Good morning, Monday commuters! Okay… there’s no snow, and no ice… I don’t think temps are in the freezing range for anything downhill of Running Springs, and it’s dry as hell out there (statistically, yes, a very dry place, what with all the fire and brimstone…). However, the wind is still here, there, and everywhere, and with it, rocks on the road. The Narrows has ‘em, and many sections of Highway 18 are minefields of damaging rocks.
Quick primer on rock etiquette: When you see rocks on the road that are of a size that could do damage to other vehicles, if you are under the age of 70, have no kids in the car, and are wearing anything less than four-inch stilettos, you are sort of obligated to stop and move the things out of the road. Of course, only do so if you can stop safely, in a fashion that will not ADD to the danger for other motorists. However, do not stop on the shoulder NEXT to rocks in the road, because there’s a GREAT chance that more rocks are going to come down, and you do NOT want that kind of rain falling on you or your car. Also, it is best if you can stop BEFORE the rock obstacle(s) (as opposed to after, regarding traffic direction), as there’s always the possibility of another vehicle flying down the highway and hitting the rock before you are able to move it… it can then become a spray of shrapnel, or the other car might even lose control and crash into you or your vehicle.
Finally, if you DO happen to hit a rock, pull over and check for damage… don’t just drive on, HOPING that there’s no damage. Your tire could blow out or other damage could occur. I recently witnessed somebody hit a basketball-sized rock, which instantly ruptured the oil pan. However, the driver simply kept going… oblivious to the fact that the life of his entire engine depended on him stopping to check for damage. I followed the trail of oil… which eventually led to a disabled car on the side of the road with a destroyed engine. Had the driver simply stopped after impact, the repair might have been a couple of hundred bucks… instead, the price surely escalated to $5,000 to $10,000.
Also: The “University Fire,” behind Cal State San Bernardino, is still burning (it began last night). However, the last updates I have received are that it’s forward rate of advance has been stopped, and at this time, it poses no threat to our mountain communities or to your commute. Please check http://www.mountainreporter.com for more information on this fire.
Today is, “National Pizza With the Works Except Anchovies Day.” I can get behind this national day! I do like all kinds of stuff on my pizza… but anchovies? Holy smokes. Everybody has HEARD of anchovies but few have actually tried them AND survived to tell about the experience. It’s not necessarily the “surviving” part, it’s the “telling” part, because those who HAVE tried them have had their faces shrivel up and pucker so badly, like a garden slug swimming in salt, that they may never be able to speak again. I’m telling you, while we’ve been told—by Big Phishma!—that anchovies are a fish product, I am pretty sure that they are simply a product resulting from the concentration and compaction of salt with some fishy flavor added to it. One anchovy is equivalent to about one salt quarry with a few drops of fetid fish scent added in order to putrefy it. You may think that I’m not a fan of anchovies: you may assume correctly. J.Geils’ boys didn’t want anchovies and neither do I. (Incidentally, that song is at the very top of the list of weirdest freakin’ songs ever. If you are looking for a thing that’ll make you see Alice in Wonderland as normal by comparison, just Google the lyrics of the song, “No Anchovies, Please” by The J. Geils Band. I’ll tease it with this: the song includes a person being wrapped in Saran Wrap, a guy named Don who smokes 40 packs a day and watches “Bowling For Dollars” at a local bar, and Don’s wife turning into a bowling ball. I’m not going to give away much more… the rest of this journey into the strange world of probably-drug-induced (J.Geils and band: I’m only speculating, all in good fun, for entertainment purposes only, not stating as fact. Please do not sue me) lyrics must be completed by you.)
Today though, “the works”—everything—goes on the pizza. Of course, there are some things that NEVER belong on a pizza, so typically, when you ask for the Buddhist Monk Pizza (“Make me one with everything!”), they won’t top your pie with bananas, chocolate chips, horseradish, or cabbage. But… you still need to watch out because some will try to put carrots on there, or they may try to poison you with broccoli, or even try to sneak freakin’ pineapple onto that otherwise edible food! See historically, the pineapple thing began as a dare, something so outrageous that OBVIOUSLY nobody would REALLY eat it. Sort of like how no college student would ever REALLY eat a live goldfish. But people consumed it, and since a few of them did not die sudden, violent deaths, it was called a “success,” with “suck” actually being the key syllable. Anyhow… be careful when ordering “the works.” I suggest very specifically ordering it with olives, mushrooms, pepperoni, sausage, onions, artichoke hearts, more olives, ham, bell peppers and maybe more olives… but NO ANCHOVIES.
I once ordered a pizza “with pepperoni” from a pizza joint in Southern Germany. When it arrived there was no meat product on my pizza, just a generous helping of peppers. I protested, but the server was baffled. He said, “But you asked for, ‘pepper on it’!” Turns out, they’ve never heard of the processed loaf of slightly spiced pig parts called pepperoni. I ate the pizza… and it was pretty good. Now interestingly, at the very same place another time, I ordered my pizza with olives. The thing came with GREEN olives… not black. I was amused but decided to try to overcome this pizza bizarrity and power through it. Turns out, it was awesome. Now GREEN olives are my preference for pizza olives. Not every pizza place offers them, because to us Americans is seems a little weird, but take my word for it: green is great.
I would like to offer a shout-out to a local purveyor of pie: The other day, I ordered a couple of pizzas to be delivered from Roadhouse Pizza in Crestline. They told me that it would probably be 45 minutes to an hour… but less than 30 minutes later, a light screech of tires and near-simultaneous car-door-slam alerted me to the fact that my pair o’ pies had showed up… and they were GOOOOOOD, too.
I must also give honorable mention to Costco. That place has pizza that is utterly amazing, huge, affordable and delicious. I mean, like best-pizza-ever delicious. A pizza the size of an airplane wheel is around $10 and comes with whatever you want on it. You will not be disappointed at all… the things are epic.
You know, a wise old 20-something once said that pizza is like nookie… when it’s good, it’s GOOOOOD… but when it’s bad, it’s still pretty good. However… I recently found an exception to this proverb.
Mrs. Kdog and I recently went to a nearby food court located inside a nearby casino, and ordered a couple of pizzas at the counter. Now, the place offers pizza by the slice or by the whole pizza. I did some quick math in my head and, as expected, the value for a whole pie was much better than the by-the-slice price. We ordered two whole pies.
After nearly an hour of waiting, I was told that, oops, sorry, they forgot to mention, they could only bake ONE pizza at time… the oven wasn’t working right. They apologized for forgetting to tell me this before I ordered. However, when I finally DID get the pizzas, after much additional waiting, AND an ordering snafu (they accidentally got the wrong customer number on the order, and then screwed up the receipt), which was apparently only solved by my use of ever-increasing-in-magnitude vulgarities and steadily increasing voice volume, I discovered that these pizzas were petite lil’ dollhouse-size discs… NOT the “whole pizzas” implied by the display. I was then told that, oh, sorry, the “whole” pizzas are different than the ones sold by the slice. And damn… these were TINY. Display pizzas: GIANT. Actual pizzas: tiny. The value was NOT there, at all… in fact, the price of the pizza actually served, was about DOUBLE the slice price.
And, to top it all off… the pizzas were weird! The tomatoes and onions and peppers and mystery items were the size of walnuts… like each topping piece was an entire mouthful in itself. One could not take a bite of pizza AND get toppings on the same bite… instead, see, you sort of had to eat pizza and then when your face collided with one of the topping boulders, you had to stop eating pizza in order to chew through the topping thingie. This was all on a crust made out of soup, I think, but watered down so as not to be as stout and thick as say, clam chowder. If there’d been any significant amount of cheese on the thing, maybe it could have held together, sort of “suspension style,” but alas, no… the cheese was just sort of a web-thin, fishnet pattern. And I think the sauce may have been ketchup… before they watered it down.
Needless to say… we aren’t going back for any more of that culinary abuse. I’d rather eat the box that a Costco pizza comes in, than eat one of those casino concoctions again.
Here’s something that’ll remind you that not all 20-somethings exude wisdom when they speak. At another place I ordered pizza from recently, I asked the guy if he could cut my pizza into twelve slices instead of the usual six. He looked at me seriously and asked, “Are you sure you can eat that much?”
Anyhow… enjoy an (almost) everything pizza today, but skip the anchovies. Skip any place nearby that you think I might have had a recent terrible experience at, too… there are plenty of opportunities to get good pizza elsewhere. However, if you get pizza at the bowling alley, while powering through your 40 packs of smokes and watching “Bowling For Dollars,” keep an eye on your wife… and don’t forget to say, “No anchovies, please!”