Ga-rrett Rod-ri-guez has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A

The other day I got myself some bologna. I love the stuff. I am sure it is bad for me and I never buy it. I even got this bologna for free. It makes some darn good sandwiches. Easy ones too. Just mayonnaise, mustard, cheese, and bologna. No need to try and elevate the stature of a bologna sandwich so just leave out the lettuce, tomatoes or any other attempt at healthy. Remember that anything multiplied by zero is always zero. No need for real cheese either. I had Tillamook Cheddar but I made a special trip to the store just to pick up a pack of prepackaged plastic cheese. You know the kind I mean. Nothing looks better surrounding a slice of this delicate mystery meat than two slices of uniformly cut flimsy American Cheese.

Bologna tries so hard not to get left behind at the kid table of the meat family with the hot dogs, spams, and other composite meats. Hot Dogs have found a niche as a party food and there are even rumors circulating about some respectable "gourmet" versions. They are easily the closest to graduating to the adult table. Yet hot dogs cannot be served cold much unlike bologna. Fry a slice of bologna up and it becomes an entirely different animal. This is where the versatility of this pink slice of heaven becomes evident. Even Steak, the big daddy of all meats doesn't compliment an egg in a tortilla better. Pig in a blanket? Wrap some ghetto steak around mashed potatoes and you are all set. Bologna tries even harder to differentiate itself from that bastard cousin of the meat family Spam.Where Spam even has a composite name bologna goes so far as to have a fancy spelling which many have likened in trickiness to "hord'ver" but we all know the truth. You can take the trash out of the trailer but you cant take the trailer out of the trash. To prevent anyone from serving this mystery meat as a finger food and making it respectable we have come up with spellings to put bologna back in its place. Boloney. Baloney. Anyway you spell it, anyway you say it, bologna is baloney, is boloney. I won't admit I eat it in public.I won't serve it to guests. I won't buy it in public. But I'll always have a special place for it in my heart. Figuratively and literally; right next to the deposits from this morning's bacon. Mmmmmm.