Because yesterday (well, this morning actually) I talked about drinking too much, this evening I should talk about one of the immediate consequences of drinking too much: eating pizza.

Once, a couple hundred years ago, after I started at K-State, I tried eating Swannie’s donuts after drinking. I never made that mistake again. Sweet and beer go together like raisins and grated carrots. Since then I’ve been a pizza man.

Now, there are countries where people get drunk and eat bowls of ramen or other types of noodle soup or go out for a curry. But those places, and the people in them, are evil and have no souls.

For me, the place to go after bars closed was Falsetto’s pizza in Aggieville. The pizza was greasy and the people in line of questionable character (i.e. my fraternity brothers) and no one ate there when they were sober. In fact, I’m the only person I know who ate there while sober and there are still people who don’t believe me. As for the pizza, let’s just say it lost something in sobriety.

The snobbish and soulless opted for Pyramid pizza, which was mostly famous for it’s thick crust and side order of honey. (See previous comment about “sweet and beer”.) Pyramid was sober pizza. It was not acceptable to eat it at closing time. If your only option was Pyramid, you should opt for a Red Barron pizza toasted at home or Frito Pie from 7-11.

That said, I’ve eaten pizza in several countries on three continents in two hemispheres and I’ve been shocked by the endless abominations offered as “pizza” by otherwise civilized countries. Italy was decent but never order “pepperoni” as you get “peperoni” and lots of peppers, not salami. I still pine for a slice of veggie pizza at the Shawarma Orient in London but, at the time, all they had was veggie pizza (more on that later). Albania and Greece had truly gruesome concoctions involving single, whole eggs cracked in random locations on the pizza.

Japan, however, excels at ruining pizza. Flaked tuna and mayonnaise are popular toppings and corn is a must have. Tonight, to celebrate my last day of classes (it’s all preparation now) we ordered pizza from a nearby Pizza Hut. We opted NOT to eat Teriyaki Chicken, or Seafood Mix or Potato Gratin and instead chose the only appropriate toppings for pizza: tomato sauce, cheese and dead animal flesh in the form of sausage, hamburger or bacon.

This wouldn’t bother me so much except I worked at The Scheme in Salina for one summer before heading off to Japan. I therefore consider myself a professional pizza chef. (I do and I was paid to do it so shut up.) Here in Japan, I tried to teach my adult students in Nou-Machi to make pizza properly, but realized I’d failed when some admitted to slipping squid or octopus on a pie when they were cooking at home.

Finally, I’ve tried to teach my girls the importance of saving energy by eating leftover pizza cold. Oddly, this has met resistance. In fact, many Japanese tell me how gross the idea of eating cold pizza is, right before they eat rotting beans on rice.

Clearly, I still have a lot of work to do.