In addition to going to Pellissippi State Community College part time, Arthur "Trip" has been a manager at Firehouse Subs on Cumberland Avenue for about four years and four months, so he says. In his time at the sub shop, he has tried more than 100 hot sauces, a few more than the average man. This would make him an expert on the matter, or somewhat of a connoisseur. 

Question: So what would you say your favorite hot sauce is?

Tahiti Joe's, because it has good flavor. It's kind of garlicy, kind of sweeter with a very herby taste.

Question: I see that there are about fifty hot sauces on the wall here. What is the point of having so many sauces? 

To make a play off the word Firehouse. (Says with a laugh) They're hot sauces, they'll set your mouth on fire. They also accent the different types of subs. Like for example, the Chipotle Del Sol is excellent on the club on a sub. Definitely go with the house sauce on a steak sub, a garlicky sauce is good for an italian, a polynesian sauce goes well on a hero and Gator Hammock goes well on an engineer.

Question: You definitely know you sauces well. How long did it take you to figure that stuff out?

Probably a year. I ate lots of bad stuff figuring it out, that's for sure. I'd have to say Buffalo Chipotle is the worse. Oh, also Wasabi Ginger. I'm sorry, I'm just not a wasabi fan — especially not on a sub. Imagine having a sushi sub, that's kind of hard to say. You try saying sushi sub three times fast.

Question:  Sushi sub, sushi sub, sushi sub. Yeah, kind of hard. So you get these sauces from a catalog, right?

Well, the ones we mostly get are from a catalog. We also have them ranked on a scale of one to ten, ten being the hottest sauce. But from trial and error we know that some of those are kind of eschew, so we'll rate those ourselves.

Question: How do you decide what sauces to order from this catalog?

I usualy try to order one that we've never had and try to keep ordering the big movers. Don't really order a lot of the real hot ones. between five and eight is the better range to order. 

Question: What is the hottest hot sauce you can get?

We don't have that one because it's too hot and too expensive. [We have to order sauces] that are around five dollars. The hottest we get is 357 Magnum, I've got some great stories about people using this sauce too. We had an employee who thought he was man enough to take an ounce shot of it. Later on, he cried for water in the bathroom while throwing and up begging us to take him to the hospital. He called his grandmother for comfort. 

Question: I bet the 'man enough' scenario comes up a lot, doesn't it?

Yeah, plenty. There was a guy who also thought he was man enough and he even took his finger and swipped the cup clean and used the bathroom afterwards and got it on his package — it burnt it up bad. There's also been a UT football player who thought he could do it, but he threw up and stayed in bed for the rest of the next day. Our owner, Paul Jarrett, cleaned the hot sauces with a rag and didn't wash his hands afterwards and wiped his eyes. He stayed in the office later for thirty minutes trying to get it out eyes. 

Question: Sounds like those guys had pretty horrible experiences. This sauce also seems like one that would lend itself to employee pranks. Does it? 

I put a bunch of hot sauce in a coffee smoothie for the General Manager, but he didn't want it so I asked him what he wanted instead and made him another smoothie. He didn't know there was 357 in it and funneled it straight down the straw. He drank it, went and got a bunch of ice and lemonade and he didn't cool down at all. So as a last resort he he got the coffee smoothie I had originally made for him and started drinking it hoping it would help, but he continued to suffer. I asked him how the coffee smoothie was and he replied, 'I don't know, I can't really taste it.' This was because the more he ate, the hotter it got. It was pretty good. 

Question: So as well as being a connoisseur your also quite the prankster. What would you do without the sauces?

Well, I'd have to be more creative. The hot sauces are an enabler, but I could put salt in employees drinks, or I could put super glue on the firehouse phone. I don't know, I'd be creative. 

Question: If you're not a big not sauce fan, what would you recommend people do to try some of these?

I've gotten plenty of people hooked on sauces, the house is a good one to start with if you don't usually like hot sauce. Just try a more mild one and you might like it. Take a chance.