I finished the Habenaro burger...Again!

and I got to show for it was this lousy bumper sticker.



Man, that was crazy hot.


As part of my company's ritual for welcoming new hires we all go out to a local British pub that serves these ridiculously hot burgers. They gave us a choice between the 'X' and the triple 'X' burger. Being a relative veteran there, I had to go for the XXX.

The burgers came looking innocently enough. Just an open face burger with a little red sauce on the patty and a side of fries. Looks couldn't be more deceiving.

The general suggestion for downing one of these pieces of lava on a bun is to get it down as quickly as possible. However, as soon as I swallow the first bite, my stomach starts flipping out and now I'm fighting an upchuck reflex whilst trying to cram more magma down my throat. 10 seconds in, I've only now started to get into the real saucy parts of the burger. I'm sweating like mad, my throat's starting to constrict, but I'm still trying to swallow big bites. 30 seconds in, I manage to get down half the burger until my pace really slows down. I have to chew each bite a lot more before I can swallow and now the burn is really kicking in. Drinking beer gives only momentary relief otherwise its making me feel a bit fuller with every gulp making it that much harder to force the next bite down. 2 minutes in, i've only managed to get another quarter down. I'm feeling a bit delirious now as the pain is somewhere between unbearable and numb. Its like my tongue has started to give up on telling me this is HOT! The rest of my mouth is still burning and my guts are at a constant state of upset. 5 minutes in and two more bites left. Seeing the end in sight, I shove the remaining bites down as I whip my head left and right to help it go down... Ahhhh, the burn, still intense, but at least I can concentrate on drinking beer from now on.

All in all, it was an entertaining experience. The next day wasn't so bad for me, but one of our newbies had to come in late due to having something diabolical in his gut.

How to do Dr. Phil's job for him
Today I was watching this show where an obsessive husband tries to compensate for a lack of control in his life by maintaining absolute control over his wife. He gets panic attacks when he can't get in touch with her and if she ever speaks to a guy, the husband gets consumed with jealousy. The problem is that this guy is pretty smart, but he's delusional. He seems to be able to convince himself that his compulsive behavior is okay when panic overwhelms him.
The problem is that Dr. Phil wants him to go to a treatment facility that doesn't force him to stay or prevents him from doing any compulsive activity. I don't know what really goes on in there but it appears that he's somehow supposed to just refrain from his compulsive behavior. The guy probably convinces himself that this place is a farce and gets right back into his routine. I don't understand why people like Dr. Phil think they can talk some sense into him. Perhaps, Dr. Phil doesn't think he can either, but boy it sure does make good television to try! The guy thinks he's smarter than most people so if he thinks that he's smarter than the psychiatrists he's not gonna listen to a word they are saying. Then when he does encounter someone more intelligent, his delusions will set in and he'll just convince himself that he's smarter and justify leaving the program.
What I'm trying to say is that help can't really come from outside his head. People can only communicate with the rational side of his head. The problems lie in the irrational side, his irrational fears of losing control, a phobia! Do we ever see this guy treated as if his illness is a phobia? No! The most effective treatment for phobia to keep exposing him to his fears and keep restricting his compulsive behavior, yet they keep letting him believe that his wife will come back to him and they don't keep him from stalking her.
If I was Dr. Phil, I would have given him 2 choices for treatment. One would be faster, but would be increadibly difficult and painful (mentally), but would offer the best chance for saving his marriage or he can take the slow and easy approach that they gave him in the show. Then I say that if he really wanted to change he should take the first option, if he only wanted to do lip-service and jump right back into his old ways, then take the 2nd (What do you think he would agree to on national television?).
What's the first option? I have to warn you that this will sound quite draconian, but with intensity we get faster more direct results. This will involve plunging him into his worst fears. I would have him stripped of all control. He would be put in a straight jacket and tied to a bed. We'd play mind games on him, trying to convince him that his wife has left him, changed her identity and that it would be impossible for him to find her again. They would convince him that he signed away all his legal rights and now they could keep him here as long as they wanted, and that now nobody cares that he's in there. It would be horrendous mental torture to him. His body would probably go into convulsions and maybe even a heart attack and they might have to sedate him several times, but eventually his mind will stop making his body self-destruct and it will realize that the only "control" he really needs is control over his mind.

The Global Warming Myth
Like many of you, I watched Al Gore's presentation An Inconvienent Truth and felt the impending doom that man made greenhouse gases have brought us to. I was all ready to buy a Prius and install some solar panels until I discovered some other documentaries that takes a rigorous look at the evidence used to connect global warming to man made CO2.
Now I don't deny that global warming is happening, I'm saying that man didn't cause global warming. The proponents of man made global warming have egregiously twisted their evidence and cherry-picked their data to lead you to their desired conclusion.

Unfortunately, convincing skeptics is almost impossible in a single blog entry, but I promise if you watch this video in its entirety you will be thoroughly convinced that global warming is a fraud. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6031514559084805348
You can also download the slides for this video which also contains the links to the source of this data for you own verification. Some of the claims that are made in the beginning of this seem dubious (like banning CFC's caused thousands of Europeans to die in a heatwave b/c they couldn't afford the more expensive AC units), but I urge you to get past these initial claims since they do not contribute to the heart of the argument. The video answered all the questions that I could have had, but if you still have some please leave a comment and perhaps I or somebody else will be able to answer it.