Pepperoni-less

“A lot of people are mad at me and ask me when I’m going to open,” he [Dominic Giansanti] said recently, maybe only half-jokingly. After all, it’s been a long, spiceless, pepperoni-less summer for his customers.

“What’s in pizza?” The concept had taken hold — pizza was the missing link in the chain of life, and the gravity of safeguarding world ecology began to weigh on those small, dirty shoulders. Meanwhile, I was laughing shamelessly and trying to formulate an intelligent warning about a future with cheese-less and pepperoni-less pizzas.

“The pepperoni is moldy so you’ll need to bring home other meat if you want it.” Other meat? As if I’d have any other meat besides Hormel pepperoni on my pizza. But I had had a hard day, so I skipped a trip to the store and opted to eat a pepperoni-less pizza, just this once.