Post a blog a few days ago titled Pier Pressure after a WSJ book review and you're further confronted with evidence that the world is connected by unseen on-off ramps.
Pier Pressure is of course the play on words the Journal used to headline its review of a book about the piers, the Irish mob, and the Code of Silence. So why should I be surprised today at lunch when I see a small white truck turning on 26th Street that carries the logo of a fish inside a circle?
The name around the circle is PIERLESS FISH CORP. There are no other markings. No street address, no telephone number, nothing else.
So, what are Pierless fish? Artificial fish? Farm fish? Seafood that Norm Peterson from Cheers had at a franchise restaurant when he ordered the "lubestar," some kind of contrived concoction meant to be surf and turf? Norm apparently couldn't afford to eat at Melville's, the restaurant above the bar.
Come to think of it, the truck turned on 26th Street, hard by the fairly inconspicuous plaque that marks where Herman Melville's home once was. It would be great to make this stuff up, but the truth is way more fun.
A little Web research revealed Pierless is in Brooklyn, at an address that I suspect puts it in an industrial park that was once the old Brooklyn Navy Yard, where my father once worked. There is no real Web site from the company itself, but rather information from a business site that informs us that Pierless has 20-49 employees and does $20-$50 million is sales. Holy mackeral. I've never seen their truck before.
Signs and lettering are things I seem to notice. Like the time I noticed a George Stiel oyster truck as the first thing that caught my eye after returning to the city and work after two weeks on Cape Cod, a good portion of which was spent shellfishing in Wellfleet for clams and oysters.
Maybe Dan Brown's right, and there are symbols all around us. Mine seem to be on seafood trucks.
http://www.onofframp.blogspot.com/
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