A.J. Antunes & Co.
Como Salsa para los Tacos: Pozole
Admiral Biscuit
Pozole leaned forward in his seat as the Ryder truck exited I-395 and merged onto route 64. He was riding shotgun; Ryder had made him hire a driver with the truck.
As a result, he’d been forced to get more truck than he wanted. Enterprise had vans available that would have been perfect, but Enterprise didn’t have drivers to rent, so he was stuck with a bright yellow box truck that rode like an old unsprung farm wagon.
Just across Bloomingdale Rd. was a Taco Bell, and he decided that on the way back he was going to have a victory taco or two. For now, he needed to stay focused on his mission.
He gazed out the window at the town going past. There were a few subdivisions, some more stores, and then warehouses clustered on either side of the road.
They made a right on Gary Avenue and then another right on Keyhoe Boulevard, and just on the other side of a swampy field was Antunes, a modern-looking white building.
Grace had gotten a copy of Taco Bell’s official equipment catalog, and they’d started tracking down manufacturers. A.J. Antunes was the provider of both the cup dispensing system, which the ponies didn’t care that much about, and the cheesemelters, which they did.
Once the driver had parked the box truck, Pozole opened the door and was about to jump out when he remembered he was sitting nearly two feet higher than he normally did in cars, so he stepped on the floor and then carefully on the fuel tank before hopping to the ground.
The front door of the building was easy enough to find; it was glass like most storefronts. He had been anticipating something more industrial, but then there was a railroad track right behind the building, which was something a big company that supplied machines to thousands of Taco Bells would need.
With the big windows, he’d expected there to be a showroom in the front, someplace where they could display the machines and potential customers could look through the windows at them if the factory was closed. Instead, they had a mostly-empty lobby and a woman sitting at a desk who he correctly deduced was a receptionist.
“Are you looking for somebody?” she asked as he approached.
“A salesperson, I suppose.” Pozole wasn’t entirely sure how humans tended to sell machines. The catalog that Grace had found suggested ordering the equipment through a computer, but they weren’t sure how that would work. Back in St. Louis, ponies were working on it; when he’d left the office they’d been upgrading their computer equipment, since it was becoming increasingly obvious that they needed more than what they had. “I want to buy a cheesemelter.”
“I see.”
“Model TBS-2X.”
“How many are you looking to purchase?”
Pozole frowned. “How many would I need?”
“That’s for you to decide, sir. We have different sales teams for single units or bulk purchases . . . are you planning to buy them by the dozen?”
“No, we won’t need that many.” Not at first.
“Very good, I’ll buzz Greg’s office.”
•••
It wasn’t long before Greg arrived and hesitated, something Pozole was accustomed to. Humans liked shaking hands when they met new people and they were never sure how to do that with a pony. He held out his foreleg and Greg gripped it lightly, then dropped it.
Pozole would have preferred a nuzzle, but most humans didn’t go for those on a first meeting.
Greg’s office wasn’t that far from the receptionist’s desk. His desk was cluttered with papers and pictures and there were several filing cabinets behind him which were painted to match the walls. The ones they had in their office were ugly, dented, mismatched old things, but they got the job done. Still, he’d be embarrassed if a guest who wasn’t working on the project set hoof in there.
“So you’re looking for a cheesemelter.”
“Yes, the TBS-2X.” Pozole wasn’t surprised that the receptionist had told Greg what he was after. It would keep things simple. “Just one for today, I think. We could get more later if we needed them, right?”
“Of course.”
“How much are they?”
Greg told him.
“I don’t have that many bits on me; would you prefer a check or a credit card?”
“We’ll accept either, but we don’t have any here right now,” Greg said. “This is our headquarters, we don’t warehouse equipment here.”
“So I can’t buy one?”
“No, you can . . . most of our customers usually order online or by phone and we have it delivered to their business. We could even ship it here, if you’d rather pick it up in person—er, sorry, that was force of habit.”
“How long does it take to get one?” Blacksmiths could take days or weeks to produce a piece to spec, depending on how many other orders they had in the queue before it. If it was complex, it might take months. Parts had to be forged, folded, fitted—it wasn’t a fast process, and human machines were several levels in complexity beyond anything ponies could produce yet. If they didn’t have any already made, he was going to be waiting a while for his cheesemelter. He’d assumed that Antunes was like all the big stores or even car dealerships that had lots of inventory available at all times.
“If you’re in the continental US, less than a week. We can overnight it, but that costs a lot more. They’re heavy units, and air freight isn’t cheap.”
“I wasn’t planning on spending a night in Carol Stream.” Pozole tapped his hoof on the chair, deep in thought. “I thought that we could load it up and drive back, that’s why I got a big box truck to carry it in. Otherwise I would have come in an Uber.”
Greg shook his head. “I don’t think that there’s much commercial equipment you’d be able to get by driving around and expecting someone to have it stock, not around here. Maybe used. If you need it today, you could try Pierce Equipment. They’re in Countryside, that’s about thirty miles southeast of us. If not, I could next-day a unit to you for a premium, or have it in a week or less with standard shipping. Where would we be shipping it to?”
“St. Louis,” he said.
“And you came all the way to Carol Stream? There must be restaurant supply houses there.”
“We thought it was best to get it direct from the manufacturer, that way we’d know we were getting a proper machine.” He paused. “Plus the service and repair manuals, those are very important.”
“Oh, I can just put those on a USB stick for you,” Greg said, and stuck a small stick in his computer. “Just let me check which warehouses have them in stock . . . mmm, okay, I can do two days on a unit to St. Louis via UPS, but it’s going to be about $150 shipping. Or we can get it shipped here for the same cost, if you’re planning on staying in town for a couple days.”
“You know, I was thinking,” Pozole said, “and if there’s a second unit there, I’d like to have two.” Odds were that the tech boffins were going to want to take it apart and see what was inside, and there’d be all sorts of friction between the chefs and the techs.
“Sure is.”
•••
After the deal was concluded, he shook Greg’s hand and got back into the Ryder truck. The driver was surprised that they were heading back with no cargo, but didn’t ask Pozole about it.
Even the expensive next-day shipping was cheaper than keeping the Ryder truck and driver, so Pozole reluctantly decided on that option. It would have been nice to have had his driver park the bright yellow box truck in front of their command center and triumphantly carry the cheesemelter in, but the only way that that would happen now was if he had the unit shipped to Carol Springs and then drove it, and what was the point of that? It would be more expensive.
The two of them did stop at Taco Bell for a meal, eating in the restaurant instead of the truck, since it wouldn’t fit through the drive-through and it wasn’t safe to eat while driving anyway.
•••
Pozole couldn’t get an airplane back on short notice, so he settled on taking Metra to Union Station and buying a ticket there. There weren’t any night trains; he’d have to wait for a morning train, and he considered riding back to O’Hare and seeing if he could get a morning flight but he was downtown already and didn’t fancy the idea of another trip out to the airport.
There was a Hilton only a few blocks away from the train station, and his room had a good view over the parks, Lake Michigan, and the busy Metra tracks which ran through a trench.
His room also came with a telephone, and while he could boot up his folding computer and type in a report like they preferred, the telephone was easier, because it was less than a dozen numbers to make a connection and then he could talk normally.
“S.C.S. Livery, how can I help?” A mare’s voice cheerfully answered.
“Are any of the bosses still in the office?” Time zones confused him and he was reasonably certain he was in the same one as St. Louis, but not entirely sure.
“Sweet Pepper is, would you like me to transfer your call?”
“Please.”
A moment later a groggy pegasus came on the line. “Yeah?”
“Hey, it’s Pozole.”
“Oh!” There was a moment of silence, then, “Did you get the cheesemelter?”
“Sort of. We found their headquarters, not a store, so they didn’t have any.” He gave her a brief rundown of his interaction with Greg. “I coulda maybe gone to Countryside and gotten one used, but I thought we’d be better off with a couple new ones, so they ought to arrive on a truck sometime on Wednesday.”
“Where’d you send it?”
“I—“ He frowned. “I should have sent it to Kansas City, but I thought of you first, so it’s going to St. Louis. So I guess sometime tomorrow you’re going to get a big heavy box that’s got a cheesemelter in it.”
“When are you going to be back?”
“Also sometime tomorrow. There’s an Amtrak train that leaves at 7 in the morning and gets there around noon, but they usually run late.”
“I’ve never understood that, they don’t have to stop for water or coal. Alright, I’ll let the rest of the team know.”
“Thanks.” Pozole hesitated before placing the receiver back on its base. He should have known to ship it to Kansas City, that was a mistake. Then again, maybe he’d get to take the package there himself, and he’d have his moment of triumph after all.
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Greg knew better than to ask why a pony wanted a commercial-grade cheesemelter. That way lay madness.
Interesting touch with the time zones. It does raise questions about how the rest of planet sees Celestia and Luna's duties. Of course, Equestria's moon appears to radiate darkness, so who knows how that solar system works?
In any case, that's another piece of the puzzle. Now the question is how long until the unicorns grab that flash drive to figure out the curse that makes you have to spin it around at least twice before it'll go in the slot.
So Pozole showed up where is Menudo? That is another soup made with hominy. Thanks now I want Menudo.
10436445 "Heritage" varieties of garden crops are making a come back in some places. Of course these would be the thinner skinned tomatoes and varieties not as well suited to the use of mechanical aids
A bit of nitpicking:
Missing space.
10446094
I'd like to point out that Discord's magic was involved in that. The fact that this did not happen in other instances of them being up at the same time indicates that the whole split-sky thing was entirely his doing.
Did Pozole work at the soup mines, previously?
At any rate, the cheese must flow.
*splat*
(Well, almost...)
The pones should start to distribute flies about human-pony-interaction, including an list of situations when nuzzling is appropriate.
...On second thought, better make a list when nuzzling is not appropriate; that's probably way easier (and shorter).
Nice as usual. :)
10446094
Obviously, to melt cheese. Or whatever, really. Greg’s a salesman, pony’s got bits--why worry about what Pozole’s gonna do with a cheesemelter or two?
There are a lot of questions about how their solar system works and it’s best not to think about them. I can tell you, living in this solar system, I sometimes got confused with time zones, ‘cause I used to go to Indiana now and again before they celebrated DST with the rest of us, so sometimes Indiana was an hour different and sometimes it wasn’t, and if you went all the way to Illinois sometimes it was the same time as Indiana and sometimes it wasn’t. Cell phones do change time zone eventually but not right away, and the car radio doesn’t. It’s very confusing.
Heh, ain’t that the truth.
10446104
Maybe y’all will see Menudo later, maybe not . . . no promises
10446162
Yeah, lots of heritage stuff is making its way back, not so much for commercial farming but for the hobbiest. And I think that’s a good thing; it keeps some varieties around that aren’t currently commercially viable, and of course in the future they might be promising, what with climate change and the drawbacks of monoculture and so on.
10446363
Correction made; thank you!
10446536
Probably not, but you never know. They do employ a lot of ponies.
Indeed it must.
EDIT:
<me, thinking>: has anybody put cheese in a chocolate fountain?
<YouTube>:
(these two were in one of the Taco Bell research vids I have, too)
10446624
Sort of the reverse of So You Want to go to Earth . . . they really ought to.
10446672
Thank you!
10447028 probably alot of crops in Equestria are heritage which would add more color to their food like purple potatoes..
Beyond Hot Wheels, and Taco Bell I'm sure they'll find other stuff to investigate and take home. How about Legos or Lincoln logs
10447031
Celestia help us if Changelings acquire Quesadilla technology!
P.S.
It could be funny if a pony spy worked a two-in-one TacoBell/PizzaHut or TacoBell/KFC, and started to have "mixed feelings" about his mission, with HQ not reacting well to his odd suggestions.
"He wants a Taco Bell that also serves pizza! MADNESS!!!"
"Now honey, he's at that age where ponies experiment with different foods."
"I won't have him sully the purity of Taco Bell with this deviance!"
10447172
Oh yeah, I’d assume so. In fact, there’s a very good chance that some farming families are known for their particular varieties, and guard their secrets closely.
Legos are a war crime, so that’s probably out. Lincoln Logs, maybe.
10447830
Yeah, they’d take out Twilight in an instant.
I’ve just now wondered . . . I used to work in a couple restaurants, and when we were bored we’d experiment with ingredients. Like, can you make a jalapeno milkshake? Turns out you can, and it actually tastes kinda decent (it’s cold then hot then cold again . . . ) You gotta figure at one of those two-in-ones employees are experimenting and combining foods. Taco Pizza? KFC burrito? The mind boggles.
10447830 10448618 LEGOs a war crime? Well Long John Silvers which is a part of Yum Brands and might go over well with Pegasi
10448635
Well, not always, but if you scatter them on the ground. . . .
I think that they’d be more discerning when it came to their fish . . . Long John Silver’s in one of those restaurants where I ate once, and vowed never again. Everything was covered in oil (including the dining room) and everything smelled like fish . . .
I could see them going for a better fish/seafood restaurant, though. Maybe Joe’s Crab Shack? Or some British fish and chips chain. . . .
10448655 They'd probably look at least and go from there
10448662
Well, they do have Grace at Yum! HQ, so that’s probably enough to give them the idea that they don’t want to imitate Long John Silver’s
10448655 After looking apparently while locally Long John Silver's is in the local KFC YUM brands sold off Long John Silver's and A&W a number of years ago.. Majority of LJSs are owned by the Franchisees now like 80%
10448680
Oh really? I didn’t know that. Or maybe I did and forgot, lol.
10448688
Knew about A&W but either didn't know or forgot about LJS
10448655
Long John Silvers is like a lot of other franchised fast-food outfits, really -- while in theory a nationally-franchised brand should be the same everywhere you go, in practice the quality can vary a lot depending on how tightly the local franchise owner(s) run their ship (so to speak) and how well the management keeps a rein on their employees. (And of course, what part of town you're located in.) The local LJS a couple of miles up the road from me is actually pretty good; certainly nothing like you describe your experience... There isn't another one near enough to me for comparison (the next-closest is way south of me in a part of town that I have no particular reason -- nor, frankly, desire -- to drive through), but I do see that franchise-management issue at work in the two Popeye's Chicken outfits near to me; one location (the closer of the two, alas) is always running out of things, the service is slow-to-nonexistent, and any to-go order is guaranteed to be missing at least one key item if you don't check it before you leave; the other, about a mile further away in the opposite direction, is consistently on the ball.
Granted, that does raise the question of why the corporate office doesn't keep closer tabs on their franchisees to make sure they're not tarnishing the brand, but I suppose they can only have so many resources to devote to that sort of thing compared to an international giant that's on virtually every street corner, like McDonalds or Starbucks...
"Kansas CIty" should be Kansas City.
There was another typo in this chapter, but my phone had to restart and I lost it. If I find it again I'll let you know.
10716939
Correction made; thank you!
10718371
Okay, some other fixes now that I'm at my computer and I can run it through Grammarly:
1. Route 64 should be capitalized.
2. "it was glass like most" should be "it was glass, like most".
3. You might consider changing "that’s about thirty miles southeast" to "which's about thirty miles southeast".
I still can't seem to find the error I saw when reading on my phone Wednesday, before it restarted itself. Oh well.