The Fearsome Blazin' Wing Challenge

Housekeeping Note

JC responded to my last post re:Terrible Tues. While an entertaining banter ensued, no resolution was reached, as his personal experience trumped any logic/thoughts I was able to bring to bear. Considering how little reader interaction there is on this blog, I have decided to post the conversation in its entirety. Hopefully this will be inspiring to some. This will either be mildly amusing/completely uninteresting depending on the reader.

JC: I disagree with the premise of your latest blog post. m^2 is always worse than t^2

THTF: I would submit that it's not just the absolute level that makes something bad, but the relative level vs expectation.

Think of a stock. Everyone knows that the earnings will stink. And then it reports bad earnings, but not quite as terrible as expected. It rallies. This is Monday.

Then there is a stock that should do fine. But then earnings are a tiny bit below expectation. It sells off. This is Tuesday.

JC: Maybe for you. My mondays usually don't come in better than expectations until im out of work

THTF: Monday is always expected to be awful. It usually matches this expectation, but sometimes it comes in better.

I always have much higher hopes for tues, and it more often than not comes in below expectations.

Maybe I need to re-calibrate tues expectations downward.

JC: It sounds like that would be a rational adjustment given your experience.

THTF: It also has ability to surprise to upside as well though. Mon never does that. Tues is just a more volatile day, but the utility loss from a downside surprise is much greater than the utility gain from an upside surprise

JC: Maybe you are more of a scholar on the topic than I

THTF: That usually is the case

THTF: So is today significantly better than yesterday for you?

JC: Yes, almost unquantifiable

Anyway, on to the point of the post. Last night after rock climbing, JD and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings. As per their unbiased website:

"Buffalo Wild Wings Grill & Bar is one of the fastest-growing restaurant chains in the country. Our concept is more than a Buffalo, New York-style wing joint with 14 signature sauces, we are also a sports bar, with a full menu featuring everything from salads to appetizers to burgers, and a variety of specialty items. All served in a relaxed, comfortable atmosphere where people like to hang out with friends, play trivia on our Buzztime^® system, and watch their favorite games on one of our many big-screen TVs."

The restaurant is actually pretty sweet, and has a menu of 14 different wing flavors. The Mango Habanero and Spicy Garlic are amazing. The most "dangerous" of the flavors is the Blazin' sauce. I read on a rather well respected website that the sauce is in the 200k+ scoville range. That my friends is 100% libel. At most this thing clocks in at 20k.

The Menu

Tuesday nights at BWW is 45cent wings, so JD and I decided to stop by for a quick dinner before going out ($2 bowling and drinks @ Lucky Strikes last night!). I decided that this was the perfect time to give the Blazin' Wing Challenge a try. The serving girl's face went ashen when said challenge was requested, and she queried whether I was sure. I admitted I was, and off she went to get the waiver that needs to be signed. Highlights from the waiver included: BWW is not liable in case of participants death, no water or celery or blue cheese, 12 blazin' wings, 6 total minutes. JD elected to sit this one out like a little girl, but was kind enough to act as a witness.

Anyway, the actual challenge was a total cakewalk. The wings were not spicy, so it came down to whether I could eat 12 wings in 6 minutes. And like any self-respecting man, the answer was yes. Four minutes and 15 seconds later, I was the proud owner of the following T-Shirt.




EZ_MODE

Terrible Tues? I don't think so

Besides the Bangles, everyone knows that Mondays suck. After spending a glorious weekend out of the office sleeping in, playing sports, doing activities, and otherwise enjoying yourself, the pain of a 5 day work week sets in hard come Monday morning; hence the term Miz Monday. But while it is brutal, it also is very expected and understood by the masses. So you can't be too upset when the day in fact is bad. That being said, I personally believe that Tuesday is actually the worst day of the week; hence my nickname Terrible Tues (or T^2 for the nerds in the crowd). Monday you still have the opportunity to regale your work buddies with your extracurricular weekend exploits, and the bar is really low as far as having a good day. Tuesday on the other hand has nothing going for it. The weekend is still an interminably long distance away, and you are required to do all the work that you pushed off on Miz Mon due to your residual two day hangover. So more work, and what seems to be the same (i.e. infinte) amount of time until the weekend makes T^2.

So this Tuesday started off as expected; terribly. Work was rough, my stocks were moving the wrong way, and Jimmy John's inexplicably covered my Italian sub with Mayo. WTF! I got home around 7pm, and made some "poor man's chili" (a JD invention, dropping beef stew onto pasta and then slathering with hot sauce; amazing!) in order to help turn the day around. I needed a pick me up, so decided to cover my dinner with Mad Dog Inferno. A great 90k sauce (garlic/molasses), I overestimated my abilities and totally pwned myself; rendering the dinner inedible. And I got a stomach to boot, F!

However from this point on, T^2's strangelhold on my day started to loosen. For JD's 26th birthday, I got him (and myself) tickets to KT Tunstall at the Ogden. Now that doesn't sound like a good gift for a 26 year old male, but I can assure you it is. So we headed to the concert early in order to snag a front row spot. The opening band was Hurricane Bells, most famous (i.e. only known) for their song Monsters that occupies track ten on the Twilight New Moon soundtrack. They were actually pretty solid. Then after 15 minutes of anxiety attacks by JD (O.M.G. WHERE IS SHE, I HOPE SHE SINGS SUDDENLY I SEE, ETC), KT made her appearance.



She, and her new album (Tiger Suit), were friggin awesome. Totally turned Terrible Tues into an Epic Day. She even dedicated a song to me (the only positive to going through a rough breakup ) which was pretty sweet of her. Highlights include her songs Difficult, and I'm Still a Weirdo, as well as how she makes her own beats on the fly (i.e. goes "woo hoo" into the mic, then records it using footpedals, and then loops it to provide the backing track to Black Horses and the Cherry Tree).



The rest of the band was pretty cool as well. All in all, a great show. KT is a must see for the 25-26 year old male demographic imho.

2nd Batch- The HOT Ones

The final six sauces I ordered arrived yesterday. A November 1st arrival was a bit of fail as they were suppose to come during Hot Sauce Month (hi OCTOBER!), but overall the quality of the sauces made up for the delay.

The GOODS (click for full img)


The Beast is a staple in the JD training regime, so it was good to restock. Then I'm very pleased with the inclusion of Liquid Stoopid and Mad Dog Inferno. Both are probably in the 75-85k range, so are the next step up. I have yet to try the Widow sauce, but it allegedly comes in with a 9 handle. Then Mad Dog 357 is a very high end (357k, duh) sauce, which should be good for spicing up a chili as well as party tricks.

Last night I tried the "You can't handle this sauce", and was super impressed. The ingredient list made it look real wimpy, so I had low expectations (vinegar, molasses, jalapeno, cinnamon, etc). But the flavor was incredible, and it actually had some real heat. While it is has yet to be determined whether I was blowing my nose last night b/c of the sauce or b/c of the onset of a cold (still waiting for it to arrive....), I'm very pleased with the unique taste and good heat.

P.S. Where's WALDO?? If you open up the above hot sauce picture, you will see a diminutive character lurking in the background. This is actually the Wuss of the WEEK! This unnamed person was overheard complaining that the black pepper on her pasta was TOO HOT. When queried, she replied that the problem was that "it was ground pepper, so it was a lot hotter than normal". ZOMG, I have my work cut out for me!