So the missus and I were in the HEB in Leander and my wife couldn't find the pork shoulder her trendy new recipe called for so I suggested she ask the butcher. She didn't want to but I insisted that's what they're there for. And why they have a button. So she pressed the button and a dude comes out. He's an old guy, a short guy and he's dressed like the scientist/surgeons in "The Re-Animator": full length coat, gloves, skull cap, facemask around his chin, glasses with lenses that look like the bottoms of Coke bottles. He's like, "What?.... uh... ma'am... Can I help you?" So my wife, being naturally cute, sweet and adorable takes about three minutes to shyly and coquettishly ask him if he has any pork shoulder by laying out the complete context of why she needs it, what's she's making, where she got the recipe, everything else that's in it and who told her about the recipe people. Dood is blinking and opening and closing his right hand this whole time like he wishes he had a meat clever.
Finally my wife finishes her delivery. Dude looks at her, looks at me and shakes his head like we had just asked him where HEB was. He audibly sighs and snorts simultaneous, pivots and strides. We're rushing to keep up.
He grabs a pork butt, hands it to my wife and says, "Here."
My wife looks at it, winces, sadly shakes her head and speaks very slowly like she's trying to trying to make friends with the Elephant Man, and says, "This says 'pork butt.' I need 'pork shoulder.'"
Butcher says, "It's the same thing."
We step backwards and simultaneously, we try to say, "uh... wait... uh..." but he's gone. He left right in front of us as we were stammering. The butcher had left the floor.
So we learned that. In the arbitrary anatomy of butchers there is no difference between a butt and shoulder.
