Is Bad Pizza like Still Pretty Good Sex

Hi, Van Buren and Claey, I don’t have a particular situation going on in my life, but I recently discovered a quote that is up there with Matthew 6 and the entire last chapter of War and Peace, that has changed my outlook on life.  And then Sharon Stone said, “Sex is like pizza. Even when it’s bad, it’s still pretty good.”  Do you concur with this?  What are your opinions?

Cold Pizza

Van Buren

Hi Cold Pizza!  It’s twenty-four minutes before the hour and coming up next hour, we’ll be giving the grand prize away seeing Arcade Fire in Hong Kong, a listener and a guest will be flown to Hong Kong and stay at the Luxurious Metropark Hotel Causeway Bar for two nights and party with the band!

Growing up with in Midland Texas, pizza was always the same to us.  Our choices were Pizza Hut, Papa John’s, and Double Daves and to tell you the truth all those places were pretty much the same.  Having moved to Boston, one of the largest media markets in the country, I was very impressed with the number of pizza places in the Italian Quarter, not to mention the splattering in both the Gay and Euro-Quarters.  I’ve got to say, I never could quite taste the difference between them.  I was not only disappointed when I received the bill, but more so when I got to the crust and there wasn’t any cheese in it.

And this got me thinking, if pizza were like sex, what exactly would be the cheese in the crust?  I must agree, pizza is quiet like sex, whether good or bad – one way or another you’re going to end up paying for it.

Claey

Pizza isn’t one of my specialties – being successful in all facets of my life is and frankly, you don’t get successful by eating lots of cheese.  Yes, there are times I eat it, but generally stay away from anything that doesn’t say gourmet or organic, so I really can’t talk about bad pizza, only bad service at gourmet pizza establishments.  Whether I’m taking out either my wife or mistress, I generally don’t care whether they like the food, even if they’re vegan or vegetarian and I’ve just ordered a Prosciutto and Yellow Pepper Pizza.  They should just take what I give them.

To talk about the subject of pizza, we’ve invited an expert on this topic, our el Maestro, Teddy Kechris to speak on this question.

Teddy Kechris

Okay Cold Pizza.  A little story from my childhood because if there is something I know, its having access to lots of pizza.  Upon arriving to this country from Greece, my father’s side of the family went into opening diners, while my mother’s side, except for her immediate family, opened little pizza places.  Across the South Shore, there must have been at least fifteen towns each with at least one pizza place owned by either a distant cousins or a close family friend.  And what this means, unlike most people, I had the experience of never having paid for a slice of pizza until I moved away to Amherst.

Like sex, Greeks never charge their family and close family friends for pizza.  Most of them work so much that their pizza joint is an extension of their home, and, even if it’s the most convoluted relationship, like my Great-Grandmother was first cousins with their Grandfather, you’re treated like a guest in their house.  Like a wish from a genie, this has both positive and negative repercussions.

This is how it generally worked out.  My mother, when she wasn’t up for cooking, would take my sister and me out to visit one of her cousins and inevitably we went to their pizza place.  In general, these people worked so much you’d have no other opportunity to visit them.  You could go to their home, but they wouldn’t be there until Christmas.  You’d sit down.  They’d offer you sodas.  My mom talk with her cousins, my sister and I would run around in the kitchen, listening to the hum of refrigerator fans, maybe there would be some other cousins… and eventually the cousins would make some pizzas and about an hour later we’d be eating.

My distant uncle would ask, “How’s the pizza?” and we’d always say the same thing, “Hmm, it’s very tasty” because you can’t critique something that’s given for free with “oh, the sauce is salty” or the “the cheese is too oily” or “the mushrooms are like cardboard”.  It’s rude to even to suggest it today.  In most cases, my cousins made good pizza, but there were some situations where the pizza was simply terrible.  Whether, the crust tasted like cardboard or the sauce had no flavor, this was simply an awkward result.

Now maybe you’re asking: why does it matter whether the pizza was good or bad?  Well, after we finished and before we left, our distant-aunt would suggest making a half-dozen pizzas for our dad, maybe for our grandparents, maybe some to keep in the fridge or freezer and you couldn’t take no for an answer.  It’s like someone picking up the tab at dinner, initially you say no, but eventually you have to relent.  And in our situation, it generally would be an insult to refuse parting gifts.

So we’d walk out carrying a week’s supply of pizza from our cousin’s “House of Pizza”, they all had the same name, the pizza box was always the same with a pizza chef, and if the pizza was terrible, we’d be scratching our heads saying “what are we going to do with the shitty pizza?”  There is nothing worse than having an endless supply of inedible pizza.  What are we going to do, feed it to the family dog?  No, my mom was an animal lover?

Sharon Stone was correct to suggest pizza was like sex, but there is a huge difference between good and bad pizza.  She never received the vast amounts of bad pizza we did.  We loved our cousins who made great pizza, but find discover the cousin who makes a bad pizza, we’d put on a grin and accept it, but eventually found ways to figure ways to sneak out the door when they weren’t paying attention to avoid the awkward question of “Do you want more?”

Van Buren, is fat and originally from of Midland Texas, lives with her dog “Butch”.  She’s the former host of Sanders in the Morning on Power 102.4 in Boston, enjoys watching the View on Channel 5 and keeping up-to-date with the local gossip.  She’s looking for a publisher for her book… ”Is Vin Diesel Gay?”

Claey Ducken is a douche and a successful entrepreneur married to his wife Jennifer of eleven years, with two kids, Eryn & Eryca, and he has a mistress Corinne for the last six years.  He’s an avid water-skier, plays five musical instruments and has written two best-sellers, ”Being Negative and Successful” and “Do what I say? Do I care what you think?”

Teddy Kechris lives alone in Los Angeles with his roommate, is single and doesn’t do much other than write comedy and edit this blog.  He’s working on a couple of screenplays and works a full-time job with the goal of subsisting on a writer’s salary someday.