Not the Name of the Rose

I've loved pizza for decades, ever since I was at Sydney University, which is next to suburbs that have large Italian and Greek populations, and some great pizzerias providing the traditional food of poor people in Italy. I'm also fond of a philosophical puzzle, so couldn't resist the title of an article that offered both.
(55 words for my lead in - excellent!).

In "The day I ordered pizza that 'doesn't exist'," Dany Webb (2015) describes how her initial confusion at her local pizza maker insisting that it was logically impossible to make a "marinara with mozzarella" because "It doesn't exist." With some helpful explanation from a sociologist friend, Webb finally understood that it was like asking for "a black coffee with milk."
(And only 60 words for this summary of my chosen article.)

No rose, a classic marinara pizza - yum! 

And right now I'm feeling hungry, even though I've just eaten a whole leg of kai yang from the friendly woman who has sold it from a stall in my soi for years, followed by some bread and my large evening coffee. Happily, the original Scoozi pizza restaurant is just a short walk from my home if I'm still in need of pizza after I finish this blog post. Sometimes when I'm there with friends, we also pop into the Scoozi branch at Paragon. I'm not being paid by Scoozi, I just think their pizzas are way better than the dubious products at Pizza Hut and like - it's like comparing tasty kai yang from my street vendor to the tasteless muck at KFC.

But not even Scoozi can compare with some of the pizzerias in Sydney and in my hometown area in northern New South Wales. My ancestors, as you might have guessed from my last name, were Italian. They were the first Europeans to settle that part of Australia, around the Lismore area, about 130 years ago, and along with grape vines for making wine, they also brought their other culinary culture, including pizza. When I go home for my annual visit to the family during Songkran, our first stop after my brother or a sister pick me up at the local airport is to have dinner at one of the local pizzerias. I think this might be one reason my youngest sister's four kids are so eager for her to be the one who picks me up.

On the other topic that originally got my interest: we have already seen in some of our class discussions how important it is to clarify what the words we are using mean, and this is not always easy. So far, we've had to work on our understanding of the word conclusion, and that has involved not only giving a dictionary type of definition, but also explaining why a particular misunderstanding is so very common. And I'm sure that next week will bring as some more discussion where we need to focus on getting clear exactly what a word means, and does not mean.

But now, the pizza still calls.
(369 words - that's fine for the response part. It's more than 300.)

__________

Reference

Mitzman, D. (2015, August 5). The day I ordered pizza that 'doesn't exist'. BBC News. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33542392