Baboon Ass Hot Sauce Tee

In 1987, a team of rogue food scientists — operating out of a converted Waffle House somewhere in rural Louisiana — decided that existing hot sauces were not, in their professional opinion, unhinged enough.

They worked for eleven years.

They lost funding. They lost colleagues. One of them lost his sense of smell permanently and considers it "a fair trade." Their grant applications were rejected by seventeen universities and one community college. Their families stopped asking how work was going.

And then, in 1998, they cracked it.

Baboon Ass Hot Sauce.

Named not for the animal — though the animal is absolutely involved in the branding — but for the feeling. The specific, inescapable, cosmically personal feeling of having made a choice you cannot undo. A heat so precise, so deeply targeted, that your body will spend the next forty-five minutes negotiating with itself about what just happened and whether it was worth it.

It was worth it. It is always worth it. That's the tragedy. That's the beauty.

This tee is the official garment of everyone who has ever looked directly at a bottle of something labeled "EXTREME" and said, without hesitation, yes, and also more. Wear it as a warning. Wear it as a badge. Wear it to Thanksgiving and let your aunt read it and watch her face do the thing.

• Bold, full-color graphic print that survived the design process (the designer needed a week off after)
• Unisex relaxed fit — roomy enough to accommodate the consequences of your hot sauce decisions
• Soft, durable Gildan cotton that washes out most stains (we said most)
• Certified conversation starter at cookouts, diners, emergency rooms, and intervention circles
• Available in sizes S–3XL — because the spice does not discriminate

Wear it to the cookout. Wear it to court. Wear it to your cousin's wedding and let it speak for your entire personality so you don't have to.

The scientists are retired now. They are fine. Mostly. One of them still can't feel his left hand but he says it's unrelated.