Pizzas and jokes

Pizza night
Last night was pizza night. For about 3 years now it has been the custom for people in my road to gather at the Bar du Pont once a week to socialise and exchange news and jokes. A man with a pizza van parks outside the bar and we buy our pizzas from him and drinks from the bar. From April/May to September we congregate on the terrace outside the bar but the rest of the time it's a question of pushing the tables together inside, dragging in tables and chairs from outside if necessary, and then putting our heads together. Since we started doing this, others in the village, not from my road, and René and Ahmelle, who now live outside the village, have joined in. There are normally about a dozen of us but it can be double that number.

Pizza night used to be on Friday, which made it a convenient end-of-week event. However, another pizza man, Roberto, appeared on a Monday and, by general consent, made decidedly better pizzas. So true to the French gastronomic tradition, pizza night was changed to when the food was better. So it's a beginning of week rather than an end of week event now.

Although pizzas are the standard fare, Roberto sometimes comes with galettes, gambas or moules- frîtes to provide some variety. He also occasionally (and generously) offers crêpes to finish off the meal. So the gastronomically inspired change has definitely been worthwhile.

How Mont Ventoux got it's name
There are two official versions of how Mt Ventoux got its name, which I won't go into here. However, when the jokes start flying on pizza night, René is always in the thick of it. He's one of the most humorous people I've ever met. So, of course, he had a version of how Mt Ventoux got it's name and it had nothing to do with either of the official ones. The story was as follows.
It is widely believed locally, on scant evidence, that Hannibal passed this way going to and from his foray into Italy. It certainly doesn't do the tourist trade any harm and several local places make reference to him. Anyway, according to René, on Hannibal's way back through this area, one of his troops, laden down with loot from the Italy campaign, made his way up Mt Ventoux. Hannibal had lots of troops named Abou but this one, certainly by the time he got up Mt Ventoux, was called Abou Desouffle. Having got to the top, he decided he was carrying far too much booty so he piled it all down on the ground and put up a notice “Vends tout”. And that's how Mt Ventoux got it's name.