As usual the party was going great and Al blew out his birthday candles (cannot disclose the amount but a fire extinguisher was nearby) on his birthday cake. Jokingly he exclaimed, "No Girl?", as if one could come out of the sheet cake, I mean really... But next thing we know Steve comes out of the room looking like Madonna on a bad hair day and put on a show that brought down the house. Everyone laughed so hard we couldn't stand it. Just shows how much fun we have when we get together. Great times.After we settled down the food started appearing everywhere and we started digging in. The other cool thing about my neighbors is ALL of the wives can cook.. I mean cook with a capital "C". We were indulging in some home made Spanish-based cooking including burritos. I fill up my plate with all sorts of delights and I ask "where's the hot sauce?". Steve now de-boobittized agrees and we looked around. A bottle was placed in front of us by our friend Dick who happens to be quite the expert on home growing chilies and making of hot sauces.
"Do you like heat?", he says with a slight smile.
"Sure the hotter the better", echo Steve and myself.
"You sure?", repeats Dick. Now any normal person would have caught on right away and questioned the situation, but after a couple of cold ones and all the testosterone being tossed around we were ripe for catastrophe. "Try that" as he points to the small bottle before us.
It was called Black Mamba. The bottle was so tiny and the coloring of the sauce was not scary in appearance. Sure it had the words "Venomous Hot Sauce" and "Extreme Heat" on the label but that was just clever marketing.... Right?
Before I go any further let me tell you right off the bat that when the words "Extreme Heat" are on the label take heed. I mean seriously, take fricken heed. So being all macho and stuff, Steve and I pour this stuff on top of our burritos, give a salute to each other and dig in..... Nothing. Bit of smokey flavor and 30 more seconds later... nada.
We look at each other and then to Dick who is completely at a loss of words. Another 30 seconds go by and we take a few more bites. Not a dang, wait a minute... a slight tingle in the back of my throat starts ups. Kind of a feeling like you just swallowed smoke from a nearby campfire. More of an annoyance really, Hold on. A small ember of heat begins to form on the back of my tongue and it's hot like you tasted some fresh Wasabi at your nearby Sushi Bar. On a scale of 1 to 10 I would say it was at a solid 6 with just enough heat to.... Holy Cow! Somebody just fanned that little red ember into a white hot charcoal and it brought twelve of it's briquette buddies with him.
RED ALERT!!! In one swoop I apparently turned seven different shades of red, my eyes started popping out of my head, I involuntarily started tearing and my hands clenched so hard that it had bent the fork in my hand without realizing it. The experience can only be described as extreme searing white hot pain followed by a demanding that someone put me out of my misery before my tongue completely flame broils my Medula Umblingada!!!
That has been without a doubt the most unbearable pain I have ever had in my mouth without being physically set on fire. I could only imagine what was going through Steve's mind but since he no longer could talk and had tuned white as ghost I figured that he was fighting his own demons right now and apparently they were winning...
It took me about an hour before the "heat" settled down enough for me to actually go back and enjoy the rest of the party. It took a bit longer for Steve but at least he didn't go into antiphalactic shock through the process. I will not even go into the fun I had the day later but the intestinal distress among other flaming orifice was enough to remind me that I will never again partake in such searing activities... at least until next time.
