Patsy Grimaldi died February 13 at age 93 in Queens. He revolutionized pizza in NYC by introducing coal-fired artisanal pies at his Brooklyn parlor.
His customers included Frank Sinatra (who was the only one to whom Grimaldi delivered), Joe DiMaggio, Rodney Dangerfield, Humphrey Bogart, and Lauren Bacall. (Sinatra would order two large sausage pies, if you must know. Grimaldi picked up fennel sausage at a pork store in Queens every morning, while his competitors bought theirs from big distributors.)
Matthew Grogan, an investment banker who co-founded Patsy’s pizzeria Juliana’s, named for Grimaldi’s mom, who thought he knew good pizza, spoke for many customers when he said after tasting a coal-fired pie: “I’ve been living a fraud all these years. This is the greatest food I ever had.” When mob boss John Gotti was on trial at the federal courthouse in Downtown Brooklyn, his lawyers carried slices wrapped in foil in their attache cases to him for lunch.
Pete Wells wrote the obit in the NY Times. It includes this lovely paragraph:
“Mr. Grimaldi’s pizzerias attracted long lines of diners outside, on Old Fulton Street, who were hungry for house-roasted peppers, white pools of fresh mozzarella and tender, delicate crusts baked in a matter of minutes by a scorching pile of anthracite coal.”
Grimaldi is survived by his sister, his daughter, a grandson, and one, large, with sausage and peppers.
Rest in peace, Patsy.
Tristin Giblin posted the following for the Dull Men’s Club (UK) under the title, “what are the odds?”
“I was being rude and looking at the phone at the till when the cashier said to me “11:53.” I said yes, thinking she was telling me the time. Turns out the time was the exact amount I’d spent on Turkish and Greek beer.
“She was mildly surprised. Apparently it had happened 63 times that day.
“When I walked home I tripped into a worm hole and woke up naked next to Picard in a petting zoo.”
I replied, asking if Picard was naked too.
I’m retired and was a state (NY) employee, not a federal one, but I was thinking about what I’d write if I had to answer Musk’s call for 5 accomplishments last week. I came up with “made a cheese omelet,” and “lay around drunk.” I’m drawing blanks now, but I’m going to keep at it.
There is more than enough material for Owl Chatter to open a new department devoted entirely to Nazi salutes. The latest was the CEO of a construction company in Idaho, Thomas Hill, who deemed his speech at an employee gathering an appropriate occasion for repeated salutes. Apparently, these racist morons keep forgetting that everything everyone does these days is captured on video by someone since even homeless people have smartphones. After being caught, his Oopsies fake apology defended the salutes (there were two) as attempts at humor and claimed he was being “unfairly judged.” The idiotic apology generated as much of an uproar as the salutes, so he apologized again, leaving out the bogus “attempt at humor” defense. We’ll keep you posted as additional apologies fly out of his ass.
Ever wonder what news people in Idaho are like?
In more news from the potato state, at the direction of the sheriff, a woman was removed from a town hall meeting for voicing dissent. Three men who refused to identify themselves treated her quite roughly.
Meanwhile, the event’s emcee Ed Bejarana taunted the woman: “Just look at this. This little girl is afraid to leave. She spoke up and now she doesn’t want to suffer the consequences.” The woman’s name is Teresa Borrenpohl, hardly a little girl. Apparently, in Idaho, there are “consequences” for speaking up. Is that supposed to be?
I solved the puzzle today using only the down clues, a method that makes Mondays much more of a challenge. I usually cave with a few blanks left and check some acrosses but not today. So I’m crowing: Caw! Caw!
Without question, how you are feeling can have an effect on how well you perform on the puzzle. Here’s how poor Gary described it today: A good deal tougher than the usual Monday, but I’m prepping for the once-a-decade procedure and I haven’t eaten for 24 hours and I’m cold, and jittery, and filled with existential remorse. Either that or it’s a tough puzzle or I’m stupid.
At 46A, the clue was “Prepared students specifically for material on standardized exams,” and the answer was TAUGHT TO THE TEST. Gary again: Back when I taught high school, we taught sophomores an essay format to pass the high school competency exam. Then, in 11th grade I had to unteach them that so they could write like normal human beings. I will bet if I asked most of them today to write an essay as 50-year-old adults, most of them would begin the second sentence with, “First, …”
The NY Times is not known for humor or sarcasm in its headlines, but how else to read “Zelensky Resists U.S. Mineral Deal.” Trump’s offer is hysterical. In exchange for the $180 billion in aid the U.S. transferred to Ukraine, they would agree to pay us back $500 billion by giving us 50% of their income from natural resources. $500 billion is more than twice what Ukraine’s economic output was in 2021 (before the war). Z said it would take ten generations of Ukrainians, or 250 years, to pay off the $500 billion. And that’s just for past aid we gave them which they are under no obligation to repay. For every dollar in future aid, they will owe us an additional $2. As Z noted, that’s a 100% interest rate. In return they get no security guarantees (not that any by Trump would mean anything). Here’s the punchline: Trump says once the U.S. has such a big stake in Ukraine (by screwing them with this “deal”), Putin wouldn’t dare attack them. Even our Phil, who spends every waking moment drinking, says “Olena didn’t marry an idiot.”
Stuart Davidson of the DMC(UK) sent me running to the dictionary with this post.
Tonight I went to the gym for the first time since my orchidectomy in September last year. I’ve gained almost 2 stone since the procedure.
Motivation to do anything has been lacking ever since. So tonight was the night I was going to change that. I pulled up in the car park, watched a laughing crowd of young muscular, athletic youths enter and thought sod it. Turned the car around and got a kebab instead. Perhaps next week.
*******
I had to look up “orchidectomy,” which I thought meant orchid removal, which makes no sense. It means removal of a testicle (or two — maximum two).
Here are some of the duller of the 75 comments:
John Scotland: A damn’ good walk in the hills will provide at least as much benefit, and you won’t see the athletic muscular young posers who probably still haven’t left home…
Stephen Arthur: That’s a good work out. The young ones only use the machines to sit on them for hours looking at their phones anyway
Kirkers SJ: Baby steps.
Chris Halliday: Gained 2 stone. I laughed out loud to that; bloody brilliant.
I was in my thirties when Caity was born, and then Sam. So I set aside my years and started counting theirs. You know, diapers, kindergarten, el-hi, college. And when all that finished I let go of their years and went back to mine. I think some part of me went through it like this:
I’m back.
Ok, but you’re in your fifties now.
Wait, what? Why? No! Thirties, forty tops!
But you’ve been gone for twenty years. Do the math, Einstein: 35 + 20.
No! Those twenty were their years, I’m coming back to my years — I’m still in my thirties! No way that’s fair!
Fair? You expected fair?
This poem by Dennis O’Driscoll is called “Time Enough.” It was in today’s Writer’s Almanac.
The tally of years
added up so rapidly
it appeared I had
been short-changed,
tricked by sleight
of hand, fallen victim
to false bookkeeping.
Yet when I checked
my records, each
and every year had
been accounted for,
down to the last day,
and could be audited
against old diary entries
(client briefings,
dental check-ups,
parent-teacher meetings,
wedding anniversaries),
verified with credit
card statements
(multi-trip insurance,
antibiotics, concert bookings,
mobile top-ups).
And, although
nagging doubts
remained—an
inkling that I had
been ripped off
in some way,
given short shrift,
made to live at an
accelerated pace,
rushed through
my routines with
unseemly haste—
nothing could be proved,
no hard and fast
statistics adduced.
I had, it seems,
unknown to me,
been living my
life to the full.
OK, chatterheads, we’ve all had enough nonsense for the day. I’m going to crawl into bed now, stay away from the news, and see if there’s some Spring baseball on TV to watch. See you tomorrow!
The Wellington Files 