Jeff Probst has nothing on me.
So I went out on Sunday for a little pre-birthday dinner. I decide to check out the Quaker Steak and Lube, which is known for its hot wings. Supposedly, they have a variety of hot wings that are 5 times as hot as any other hot wings in this area: Atomic Wings. I had heard that the wings were so hot, Quaker Steak makes you sign a waiver before they serve them to you. I've never shied away from a challenge, so this seemed to be appropriate for a birthday challenge... (Speaking of, if I ever do the Birthday Challenge, I might have to include Atomic Wings in the mix somehow.) I only ordered a sample, which was 5 wings.
For a hint of how hot these wings were, they included something with the order that was meant to cool your palate. Usually, that's bread, because it soaks up the spicy oils in the wings that hang out in your mouth. No bread for these wings... They were so hot, they offered Jalapeno peppers to cool your palate. I know people who can't handle jalapenos in the first place, so those people might actually have fire shooting out of their ears. (Their ears if we're lucky, to quote Krusty the Clown.) Most hot wings are covered in an oily sauce, which is usually loaded with tabasco, or some other liquid hot sauce.... Not these. These wings were covered in a hot paste instead of a hot sauce.
Yeah, they were hot, but eating them was fairly easy. To me, hot mustard is harder to eat, because the spiciness of the mustard goes up into my sinuses, making my eyes water and sinuses drain. That is what I compare "hot" to in terms of eating. The "hotness" of these wings were more evident after they hit my stomach. Ever seen that Simpsons episode with the chili cookoff (...I'm missing the chili cookoff... less artsy, more fartsy...) where Homer eats the Guatemalan insanity peppers? Well, it was like that. No, I didn't "brain my damage" or talk to a Johnny Cash-possessed coyote, but I could definitely feel it in my gut. Every part of my body that came into contact with that hot paste increase in temperature by at least 50 degrees. In the mouth, I could tolerate, but in the stomach...? It was almost hot enough that my stomach was saying "Are you serious? I'm not digesting that." Sufficed to say, they took some time to get down.
The other big problem was that no matter how well or often I washed my hands, there was still some of that paste residue on them. This became very painful when I had to take my contacts out that night. Putting them in again in the morning was no treat either. It took a FULL DAY for my hands to be rid of that stuff.
Strange, mystical journey, indeed.
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Friday, June 10, 2005
Va-Va-Va-Vroom
If you ever get the chance to test drive a sports car, don't pass it up. It's those simple thrills that make life exciting and fun.
I was helping a friend look for a new truck/SUV last night. We went to the Ford dealer, since she currently owns a Ford, and I think her family might disown her if she bought anything other than a Ford. This didn't make sense to me, because she's having problems with her SUV right now, and the car is less than 3 years old. She's had the thing in and out of the dealer way too many times for a car that's less than 6 years old, let alone a car that's half as old. Why go with the same maker if you've had so many problems in the past? Do the cars really get more reliable in 3 years? Yeah, right.
Anyway, after the ford dealer, we ended up at the Nissan dealer looking at Frontiers. They're basically the same idea as a Ranger or Explorer Sport Track, but with a slightly different look. I told my friend that they looked like a kid with a big head. They have this really masculine, aggressive front end, and then everything wimps out past the crew cab. Maybe thinking of kids with big heads made us hungry or we just needed to eat, it doesn't matter, we decided to head out. On the way out of the parking lot, my friend noticed four 350Zs sitting by the exit. "What are those?" she asked. Doesn't everyone know what the "Z" is? So I explained what they were. She expected them to cost $40-50k, and I told her they were closer to $30k. I guess that got her interested enough that she wanted to look at them. Although, maybe she just did it for me, who knows. Anyway, the more she looked at them, the more she became interested. The sales guy came out, and my friend asked if it would be ok if we could take a closer look inside. No problem.... Then the guy asks if we want to take it for a spin. Does anyone really need to ask?!
Do you remember when you were kids, pretending to race cars (Matchbox, etc.), and the only engine noise you could think of for your fast cars was "Vroom"? "Vroom" gave us a hope, a desire to experience something so exhilarating that the only way we could image the experience was to make up words to describe it. This car put "Vroom" to shame. Sure it was only a test drive, but I don't regularly take a test drive car up to 95 mph in less than 10 seconds. Sure, the visibility is limited and the space is a little cramped, but I was more interested in the experience... Vroom, indeed.
Sports cars are like drugs.... They're so exciting and inticing that my friend actually contemplated going with this cramped 2-seater barely capable of carrying 1 suitcase instead of a crew-cab truck with a 4-ton towing capacity. Gotta find another place for my fix... I hear the Forester is a good SUV, and that'd give me enough of a reason to at least take a peek at the WRX. Just a peek, though... right?
I was helping a friend look for a new truck/SUV last night. We went to the Ford dealer, since she currently owns a Ford, and I think her family might disown her if she bought anything other than a Ford. This didn't make sense to me, because she's having problems with her SUV right now, and the car is less than 3 years old. She's had the thing in and out of the dealer way too many times for a car that's less than 6 years old, let alone a car that's half as old. Why go with the same maker if you've had so many problems in the past? Do the cars really get more reliable in 3 years? Yeah, right.
Anyway, after the ford dealer, we ended up at the Nissan dealer looking at Frontiers. They're basically the same idea as a Ranger or Explorer Sport Track, but with a slightly different look. I told my friend that they looked like a kid with a big head. They have this really masculine, aggressive front end, and then everything wimps out past the crew cab. Maybe thinking of kids with big heads made us hungry or we just needed to eat, it doesn't matter, we decided to head out. On the way out of the parking lot, my friend noticed four 350Zs sitting by the exit. "What are those?" she asked. Doesn't everyone know what the "Z" is? So I explained what they were. She expected them to cost $40-50k, and I told her they were closer to $30k. I guess that got her interested enough that she wanted to look at them. Although, maybe she just did it for me, who knows. Anyway, the more she looked at them, the more she became interested. The sales guy came out, and my friend asked if it would be ok if we could take a closer look inside. No problem.... Then the guy asks if we want to take it for a spin. Does anyone really need to ask?!
Do you remember when you were kids, pretending to race cars (Matchbox, etc.), and the only engine noise you could think of for your fast cars was "Vroom"? "Vroom" gave us a hope, a desire to experience something so exhilarating that the only way we could image the experience was to make up words to describe it. This car put "Vroom" to shame. Sure it was only a test drive, but I don't regularly take a test drive car up to 95 mph in less than 10 seconds. Sure, the visibility is limited and the space is a little cramped, but I was more interested in the experience... Vroom, indeed.
Sports cars are like drugs.... They're so exciting and inticing that my friend actually contemplated going with this cramped 2-seater barely capable of carrying 1 suitcase instead of a crew-cab truck with a 4-ton towing capacity. Gotta find another place for my fix... I hear the Forester is a good SUV, and that'd give me enough of a reason to at least take a peek at the WRX. Just a peek, though... right?
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