Horned

J picked up one of these at the store:

It's called a horned melon and is from Africa. J called me up at work to tell me that this would surely be an exciting experience. At the store, the sign described it as having a melon/lime/apple/cucumber/banana taste, which I guess was some produce guy's way of covering his ass. With that description, I was picturing something more like jicama, but was greeted with something more like this:

Though the fruit originated in Africa, It tastes like something the Japanese would have invented. A little slimy, a little tart and filled with seeds, my first taste reaction was that I was eating a fancy facial mask. I don't know where banana and apple came from (or really, melon), but the taste is pretty much a very sour, slightly sweet cucumber that's been sitting in a plastic bag in the back of the fridge too long.

I'm also not sure about eating a fruit that looks like it was designed specifically to keep anything from eating it.

Speaking of eating, we ordered Beau Jo's pizza last night. This is some delicious "mountain pie" pizza with thick crust, thick cheese, and a slightly spicy sauce. The restaurant chain is famous for their "challenge," a relatively small (in competitive eating terms) pie that makes up for its size by weighing in at 12-14 pounds. A team of two has an hour to polish it off. We asked the guys at the counter if their store offered it and they got very excited. "Oh yeah! But you gotta be really hungry." I told them I knew some competitive eaters and they positively lit up, "Like REAL competitive eaters?? You tell them that if they come and do it, they'll get $50 bucks each and t-shirts!" Which is pretty cute, don't you think? But then they upped the ante by telling us that no one has beat the challenge in TEN years. Are you eaters out there listening? Because that sounded like a gauntlet being thrown. down.

Skinnyboy, Colorado native and resident competitive eater, tried recently, but didn't make it. I, being who I am, spent the rest of the night thinking about dream teams to complete this challenge. Then, like, a whole competition made up of dream teams.

All's I'm saying is you can stay in our spare bedroom.