TONY CAPUTO’S MARKET & DELI – Salt Lake City, Utah
Most of us know someone like Lucy Van Pelt, the irascible, bossy, highly opinionated diva in the syndicated Peanuts comic strip. Since her debut in 1952, Lucy has been the perpetrator of two long-running gags. One involves her holding the football (ostensibly so that Charlie Brown can kick a field goal or extra point) and pulling the ball away because she doesn’t want Charlie Brown to get it dirty. The second gag parodies the lemonade stand operated by many young children under spacious skies. Instead of a lemonade stand, she operates a psychiatric booth where she offers advice and psychoanalysis for a nickel. The “advice” is often worthless though on occasion, she actually dispenses a pearl of wisdom. Lucy Van Pelt has nothing on Tony Caputo and his friends in Salt Lake City. Every Saturday morning for years, Tony and his friends, seven sagacious septuagenarians, would meet at Tony’s eponymous deli where they’d solve all the world’s ills. To amp up excitement in their lives, they decided to share their wisdom with people in dire need. Caputo got a booth at the nearby farmers market where the seven could dispense their counsel. He put up a large banner…