Last year Dave set out to eat a ghost pepper but the whole thing went horribly wrong in every way possible. He decided that he could do better this year because he was armed with a list of remedies for the heat, all suggested by people commenting on last year’s video. Dave’s misadventure started with a challenge issued by his wife, Kristy. Dave had playfully complained that her cooking wasn’t spicy enough for him. Kristy is a clever woman, so she ordered seeds for every hot pepper she could find and began growing them in her garden. Dave is a very spoiled man and Kristy’s cooking is actually far better than he deserves, but he couldn’t back down now that he had made his unfortunate statement. Kristy’s plants grew and the harvest was impressive. When the peppers ripened, Dave took his video camera to her garden and went in search of the infamous Bhut Jolokia, the Ghost Pepper, and he wolfed down a raw one fresh picked from the plant. But as he ran for the hose and stuffed it into his mouth for relief, Kristy realized that he had actually eaten a Trinidad Scorpion pepper. She couldn’t contain her laughter and she alternated between sympathy for her suffering husband and triumphant laughter as he admitted that she had out-spiced his taste buds. The video of Dave and Kristy’s pepper challenge (Husband wants spicier food, wife gives him Trinidad scorpion pepper) received serious attention on the Rumble Viral YouTube channel and the internet provided Dave with encouragement and advice in the form of 2,500 comments. Much of it was aimed at helping Dave deal with the spice through simple remedies like sandpaper, alcohol, tomatoes, yogurt and milk. With renewed confidence and hundreds of tips from supporters, Dave told Kristy that he was going to eat more of her scorpion peppers and ghost peppers. The internet had also informed Dave that the Carolina Reaper was the world’s hottest pepper and there should be no celebration until he took on the hottest of the hot. Kristy had made Dave a selection of delicious sauces that tipped the Scoville scale and Dave was determined to train for another round with a raw pepper fresh from the garden. This year, Kristy grew Carolina Reapers and the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion pepper. Depending on what source you believed, both were believed to be the world’s hottest pepper. Because this was hotly debated, Dave decided the only way to handle this was to eat one of each. And he was certain that the remedies suggested would make it all very bearable. Dave got half of each pepper in his mouth, chewed them and swallowed them and waited for the heat to build. It didn’t take long until Dave realized that again, he had bitten off more than he could chew and his whole head was on fire. He turned to the suggested remedies one by one and quickly found out that the well-intentioned advice he had received wasn’t helpful at all. He tried them all in succession, leaving the milk until the end. It was only then that he found any relief. Dave didn’t plan as well as he thought because he had a bag of milk and no scissors to cut it open. There was no time to waste so he chewed through the bag and began gulping it down. Dave’s solution on the first attempt last year was to spray the hose into his mouth and he eventually resorted to that here as well because even the milk wasn’t putting out the fire. Reluctantly, Dave admitted that he had met his match and asked Kristy to stick to growing jalapenos next year. Dave has learned many things from his experience. He now knows not to challenge Kristy and her cooking (finally). He knows not to try eating two of the world’s hottest peppers at once, and he knows that not everything you read on the internet is true.
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