I was taking orders at a pizza place. I told the customer the price, including the delivery charge.

Customer: “I’m not going to pay a delivery charge! I live so close to your store!”

Me: “Every order for delivery automatically has the delivery charge applied.”

Customer: “I’m not paying for delivery.”

Me: “Would you like to pick up your pizza instead?”

There was a short pause.

Customer: “I don’t like your attitude. Let me talk to your manager.”

I cheerfully handed the phone over to the owner, a cheapskate who would definitely charge her for delivery, and left on another delivery.

When I was a kid, my mom blew up dinner one night. (Even with the good Pyrex, never leave it on the stove empty and turn on the burner directly under it.) So, we went out to an interesting mom-and-pop pizza place in town.

Being the small kid I was, I ordered a pizza with extra cheese. But not just extra cheese — extra, extra, extra, enough to ski jump off of amounts of cheese. My parents rolled their eyes and the waitress laughed, writing down “extra cheese”.

We all expected a normal “extra cheese” pizza to come out. But the cooks that night were in a good mood and decided to tease the kid a little. What came out was about 90% cheese with a little crust somewhere under the pile.

Waitress: *Laughing* “If this is too overboard, I’ll take it back and get a regular ‘extra cheese’ one for you.”

Me: “No way!”

I happily started to dig in. I think I had a two-day stomachache after, but it was still so worth it.

The little shop was great. They had a woman who would come in once a week and make their sauce from scratch. My only complaint was she tended to use chilis in the sauce, which gave it a slightly spicy kick. Adult me would love it, but kid me was averse to anything spicy.

I work in a gas station. A bunch of little kids are outside pooling money together near the gas pumps where I am working. The gas station also sells pizza. I overhear that they’re buying slices of pizza, and they all agree to just use a pocket knife and eat a third of a piece each.

One kid needs some sort of part for his bike he’s been saving for and only needs another $20. He offers to buy everyone a piece if they try and get their parents to let him mow their yards for the money he needs.

I go in and grab a bunch of pizza, and they come in just as I am putting on the counter.

Me: “I saw you all trying to share your money.”

I leave $20 on the counter for the kid’s bike.

Me: “You get to divide it up and get your bike fixed because you offered to use your savings.”

I’ve never seen a happier group of kids. Since then, I try a few times a month or so to do something nice for someone.

About thirteen years later, I have moved on, but I swing into the same gas station as a customer to grab snacks for myself and some friends heading to the zoo. The Internet is apparently down all over town, so credit cards aren’t working, and we have almost no cash. I am pretty bummed, but stuff happens.

As I am putting stuff away, a guy offers to just pay for it all. When I politely decline, he starts laughing.

Guy: “Dude, you’re the guy!”

Me: “I’m what?”

Guy: “You’re the guy that bought us all pizza!”

It was the bike kid from years ago. He paid for the snacks, got his own, and followed us to the zoo on his motorcycle. He has a motorcycle shop now and has a spot out back where he gets junk bicycles donated to clean up and give away. He swears he’ll never have a vehicle with four wheels.

I guess he got his bike fixed. And now he has a pretty good life running a motorcycle shop and fixing/donating other kid’s bikes!

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Customer: “What’s the difference between the eight-inch and ten-inch pizza?”

Me: “It’s two inches wider and five dollars more.”

Customer: “Haha, very funny, smarta**. But seriously, what’s the difference?”

Me: *Using the pizza boxes to indicate this* “The diameter is two inches longer.”

Customer: “You think you’re real smart, don’t ya? You’re working in a pizza place, and I’m driving a BMW, so who’s smart now?”

Me: “Well, if I was being real smart, I’d use pi-r-squared…”

I quickly write up the equation on the chalkboard where we write out our specials, and I calculate the exact increase in the area of pizza they will be getting if they go for a ten-inch over an eight-inch. I then tell them.

Customer: “Why are you using all that math?! And I don’t want pie! I want pizza!”

He drove away in his BMW without a pizza. Or a pi.

I used to work in a family pizzeria owned by a father and son. We sold beer and wine, but we didn’t have a full bar. [Father] would buy a large number of beer mugs, pitchers, and wine glasses from his vendor in bulk and then wouldn’t need to place another order for several years, as a) alcohol wasn’t our biggest seller, and b) glasses didn’t actually get broken very often. This meant that when he did eventually place a new order, sometimes it was hard to find the EXACT same style, though they would always be the same size, i.e. 12 ounces, 16 ounces, etc. At some point, some of the old and new glasses got mixed in together, and the difference was really only noticeable if the glasses were side by side; the new glasses were slightly shorter but wider and still held the same amount of liquid. Same for the beer pitchers. 

We had this guy that always threw a fit. We “lovingly” referred to him as Beer Mug Guy. He would insist on keeping all of his finished glasses in front of him so he could harass the waitstaff and accuse us of trying to rip him off. He would roughly dump his beer from one glass to another, and when it would foam up, insist that it proved that the new glasses were smaller and we were trying to scam him. He would always laugh as he did so, making it a point not to look so aggressive that he got thrown out or cut off. 

One night, he came in with his family — a wife, a teen daughter, and a tween son. He proudly bragged to me that his daughter had just had a birthday and was old enough now to work. He insisted that I bring them an application for her to fill out so HE could get the employee discount “since we were trying to pull a fast one over him after all and he deserved the discount”. His daughter smugly smiled at me with an unspoken “My daddy said this is a done deal.”

I brought the paper application and a pen, and the teen filled it out while Beer Mug Guy went through his usual spiel about his mugs seeming smaller than usual.

At the end of the meal (and several beers later), BMG and his darling daughter came up to the counter to cash out. The daughter handed me the application, and they made sure to insist that it go “directly to the owner”. Neither owner was in at the time, so I placed the application in the inbox basket under the register so it would be seen by either owner. The daughter announced to me that she would need a size medium shirt and wouldn’t be able to start until after the local school holiday break was over. I rolled my eyes as she sashayed out the door with her family.

After they left, I told my coworker about the interaction and she gasped. 

Coworker: “Where’s the application now?!”

Me: “In [Father]’s inbox.”

[Coworker] ran over to the inbox and pulled the application off the top, immediately dropping it in the small trashcan a few inches away. Then, she turned and looked at me innocently.

Coworker: “Oops.”

Later, when [Son] came in, [Coworker] and I recounted the story to him. He shook his head and asked if [Father] had received the application yet. [Coworker] gestured to the trash can and casually mentioned that she might have “accidentally” dropped it in the wrong basket. 

Son: *Smirking* “Can’t hire someone if they never filled out an application!”

BMG came in a few more times before I left the restaurant business, but he never mentioned the application, and I never saw his daughter again.