section. "It happens all the time. You drive to the video store intent on rending a specific movie only to find that all 20 copies are out. Well, get ready to save yourself a trip". Then they talk about technology that will beam videos straight to your video cassette recorder in five minutes. Who researched this? In fairness, they also mention this service being available to PCs but you can't download movies now in five minutes. How was it possible dial up days?

Maybe they're talking a streaming thing but even then I don't think it was possible in 1997. It's actually some weird technology that I don't think was ever released. You could watch it twice and then it was deleted unless you paid a higher price to own it. Actually, I do vaguelly remember such a thing possibly existing.

CB revival, apparently. They give you some good CBs that you can buy.

A keychain that plays Tetris is also given a small mention.

Now the games. Ten Pin Alley gets a good review. It's a bowling game with real 1997 graphics. Playstation game. Wow. Checked out some footage on Youtube. It's horrible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tK2p1Dy563g

Peter Gabriel's Eve gets a mention. Never heard of it. Looks pretentious. Can't find a single video of it on Youtube. Something on Vimeo, though. Looks like shit.

https://vimeo.com/23613994

Something called Banzai Bug where you play as a bug collecting human ear wax. Yeah, terrible as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZ7KKEIDhlA

Never heard of this shit. But are you tired of looking for jobs in the newspaper's classified section? Playboy is here to help. They namecheck monsterboard.com ; careersite.com ; and careerbuilder.com

I used careerbuilder.com but never heard of the other two. Maybe monsterboard.com became monster.com. Yeah. It did. Still exists.

As does careerbuilder.

I guess careersite does too but I don't know how popular any of these sites are any more or if they're owned by the same people as in 1997.

There's also overseasjobs.com which is self-explanatory and cooljobs.com for cool jobs like at MTV, Club Med, or LucasArts. I think LucasArts is long gone but amazingly Club Med still exists. When was the last time that was considered "cool"? 1997 at the latest. And these sites still exist but probably not the same owner.

Wow. Virtua Fighter for the PC gets a negative mini-review. I had this game. It was laggy as hell on my computer and very bare bones but I still played it. Considering the shit they recommended, this is surprising.

Catfight also got a bad mini-review which is justifiable.

So many alcohol and cigarette ads in here. I guess Playboy was one of the few publications that allowed alcohol ads. And now I think cigarette ads aren't allowed anywhere but in 1997 you still saw them in mainstream publications. Not alcohol ads, though.

Ah, the Playboy Advisor. A guy is having sex with his maid then his wife fired the maid and wonders if the wife knows.

Another guy has a more mundane (and real) problem. He's hearing all about these great X-rated movies but he's dumped his crappy old VCR ages ago. Are there any good pornographic films on the next big technological leap: the laser disc? CG from Austin, Texas, you're a fool.

A semi-interesting article on Timothy McVeigh. The Oklahoma City thing was just a couple years earlier.

Oh baby. Now we're talking. A nude Carmen Electra. She looks great.

Then some weird fiction that I never read. I don't even think it's pornographic. It's called In the Black Mill.

Article on how Viagra is coming.

And this month's Playmate is Carrie Stevens. She's 28 and I remember her being quite old for a Playmate. Actually, this was 20 years ago...so she's 48 how. I could probably have sex with her now. Let's see what she's up to.

Yeah, seems to be single. Has a child from some little-known film director. I guess that she still does very ocassional acting. You can get a signed copy of her Playboy for $55. She's probably pissed off that she's not on the cover. It's because this is the Playmate of the Year issue. So she's basically signing for Victoria Silvstedt.

She's on Twitter as well. These must be really old photos. No way does she look like this. And her lifetime's achievement seems to be this Playboy pictorial.

Some good Tweets, though.

"Why when women get breast implants or lip injections it's called self centered but when Caitlyn does it, it's courageous?"

Also posts a lot about Ireland and Dublin specifically. She has Irish heritage, apparently.

Trying to sell fudge.

Actually, maybe it was just that transexual post that was good. It's still one more than Simon H has managed, though.

So yeah, Carrie. I wonder if she still has the giant nipples. Biggest nipples I've ever seen. And I don't mean aereola, although those are pretty big too. She has big nipples. I think it's just a lighting trick, though, because in her centerfold she looks normal. I mean, still hot but nipples look to be a normal size.

Here's the gadget page. Wow, a Sony Walkman. In 1997? That's surprising. They had CDs by then.

Here's Lisa Baker who first appeared in Playboy in 1966 doing a new pictorial. Still looking great. She must be over 70 now. There's a pictorial few people want to see.

Al Sharpton article.

And here's Victoria Silvstedt. 19 years old and all the way from Sweden. Looking good. Let's see what she's done in the past 20 years.

Wow. Looking pretty rough. She's 40. Did some modeling, tiny bit of acting, presented Eurotrash on Channel 4, does some ocassional presenting in France now. Married an American news anchor for 7 years. Separated since 2007 but not divorced.

"According to the Finnish broadsheet newspaper Keskisuomalainen, Silvstedt earns millions of dollars every year for her work in modelling, television presenting, and promoting various brands and products." I find that hard to believe.

No children, apparently.

She looks great in her Twitter photos but these look heavily Photoshopped. Her candid photo on Wikipedia looks pretty bad.

Would I have sex with her? Well, I guess. But I wouldn't be too excited at the prospect.

And that's pretty much it. So that's Playboy in 1997. Of course, Playboy today is in bad shape like all print media. There's a few references to the new Playboy.com in this issue as well but that didn't really take off. I mean, if you can see every sex act known to man on the internet are you going to be content with the soft-focus cheesecake photos that Playboy trades in?

But in 1997, that's all most people had. These were simpler times. People were even jacking off to People magazine.

When the power goes out across the world, I'll be ready with my ancient Playboys. But that's the only function they serve at the moment: emergency masturbation material for the apocolypse. It's like people who stockpile food and ammunition and whatnot. I stockpile pornography.