Sonoran Hot Dog! The Primanti's of south east Arizona

While visiting my friend Marissa in Tucson, AZ, I had the pleasure of visiting El Guero Canelo, the home of the now-famous-via-the-food-network Sonoran Hot Dog.  The in-house promotional materials, and abundant pride and friendliness of this place reminded me of Pittsburgh eateries in many ways, not the least of which was their over-stuffed, overflowing hot dog which is akin to Primanti's sandwiches.

Below you will find nice homemade T-shirts and printed/laminated additional menu items behind the registers.  Not to mention 6 varieties of Agua Fresca, a delicious, natural juice-infused water beverage from Mexico.

I love these Mexican flag picnic benches.  

Here's the meal...

...and here's the Sonoran Hot Dog in all it's glory

Gotta love a place that offers sliced radishes in their condiment bar, and a hot dog that's named after the desert in which it is made.

xoxo, Tucson!

-Ms Pittsburgh

Bye Bye Jeff Reed

Today, the Steelers have officially cut Jeff Reed from their roster. 

In lieu of a photo post for this blog entry, I suggest you do a google image search for 'jeff reed'.  Anyone feeling ambivalent about the loss of our kicker of 9 years should be comforted by the results of this image search.

Its been fun, #3.  We bid you a fond farewell.

http://www.google.com/images?q=jeff+reed&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&ei=q9fiTMPGG4-WsgOG2bxm&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=4&ved=0CEgQsAQwAw&biw=1680&bih=855

Happy Halloween!

Thanks to Josh Bonnett for the photo!

POLAMALU+MOTÖRHEAD: REAL WORLD YINZ YANG in Colorado Springs

Ms. Pittsburgh has hit the road!  I am currently in Colorado, doing an artist residency, taking in the majestic Rocky Mountain sites, and experiencing the local Pittsburgh diaspora / Steelers Nation culture.  Today I visited Manitou Springs, a small mountain town just outside of Colorado Springs for the annual Emma Crawford Coffin Race.  The event was basically a big pre-Halloween whole-town party with more than a few great surprises.  After yelling "Go Steelers" to this fella on the sidewalk, he raised his #43 jersey to reveal the following real world Yinz Yang:

These were our real outfits!!!  Motörhead over Polamalu and Polamalu over Motörhead!!!!!!

YINZ YANG!

Sound of crash = sound of ca$h

Cha-ching!

The moment I heard the dull crashing sound of James Harrison's now infamous tackle of Mohammed Massaquoi, I thought/said "He's gonna get fined for that".   Not because I think it's right, just cause I know that's how the NFL rolls.  I know of no other institution that fines its members for doing things that are legal and just thinking about a contradiction like that makes my head spin.  How's this guy supposed to play football?  How's anyone supposed to play defense anymore?  How can James Harrison simultaneously be paid and fined for doing the same thing?

Props to Hines Ward, the blocking-est receiver in the league, for coming out and acknowledging that some of the burden in this lies on the offensive players and that there's good and bad ways of taking tackles.  I don't know how any offensive player coming into the NHL from college is in anyway prepared for players like Harrison as there doesn't seem to be any defense in college football.  I genuinely hope that players will be coached to play in ways that protect themselves from major injury and the game from being watered down into a useless, boring puddle of fines and contradictions.

Pittsburgh Pirates: "HURTIN FEELINZ" since 1990somethin'

To the author of this window decal:

I'm not sure if this message is solely addressing the damage the Pirates have done to us over the last 18 years, but whatever the case, well done.

Yours,
Ms. Pittsburgh

Quotes from Big Ben's Big Day Back on 10/17/10

Hey everyone,

Sorry this is a bit late; I misplaced my camera for about a week with all my images for my posts.  Lets get to it now...

I figured all responsible parties would be doing their darnedest to make Big Ben look like an upright guy on the day of his big return to NFL play in the Steelers' Week 6 game against the Cleveland Brownies.

Did anyone else out there in TV land notice the overcompensation on part of the network in depicting B.B. as a resurrected hero?

Did anyone else notice that the commentators' reverent praise also had an unintended ulterior dimension of interpretation...?  As in the kind of innuendo that reminds of you of Ben's off-season follies rather than having you forget about them?

Here are the quotes that I managed to write down while watching the game:

"You ask what R brings to the this offense...how 'bout an explosive weapon"

"Ben's pump fake makes his receivers open and extends the play"

"He already has pushed it to the edge.  He continues to live on the edge."

"Talk about QBs being smart enough to say the play is over..."

"R is one of the best QBs in the NFL and his return makes the Steelers all the more dangerous"

"The slippery Roethlisberger" (after evading a pass rush)

After a incompletion thrown well over the head of Heinz Ward (the intended receiver), the commentators said that Heinz didn't move vertically enough, resulting in the incompletion.

After two consecutive bad passes the commentators comment on how consistent he is.

Best quote of the day came from R himself: "I have to learn to live to fight another day and not expose the ball".  Yep, that's Life 101 dude.