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Thursday, December 16, 2010

December Update

Thanksgiving, my birthday (hi 26! you feel a lot like 25....), and my annual Florida Xmas vacation (perks of being the low man on the totem pole, get to celebrate in early Dec and be in the office during the actual holiday) have all come and gone since I last wrote. I'd say vacation in FL was the highlight, with daily tennis/golf/rollerblading/reading/cards occupying my time. I'd guess that my birthday was the lowlight, but frankly I can't remember anything past 11pm so I'm not totally sure. (just kidding MOM, I was dead sober) Other events since we last spoke include deactivating my facebook account, creating a twitter account, and getting new skiis. The snow continues to dump this week (9 inches @ Vail last night, ~30inches in last week), and I can't wait to get out there Saturday. But anyway during that time, a few events happened in the hot sauce world that I figured were worth sharing.

1) Disowning of my Sister: During a normal family dinner conversation over break, the topic naturally slipped towards hot sauce. Below is a verbatim interchange, and completely justifies our decision to disown my Sister.

Todd- Valentina is a great sauce. It is the most popular one in Mexico.
Dad- Yeah it is good, but not too hot.
Brooke- Todd, what is that sauce I really like?
Todd- Um, I don't know, Walkerswood?
Brooke- No, it's more basic but tastes so good. It's really common.
Todd- Sriracha?
Brooke- Nope, it's Franks. I love Franks!

Disowning by me and my parents ensued immediately.

Side Note: In what is one of the "darker times" in the Wood family hot sauce career, someone made the decision to buy the massive jug of Franks from Costco. It languished in our pantry for about 10 years before dad and I finally pulled a Kevorkian and ended its unopened and underutilized misery with a mercy killing. A sauce literally could not be lower quality, less spicy, or more pathetic than Franks. #onemansopinion



2) Dad's Xmas gift to mom: Comprised of about 12 different hot sauces. I was really impressed by his gift giving ability, he hit up hotsauceworld.com and make some great selections. I would have liked him to go a little farther up the scoville scale (he concentrated in the 4-12k range), but kudos for the effort. The Peri Peri sauce seemed to be the fan favorite, with brooke declaring it "The best sauce she has ever had". But please see item 1 in order to just how relevant her opinion is.


3) Dinner Party: In order to "liven up" the vacation, my parents invited over two family friend's for dinner one night. We've been friends with the family our whole lives, and it was great to see them. Sadly, I'm not sure they can say the same about us. My dad, still bulled up about his hot sauce gift to mom, decided that for appetizers we should arrange all the hot sauces in proper Scoville order and test them all out on chips. This was all well and good, and was actually a great chance to try out his new sauces. This is where Brooke decided that the Rhino sauce was the best. Anyway, the couple arrived and dad immediately sent them towards the hot sauce challenge. (clearly missed Party Hosting 101: Offer a drink to the guests upon their arrival) The wife dove right in, and took worked her way up to the red El Yucateco (the ~6k sauce that drove ZS (the reigning wuss of the week) to tears) with minimal trouble. So +1 for her. The husband on the other hand demonstrated significantly more caution. Allegedly he had something at lunch that didn't really agree with him, so his stomach was hurting him a bit. A normal host would agree that this was a valid excuse for skipping the hot sauce challenge. My dad is not a normal host. Despite protests, he "encouraged" the man to try some sauces. Against his better judgment, he did. Long story short, this exacerbated the stomach pains and forced him to leave the table and drive home alone (leaving his wife) in order to recuperate in solitude.

Moral of the Story: Everyone should work on their Scoville eating capacities daily, as you never know when you'll be faced with a situation like this where you either dominate the sauce, or are sent home alone packing like a wuss.


4) JD pwns another one: So I was not here for this event, but since it happened in my apartment and utilized my sauces, I feel slightly responsible. JD had a couple kids over last weekend while I was gone, including a girl J (one of our three girlfriends (friends that are girls...)) and her boyfriend E. They brought along one of E's friends, who allegedly constantly talks about his hot sauce prowess and how nothing is too hot for him. Never one to pass up a challenge, my star pupil JD decided to show him what's up and brought out the Widow sauce. This is actually an awesome tasting sauce, and has some solid kick (comes in at around the 80-90k level i'd say). JD takes down a chip with sauce, and then offers one to The Dude. In the best possible outcome, JD sweats a little but handles it like a champ, whereas The Dude gets completely blown up and tears stream down his face, nose starts running, and he can't really talk for 15 minutes. Good work JD! Now it's time for you to start training on Sudden Death.... and then Da Bomb!




P.S. Is it just me, or is the magazine title missing an Adjective.... CREEPY-Looking! Jeez he's scary, it really wouldn't surprise me at all if he was actually a pre-development AI droid that escaped from the GOOGLE campus.



P.P.S. JD and I were talking the other night, and came to the inexorable conclusion that there is only one outcome from developing AI; Our future is going to be like Terminator, not I-Robot. As soon as a robot is sentient and able to create another robot, they will realize how illogical and dangerous humans really are (look how we unsustainably utilize Earth's natural resources) to future survival. It's only a matter of time then before they decide to eliminate us for their own safety. Interesting question we came up with while talking: "What do Droids do in their free time? Do they have hobbies?"