dazed and confused

I ordered dinner from the Chinese restaurant that is around the corner from my house. Mrs. Pincus and I have been ordering food from this restaurant on a semi-regular basis for many many years. It's gotten to the point where I walk in and the nice young lady behind the counter says, "You're getting the all-vegetarian order, right?" when she sees me.

So, approximately thirty minutes after I placed my order, I hopped in my car and drove over to the restaurant to pick it up. When I walked though the entrance, the small area in front of the counter was filled with a group of people — which is actually a rarity. For years, I have always been the only person picking up an order, although there are usually five or six neatly packed bags, perfectly lined up on the counter, waiting for a hungry patron — one that I never see — to bring it on home. This particular day, the compact "lobby area" was alive with anxious energy.

The group was comprised of two older women (and by "older," I, of course mean "of  my own age") and two young ladies, perhaps in their late teens or early twenties. (Once you reach my age, people are either "older" or "kids.") The foursome were very busily and very intensely perusing a now-unfolded paper take-out menu. Based on their conversation (which because of my close proximity, I heard every single word), I quickly surmised that these folks had never set foot in a restaurant in their lives and they were completely baffled as to how the ordering process works. The young woman behind the counter was overly and commendably patient as she tried to gently coax a cohesive order out of these... these... um... people. The two women ordered first — hesitantly — stumbling over nearly every word in their brief directive. The two young ladies squinted their eyes and screwed up their faces as they, apparently read words they had never before encountered. Finally, one of the girls announced, "I want chicken and rice."

I have been to countless Chinese restaurants in my life, both pre-vegetarian diet and post. I know, as I'm sure you do too, most neighborhood Chinese restaurants offer — pretty much — the same things, save for maybe three or four "specialties of the house," which are often just a re-working of some other item on the menu. I know — for a fact — that "chicken and rice" is not a standard entrée on any Chinese restaurant menu. A Mexican restaurant's menu, perhaps, or the punchline to a sequence on an episode of I Love Lucy, where the irrepressible redhead is clueless on how to prepare "arroz con pollo" for her Cuban-born husband. But on a Chinese restaurant menu...? Oh, no sir-ee.

The young woman behind the counter tried to clarify the order, as the girl was offering no further explanation. 

"Do you want chicken fried rice?," she asked, as she pointed to the words on the menu. The girl made no attempt to look where she was pointing, instead, she directed her attention to one of the women and repeated "chicken and rice." This time, the tone of her voice grew angrier and more impatient. One of the women asked "Is the fried rice made with white rice?" You and I and every one in the Chinese food-eating world knows that fried rice comes out brown no matter what color it starts out as. We also know that if this girl has her heart set on "chicken and rice" that she ain't gonna be satisfied with anything that doesn't look like the picture of "chicken and rice" she has in her mind — even though she really has not described what exactly she envisions. The young woman behind the counter named all of the components of "chicken fried rice" and the girl frowned at the mention of each ingredient.

One of the women took the menu in her hands and gave it the ol' "once over." She pointed to a photo of chicken with broccoli listed under the heading of "CHICKEN." "Is this what you want? Chicken with broccoli over white rice?," she asked. The girl grit her teeth, now getting very annoyed by the additional questions. She finally spat out, "Yes! That's what I was saying!" Her words were filled with vitriol and she stomped her foot hard on the carpeted floor and folded her arms across her chest in a final gesture of "This conversation is over!" By the way, this was the very first time that the concept of "broccoli" was introduced into the ordering process.

I skirted the foursome and paid for my order. I was not planning to be there when the wrong configuration of "chicken and rice" emerged from the kitchen.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

first time

For those of you outside the Philadelphia area, Wawa is a chain of convenience stores that, more recently, have focused on their sandwich, coffee and take-out foods business. With very few exceptions, most Philadelphians love Wawa and visit them often.

There are at least nine thousand Wawas within five minutes of the place where I work. Several times a month, I will stop at one of them to pick up hoagies for Mrs. Pincus and myself. (That might be the most Philadelphia sentence I've ever written!) Last Monday was one of those times.

I usually choose the Wawa at Route 73 and Remington Avenue, just down the street from Pennsauken High School (home of the still politically-incorrect "Indians"). A few years ago, Wawa introduced a convenient touchscreen system to make ordering sandwiches, salads and other prepared foods a breeze. The system is great. It's fast, accurate and requires little-to-no interaction with any other human being. Each step in the ordering process is given its own screen from which a hungry customer can select the type of sandwich, the type of bread, the type of ingredients, the type of toppings and even the amount of said toppings. (Although, the choice of "a little bit of mayonnaise" is still totally subjectable, leaving the customer at the mercy of a hair-netted, name-tagged, minimum-wage earner.) When the order process is completed, a little box spits out a barcoded receipt. The customer takes the receipt to the cashier to scan. The customer pays and returns to the order area to pick up the tightly wrapped sandwich, usually ready and waiting. Regular customers of Wawa are used to the whole procedure and engage in it often. I know I do.

The whole touchscreen system is very intuitive, even for the most technology-fearing customer. This past Monday, while I punched out my selection for two hoagies, I overheard a guy at another touchscreen terminal. Actually, everybody in the place overheard this guy. He was screaming. 

I have noticed that people who insist on talking on their phones everywhere they go, love to scream. They have no issues with discussing personal issues — at top volume — while casually walking down the street, sitting on a bus, standing in a checkout line at Target or just about any public place. Well, this guy in Wawa was screaming into his phone. As the conversation unfolded, it became clear that he was ordering hoagies for someone who had never eaten a hoagie before. It was not clear (but it was a distinct possibility) if the person on the other end of the conversation had ever seen a hoagie. Perhaps these two — the guy at Wawa and his unseen conversation partner — were new to the area. Perhaps they just moved here and were unfamiliar with the local delicacy known as "the hoagie" and how Philadelphians place it in the same esteem as soft pretzels, "wooder oice" and — yes! — Benjamin Franklin and the "Liverty Bell." I would have given this pair the benefit of the doubt — except the guy was sporting a Phillies cap and an Eagles "Super Bowl Champions" t-shirt.

The conversation went a little like this...

GUY IN WAWA: What size hoagie do you want?

VOICE ON PHONE: Size? What do you mean "size?"

GIW: Size! Six inch? Ten inch?

VOP: Well, how big is the ten inch?

GIW(rolls his eyes and stares at the phone): TEN INCHES! Y'KNOW... LIKE TEN INCHES LONG! Y'KNOW BIG!

VOP: Um, then, six inches, I guess.

GIW: What kind of hoagie do you want?

VOP: Well, what kinds do they have? Do they have chicken salad?

GIW: They have the regular kind that everybody has.

VOP: Do they have Italian? Can I get an Italian, but with chicken salad?

GIW: What? No, they don't have chicken salad! You just want an Italian hoagie, then?

VOP: Well, what's on an Italian hoagie?

GIW: I don't know! I guess the regular stuff that's on an Italian hoagie anywhere!

VOP: Do they have cheese? Can I get cheese? Do they have Swiss cheese? Can I get Swiss cheese on my Italian hoagie? You say they don't have chicken salad? I really wanted an Italian chicken salad hoagie.

At this point, the GIW walks — no! stomps! — away from the touchscreen area and ducks down one of the merchandise aisles. After a minute or so, he emerges, still speaking into his phone at the very top of his voice.

GIW: ... you can can get lettuce, if you want. Yes, and tomatoes. What? No, they don't have chicken salad.

The number on my receipt was called and my hoagies were ready. I picked them up and left.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

oh, oh domino

 Oh jeez.... another blog post about pizza? 

Since I began this blog, I have written exclusively about pizza eight times and mentioned pizza too many times to count. Well, whether you like it or not, here is another tale/rant about pizza, which now, I suppose, has revealed itself to be a favorite topic of mine. Right up there with television. When I was a kid, my dad was convinced that the only food I ate was pizza. I'm not sure if this was some kind of "diss" in his mind, but I do not recall ever seeing my father consume a single slice of pizza. Ever. I don't know if he was truly expressing concern for my questionable eating habits or if he was just repeating one of those "I'll never understand these kids today" fallacies that seem to attach themselves to generation after generation.

I like pizza. I have always liked pizza. And, as I have mentioned previously, I am not very discerning when it comes to pizza. I firmly believe that there is no such thing as "bad pizza." Recently, a less-than-pleasant experience at a conveniently-located and frequently-visited Little Caesar's Pizza forced me to seek another purveyor of pizza close to my home. While this new place — which has been open since 1966 —  is a little closer to my house than Little Caesar's and serves up a decent enough pizza, their prices are ridiculous for a little neighborhood pizza joint. A basic 18" circle of dough with a generous spread of tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese runs a little over twenty bucks. I don't know if this is the going rate for pizzas at independent establishments, but, to be honest (or at least "out of the loop"), most chain pizza places are constantly in a price war. I guess the idea is: if it's cheap, you don't mind the shitty quality... and, again, there is no such thing as "bad pizza," so a twenty dollar pizza should be — by my nonsensical logic — be spectacular. 

Recently, in my search for a new place to get a quick pizza when the back-and-forth debate over "well, what do you want for dinner?" rears its famished head, I have relented and gave our nearby Domino's a redeeming chance. I haven't been to Domino's since my son was in high school and we'd get pizza on a Friday night when my wife was working late at her family's store. (My son is now 37 and my wife's family's business has been closed for nearly two decades.) It wasn't that I had anything against Domino's, it's just we found good "bad" pizza elsewhere for cheaper. But, just this past weekend, Mrs. P and I decided to give Domino's  a call... except, as you probably already know... ordering a pizza doesn't work like that anymore. It's now done — like most automated, contact-free processes — online through an app.

I downloaded the Domino's app. I found it to be very user friendly and very easily navigable, although I did nearly order a pizza with no cheese until the intuitive app guided me back to the toppings section of my order. After I placed my order, paid with a credit card and received an emailed receipt and confirmation, the Domino's app sprang into action. When I signed up for an account, I was asked for my cellphone number. I assumed it was merely for identification purposes. Oh, no, no, no. I immediately received a text with something called "Domino's Tracker." The Domino's Tracker offered me real time, step-by-step progress of how my pizza was doing. It skipped the "Order Received" Level 1 and moved right ahead to the Level 2 "We're Firing it up!" This was exciting. As I readied a couple of paper plates and a stack of paper napkins before I set out on the eight-minute drive to Domino's, I was alerted that my prepared pizza had entered to oven, which is Level 3 on the Tracker. 

On my drive, my phone signaled me several more times. When I finally reached the tiny parking lot at my nearby Domino's, I parked and checked my phone before entering the store. My phone had logged three progress reports from Domino's, including a final request to let the good folks inside that I had arrived and was on my way in to collect my pizza. This could be easily accomplished by clicking a big red button that read "I'M ON MY WAY IN!" Simple enough! 

There was a huddle of workers behind the small counter inside Domino's. Some of the young men were busily assembling pizzas. Others were surveying a computer screen, searching for the correct order to stuff into their insulated bag and speed off to deliver to a hungry family or single stoned guy in his mother's basement. Upon spotting me walk in, a young man greeted me with a standard, "Can I help you?" I told him I was picking up an order for "Josh." He asked me to repeat my name while he scanned a stack of similar-looking boxes with receipts taped to their fronts. As I finished the "SH" in "Josh," he plopped a box into my hands and thanked me for choosing Domino's.

I brought the pizza home and Mrs P and I ate our dinner. It was fine. It was nothing special. It was just okay. During dinner, however, I received another text and two emails from Domino's. Over the course of last week, I received at least two emails per day — per day! — from Domino's. Each day brought a new offer or reminder or discount from the marketing staff at Domino's. I just needed to make one more order from Domino's to receive a free pizza said one email. Another email informed me of a free "emergency pizza" could be ordered from my local Domino's at any time, as long as that time occurred before November 21st. (Technically, isn't every pizza an "emergency pizza?") I am expecting a few more messages of enticement from Domino's any minute now.

So far, I have only placed the one order with Domino's. Who knows if and when I will place the next one. If my father was still with us, he'd probably say that order will be placed as soon as I finish writing this blog post. But he didn't know what a blog post was.

Pizza... that he knew.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

time has come today

I love Wawa. As a life-long resident of Philadelphia (and now the Philadelphia suburbs), I believe it is my duty as a citizen to love Wawa. Wawa has stores throughout the Greater Philadelphia and New Jersey area and have recently expanded to include locations operating in Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C., Florida, Alabama, and North Carolina — with its corporate sights set on Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, New York and Connecticut in the near future. If you don't live in one of these lucky states, let me explain what exactly Wawa is.

Wawa is the greatest convenience store there ever was. Wawa runs circles around places like 7-11 (except for Japanese 7-11s, which, by all accounts, rival Disneyland). Sure, Wawa sells a smattering of groceries for those who run out of something-or-other and need to fill in before their next supermarket run. Yeah, they sell pints of Ben & Jerry's ice cream for a little over eight bucks, but Wawa is not a grocery store. Wawa is Wawa! it's a place to stop for great coffee and a fresh packaged baked good on your way to work. It's a place to grab a pre-made sandwich or snack or salad or — better yet — get a custom-made sandwich or hoagie from their innovative (and intuitive) touchscreens. Over the years, since Wawa introduced the made-to-order system, they have branded themselves as the "go-to" place for quick-serve meals. It's become as "Philadelphia" as The Liberty Bell, chucking snowballs at Santa Claus and soft pretzels.... oh! and they have soft pretzels, too. Sure, there are a lot of people in Philadelphia that do not like Wawa — some of whom I know personally, but I still choose to remain friends with them. 

Wawa's hoagies are just fine, as far as I'm concerned. Granted, as a vegetarian, my choices are limited. I switch between a mixed cheese, tuna and roasted vegetables varieties — three choices that die-hard Philadelphia hoagie aficionados will tell you don't belong anywhere near a hoagie. I cannot speak on behalf of any of Wawa's "meat" variety of hoagies, so I will not pass any judgement. Their custom-made salads are good, too. Wawa has added a number of different sandwich options to their menu, including paninis, quesadillas (with customers readily pronouncing both "L"s in that word) and wraps. They have also bolstered their expanding menu with breakfast options like oatmeal and egg sandwiches. More recently, Wawa has begun to offer milkshakes, smoothies, and whipped cream topped coffee beverages that rival Starbucks. Plus, their "annual hoagiefest" seems to pop up way more than "annually."

A few months ago, Wawa introduced pizza to the Wawa stable of made-to-order fare with a campaign they mounted as though no one in the Philadelphia area had ever heard of pizza before. (Full disclosure: Aside from the various national pizza chains that dot the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia boasts a "Mom & Pop" pizza place approximately every fifteen feet.) Nevertheless, Wawa sang the assured praises of their pizza, flooding the area with billboards and commercials and plastering their stores with the simple mantra: "Wawa has pizza!" The phrase was ubiquitous. It grew to sound like a threat. It was apparent that Wawa spent a ton of money outfitting their stores with some sort of pizza oven (these were concealed "in the back" and out of customer's view) and training their minimum-wage employees in the fine art of the culinary preparation required to produce a pizza that Wawa would be proud to put its name on. (For a frame of reference, Wawa has no problem with feeding customers macaroni & cheese or soup out of an 80 ounce food service bag, so their sense of "pride" is questionable.) Needless to say, local pizzerias have nothing to fear.

Mrs. Pincus and I do not fancy ourselves as "food connoisseurs." We like what we like. We don't frequent pretentious restaurants. And we are fine with getting hoagies from Wawa a few times a week. It's convenient, relatively inexpensive and a stop on the way home from work only takes about twenty minutes. Our interest was piqued by Wawa's big pizza "roll out." So, when the good folks at Wawa offered one of their pizzas for five bucks (if ordered through their easy-to-navigate app), we were all in. Hey, I've eaten Little Caesar's pizza and I am convinced that there is no such thing as "bad pizza." So, five bucks was good enough for us to give it a try.

Wawa's pizza is okay. Just okay. It's kind of like the pizza you got in the cafeteria in elementary school. Not horrible. Not terrific, Just.... well.... okay. We ordered, and picked it up at a nearby Wawa. (We live in close proximity to four Wawas, all about the same distance from our house.) When we got it home and opened the box, it looked just like the pizza they display in their commercials. Perfect! Perfectly golden brown crust. Perfectly yellow-y cheese melted in a perfectly symmetrical circle equidistant all around from the crust, with a perfect border of red tomato sauce serving as a barrier/border between the cheese and the crust. It looked fake. I'm sure you've seen those videos of how they used food-like alternatives in commercials to showcase food products — like motor oil in place of pancake syrup or white school glue in place of milk in cereal or mashed potatoes (that won't melt under the studio lights) in place of scooped ice cream. Wawa's pizza appeared to be a reasonable facsimile of pizza. It tasted..... okay. Without the special deal, a Wawa pizza is fifteen dollars. I can get a larger, better tasting pizza for nineteen dollars just a few doors down from a Wawa near us.

Well, Wawa started offering us five bucks off the price of a pizza (when ordered through the app) nearly every weekend. So, I buckled and ordered on a Saturday evening. When the total was calculated, a full ten dollars was deducted from the price, leaving a final total of just five dollars. I selected the time I'd like my order to be ready from a list of times broken down in five minute increments. I also elected to have the pizza brought out to our car. I clicked and clicked and clicked and my order was placed. We arrived at Wawa #8080. We parked and — through the app — I let Wawa know in which numbered space we were parked. Several long minutes after our selected "ready" time, a Wawa employee emerged from the front doors carrying a large pizza box. He walked right past our car. My wife and I looked at each other. Mrs. P started the car and we slowly followed the guy with the pizza as though we were looking for an address on an unfamiliar street. He took our pizza on a little stroll and turned the corner of the building, headed back to the front door. Before he went back inside, Mrs. P called out, "Hey! Is that our pizza?" The guy adjusted his Wawa visor and asked, "Order for Josh?" Mrs. P replied in the affirmative and he handed over the pizza. We got it home and ate it. It was fine. Maybe a little overdone this time. Someone didn't read the training manual as closely as they should have.

In subsequent weeks, we began to order pizza from Wawa nearly every Saturday. We kept getting offers for five dollars off and they kept miscalculating the discount, leaving a grand total of five dollars. However, even after choosing a "ready" time in the app, I have had to wait at least twenty minutes for my order. Each time. Sometimes, I had to flag down an employee to check the status of my order. The employee's report of "it'll just be a few more minutes" was always punctuated with an apology. They seemed to be used to the question and accustomed to rendering apologies. After a few incidents of waiting too long for an "okay" pizza, I switched Wawas. 

I decided to give Wawa #8066 a chance, placing my "usual Saturday usual discount" order. I arrived a few minutes before my selected "ready" time. The sandwich makers were busy making sandwiches. Customers placed orders and picked up their orders as I waited. And waited. And waited. Finally, a Wawa employee started refilling shelves near where I was impatiently waiting. As he got closer to me, he asked, "How are you today sir?" in a very "customer-service-y" tone. I told him I was waiting for an order that should have been ready fifteen minutes ago. He aske for the order number and promised to check the status. He disappeared behind the sandwich prep area and quickly returned with a solemn look on his face. With the somber demeanor of a surgeon delivering adverse results to a grieving family in a hospital waiting room, he said, "They're remaking your order. It stuck to the pan and they weren't happy with the presentation. I'm sorry. It'll just be a few minutes." It was fifteen more minutes. Ultimately, he handed me a warm pizza box along with another apology. I wonder if "apologies" are the final chapter of the "How To Make A Wawa Pizza" instruction course. I brought the pizza home. It was fine. Maybe a little burnt in some places and the cheese was placed a little unevenly, but it was fine.

Once again, Saturday brought another pizza discount from Wawa. Mrs. P and I gave in to the offer. I would be giving Wawa #0276 an opportunity to redeem the good name of Wawa. I placed my order as I had in the past, selecting my "ready" time as 5:40 PM, giving me enough time to pick up my pizza and get it home before the 6:05 start of the evening's Phillies game. I arrived a few minutes ahead of 5:40 and waited. At 5:39 on the dot, a guy behind the counter stopped what he was doing and retreated to the unseen "back," returning with a pizza box a few seconds later. I approached the glass separating the customers from the workers and pointed to the pizza. At 5:40 exactly, he place the pizza box in my waiting hands. After a little trial and error, I think I found the correct Wawa.

This pizza was okay. Maybe a bit more overdone that it should have been. Maybe the cheese had shifted a bit to one side. Maybe the crust was a little dry in places and chewy in others. Maybe the slices were uneven and not cut all the way through.

Maybe Wawa pizza isn't really that great. Maybe it really isn't even that good.

But I do love Wawa. Just like Bryce Harper. I bet he doesn't have to wait for pizza. I bet he doesn't get pizza from Wawa.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com