Sunday, August 1, 2010

Watermelon and Pizza


I thoroughly enjoy a blog by The Sassy Curmudgeon and recently she posted that she hates watermelon. I have to say that I don’t agree with her on watermelon; I happen to love it, but she has given me the courage to say…I HATE PIZZA!!!

There. I said it. Now please stop reading this and call 911 for those who just had a heart attack reading that sentence.“I hate pizza”. Try saying that - to anyone. It is a guaranteed conversation stopper. People stare. Some start to quiver. Others turn bright red. They all start to Back. Away. Slowly.  And if I say it to a group of people, the pitchforks and torches come out and then I am the one trying to Back. Away. Slowly.

I hate pizza. I hate everything about it. I hate the pools of grease large enough to hide the Loch Ness monster. I hate the crust which tastes like cardboard. Dry cardboard, soggy cardboard, or chewy cardboard depending on if it starts its life as thin crust, thick crust, or deep dish crust. And mozzarella cheese! Who invented this Silly Putty of cheeses? You can’t bite it, tear it, or cut it. It will stretch from your mouth to the moon. Thieves, forget zip lines! Just have a friend hold a slice of pizza on the roof while you take a bite, and float down to the museum floor safely and quietly on the never-ending string of cheese. As a bonus your fingers will be so greasy you won’t have to worry about leaving fingerprints; they will all smear into an unrecognizable mess.

My husband drags me to every pizza joint in town, determined to find one I will like. Since I am a veggie person he has started ordering variations of veggie pizzas for me to try. I can honestly say that it doesn’t matter what the vegetable is – green pepper, mushroom, olives, whatever – after putting it on a pizza and baking it for, apparently, 49 HOURS, it all looks like those washers the plumber puts on facets to make them stop leaking, and tastes like...well...the Loch Ness monster.

Of course, even though I hate pizza myself, I still know how to order pizzas to please any crowd. This is both a fine art and a necessary skill. Surprisingly enough, liking pizza oneself doesn’t mean that one can order just the right pizzas, sizes and combinations, to satisfy the hungry lions, er, pizza aficionados. This lesson was brought home to me one day many years ago when a man who was trying to date me offered to come over and bring pizza. I genteelly refrained from screaming into the phone “I hate pizza, you twit” and reflected upon the fact that, at that very moment, I had two Hulks (otherwise known as two 17 year old boys) and one Hulkette (my 17 year old daughter who, let’s be honest, could eat them under the table. Okay, that didn’t sound quite the way I wanted it to…) at any rate, these three teenagers were in my home and they would soon be expecting fooooooood. Which in teenage lexicon, of course, means either pizza or pizza. Or maybe pizza. With a side of pizza. Oh, and with a liter of coke, of course. For each.

So I told him “Sure, come on over – but I have three teenagers here.” He replied “No Problem! I’ll bring enough for everyone!”

He brought one large pepperoni pizza and one medium ham and pineapple pizza.

That was ONE large pepperoni and one MEDIUM…well, you get the picture.

My daughter swooped down on him at the door and divested him of the boxes and disappeared into the kitchen. From whence she promptly re-appeared and forced me to attempt to remain sober and straight-faced as she stood behind him holding her fingers in an L on her forehead.

And who knew that Hulks could whip up pitchforks and torches so quickly?

Camellia