Sunday, January 25, 2009

Hot Razzies

Today I have to rip on a movie I just watched under the guise of scoring "wife points." Then, I discuss a recent and potentially dangerous obsession. First up, the Grecco-britan musical, Mama Mia.

During my stint in Las Vegas, Mama Mia looked like one of the few things on the Strip I could go for. But I couldn't seem to stomach the idea of paying $200 to watch a play. So I took the $1 option at Red Box. Now we're saving money!! Unfortunately, that was the best part of it. Basically this movie seemed miscast and horribly sung (for the most part). I know several musically discerning people that may read this, and if you loved it, I have no more respect for you. The problem boils down to Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan. Both are wonderful actors that I've enjoyed over the years, but neither of them should be leads in a musical. It was awkward and painful every time 007 opened his mouth to sing.

Here is the worst part. This movie brought to mind "Waiting for Guffman," (a Christopher Guest flick - Best in Show, This is Spinal Tap) one of the greatest mockumentaries of all time. For those of you unfamiliar with Guffman, its about a play put on by some local-yokals in a small town in Missouri, led by a flaming, yet in-the-closet director. The cast thinks they are awesome and have a shot at going to Broadway. Of course they are terrible. Here is a sample.


To put it bluntly, these guys do a better job trying to be awful than the Streep and 007. How sad. I'm sure the play is better, the ABBA songs are great, I nearly wanted to dance, but then remembered I'm white, uncoordinated and don't know the lyrics. So I sat down.

Onto my newest obsession. Hot Sauce. Years ago in Boston I decided I needed to develop some intestinal fortitude against spicy food. (You could say I was inspired by how the Dread Pirate Roberts developed immunity to Iocane powder). So I began to gradually put more and more Tabasco sauce on my nightly dish of a raccoon meat meat, fake cheese wrap. At last, I could bear the sauce, peppers were still punishing, but I could hang in there.


I gained some sanity over the years until "The Sacramento Treat" recently introduced me to Habanero sauce. This combined with my recent eating of the jalapeno bratwurst sparked my interests to push my pain threshold higher. So I got a bottle of Habanero sauce and went to work. Now my usual Tapatio is just flavor. I find myself soaking all kinds of random foods in my Habanero sauce as my wife says: WHY??? I think I might be going insane, loosing my sense of taste or I've found another way to get an Endorphin high. Read the following blog from "The original Juan" (the pun is intended) to learn more about the science of spice.

http://www.originaljuan.com/heat_gauge/

4 comments:

Jay said...

#1 - I saw Mamma Mia here in Vegas on the strip (got free tickets) and it was terrible.


#2 - I love hot stuff too. Anything that burns my mouth off is great stuff, but I often have an issue with flavor. I could, for example, eat a raw jalepeno, no problem. But I can't stand the flavor (unless nicely mixed into a salsa of course).


#3 - Small story: When I was 17 my mom bought my friend Rich and I the hottest bottle of Habenero sauce could find because we claimed nothing was too hot for us. I ate one chip, yum, another, yum, more, yum yum yum... but then the spice did its work. We started tearing up. I felt like I was suffocating and dying. They say milk takes the burn away. I drank 4 FULL glasses of milk and another 3 of water. No joke. Now THAT was hot stuff.

Fletch said...

Great story. I need to take the "pepper challenge" to see where I'm at.

Unknown said...

Dude found your blog from a friend pretty funny stuff. Sounds painful bet it hurts on the other end if you know what I mean.

Fletch said...

Kurt, you may be the first person I'm not sure I know that has commented on the ol blog. Hope your stint here was enjoyable.