Return of the Lunch

Ok, four weeks after the fact, here is the final part of my Albuquerque lunch trilogy. My Return of the Jedi, to be followed in twenty years by a really shitty "prequel" about my breakfast in Durango back in '98 when I was annoyed by a little smart-ass kid, a large bug and an Ebonics-spouting swamp dweller.
Pulling out of the parking lot, I immediately take a wrong turn and spend the next few minutes taking a very un-scenic tour of some of the back streets around the Old Town area. Later research revealed that these streets were designed in the late 1700s by a blind Spaniard riding a drunk mule. Upon discovering Central Ave., I stuck a little American flag in it and turned right.
In between downtown and Old Town, or Down Town and oldtown, there is a little place called the Dog House, that serves the best danged ol' chili dawg I've ever had. Not at all hungry, but unable to avoid stopping at a place that looks like a Tastee Freez painted yellow and converted to hot dogs, I pull into the lot and spend the next few minutes standing in front of what appears to be a window for ordering before I try to walk through the door to the kitchen and finally find the right door and enter the restaurant (the right door is the one to the left).
Inside there are a handful of tables and a short counter (yes!) where I sit and order a 6" chili dog with mustard, cheese and onion, and a lemonade for under four bucks. The dogs are split and a cooked to a nicely caramelized crispness on a flattop, the buns are toasted, and the whole thing is then covered in a spicy stew of what tastes like our own New Mexico red chile mixed with thin canned chili, yellow mustard and nacho cheese…in short, it's flippin' delicious.