Pizza.

Living in New York my entire life, I grew up believing that the way I referred to things was pretty much the same as how most people referred to things.

Boy was I wrong.

For example, I call a car a car. In Wisconsin, it’s a vehicle. And it’s mostly women that call it that. Every syllable is clearly enunciated, too — making the word resemble the sound made by a cat coughing up a hairball. Why would you want to take the extra time to call something a veh-ic-le, when you can just say “car.” Think of all the time you save sticking with the one syllable here.

I grew up calling Italian bread, Italian bread. In Wisconsin, it’s called a loaf! What the hell is that about? Don’t all breads start out as a “loaf” before you slice them up and make sandwiches and french toast with them? To me, a loaf is someone who doesn’t like to do stuff. Kind of like a bum, or a person with no ambition. But hey, what do I know?

Now, let’s talk about the thing that everybody has on top of their house. I call it a roof. Again, I find an alarming difference, this time in the pronunciation of what appears to be a simple word. In NY, we say roof, like “roooof.” Here in the frozen tundra that is Wisconsin, they say it more like “ruff.” What the heck is a ruff? Sounds like someone’s dog is barking if you ask me (which nobody did by the way).

This brings me to the biggest, worst and most ugly difference of all.

Now here’s the weird thing. In Wisconsin, they say pizza just like I did in New York. But what they call pizza tastes more like the cardboard box that NY pizza comes in! It smells familiar, like cheese and sauce and bread (or a loaf). But that is where the similarity ends.

Why-o-why does the pizza have to suck so bad out here?

There are varieties like pizza with potatoes and veggies on it. Just what America needs. Pizza with an extra starch. We’re not fat enough. Meat-lovers pizza has bacon, sausage, beef, ham and pepperoni. And it’s guaranteed to clog your arteries! And then there’s the mid western classic — Cheeseburger Pizza. Now there’s an image that makes me want to yack! But I’m afraid to because somebody might want to make “Cheeseburger & Yack” pizza! 

At least a loaf still tastes like bread, even though they call it the wrong thing. But the pizza? Somebody needs to hold a seminar or something to help them get it right. Big money making opportunity for you pizza makers in NY.

My final quibble concerns the potato. Where I’m from, a potato is part of a meal. A side accessory so to speak – the starch part (remember, it’s not a vegetable). It is usually served with a topping (like butter or sour cream), next to a piece of MEAT and a healthy portion of VEGETABLES (the darker the color, the more healthy).

But here in Wisconsin, the dairy state, a potato is a meal in and of itself.  Top it with enough crap and people go crazy like it’s a four-course dinner! Here, they just lump everything into it – cheese, meat, veggies, a ground up tire from their ve-hi-cle… WHATEVER THEY CAN FIND! And they call it a meal.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Wisconsin. Especially the days when I don’t have to leave the house. But this stuff just bothers me.

And remember, you are not alone…