Jeremiah's School of Levitation

So, the gods that be must've heard my rant about pizza being a racket, about how it's dreadfully overpriced, and generally just a mess someone made on a piece of dough, and instead of those gods getting their revenge by conspiring to make me into a pizza by cosmically directing me in front of a speeding bus, they instead did the love thang to make me eat my words, with Italian sausage and eggplant.

See, we ordered a pizza for delivery this weekend, a large, and I grumbled like a bad stomach. I, of course, made some reference to the pizza cartel, and how I was wondering if I could just make monthly payments on the pizza to help the impact to my budget. And, as usual, no one was paying attention to me.

So, finally, the knock came and I did the long-legged lurch to the door. You know, the one that kids do when you tell them they have to come in now, and they scrunch up their faces and start walking all straight-legged, stomping and leaning, their stride making them look like their knees have suddenly frozen up and they whine and whimper and say "Aw, do I hafta??" (I do that when my wife tells me to come away from the liquor cabinet, actually.)

Anyway, I open the door, my frown on tight, and the pizza guy is there, smiling, holding the rare and exhalted pizza, his limo humming behind him.

I didn't return the grin. I just reached for my wallet.

And, at that moment, I thought I heard angels.

"Oh, sir, no need to pay."

"Huh?" I said.

"This one's on us! See, every now then, we give our regular customers a free pizza. This time, your number came up! No charge!"

"Huh?" I said. I felt my heart, to make sure I was still alive and that this wasn't some scene from Sixth Sense and the pizza guy suddenly wasn't going to sprout fangs and tell me something like "I deliver to this GRAVEYARD every night! You must be new here!"

Nope, he just handed me the pizza, which was actually hot and real. I opened the lid and no snake jumped out and no one said anything about Pranks and Practical Jokes. This was really happening.

"All yours, sir!" said the pizza guy. "On us!" He lifted on his toes and grinned. "Yep. Free!"

"Dude," I said. "Sorry about the blog." I knew he wouldn't get it, and he didn't, but I had to say it, to appease the gods.

"The what?" he said.

"Nothing." Then, I realized why he wasn't leaving, and why his grin was so wide.

I finally did get my wallet, and pulled out a five spot for the guy.

"Thanks!" he said, and he sprinted off. And, actually, his car wasn't a limo at all, but an old Toyota Celica that normal, nice people drive. Hmm. Must've been the light...

So, there you go. I get in a huff about something, and I'm proven goofy, in a most humbling way. I'd like to think that pizza joints everywhere were whispering about my blog the day after I'd ranted and that the cartel decided that "we're going to have to show that Jeremiah fella that we're just trying to make a living. We gotta put some love, and free pepperoni, in his heart. Yeah!"

But, it probably didn't go that way, but it did end up nicely. So, though I don't take back what I said about the pizza mafia, I do have to say, "alright, well, maybe there's a bright side. Fine."

One other thing, though, I thought was funny. Since this pizza joint does this free pizza thing regularly, I bet the delivery folks get an especially good tip when they deliver the free pizza. So, I bet up at the pizza joint, this causes some, um, "healthy competition" to be the one who gets to deliver the free pizza. In fact, I think the competition is pretty brutal and vindictive because, just as the driver was pulling away from my house, his car exploded.

Just kidding.

Don't you just hate it when you get a good snit on and then life throws something unexpectedly nice at you? BAH!

I've had that happen twice, probably from that same company that gave you your freebie, as we live in the same area. I couldn't decide whether to be grateful, or embarrassed because i'm a regular.

C'mon! Are you sure you're not making this up? It's sort of counter karma. You throw some nasties out into the universe, and a goodie comes to balance it. If this was guaranteed to work, I'd hurl out nasties by the handful and wait for the goodies!

What pizza place??? FREE??? I'm all about pitchin' a fit for free 'za!

I found you through Susiebadoozie!

Your blog is great! You may have found yourself a new fan!

I agree completely, pizza is a racket! .....but I think it's really funny that you wrote that post then you got a free pizza! Bwa ha ah!

I dunno... I'd be skeptical about free 'za myself.

My guess is that they dropped it on the floor before they got it into the box and didn't want a lawsuit.

Lawsuits are just a nuisance for cartels, doncha know...

I used to work for a pizza joint in those parts when I was a youngin. I don't recall giving out free pizzas now and then, but we had the most delish pizzas around. Seriously. It was called Tony Maroni's. And I'm willing to bet Mr. Tony was part of some pizza cartel. Managers were always frantic and panicked when he came around.

Meno: The Wasted Snits was one of my favorite bands in high school.

Lucia: No make up. But, I think that you can actually complain your way to the top. Right, Andy Rooney?

Misty: Ahhh, hot wings! God, I love hot wings. They are singularly responsible for five pounds I gained one month.

Mona: Save up a real good fit and pitch it in front of a Honda dealership!

suzie: Hmm. Didn't think of that! Looks like I survived, but, someday, I would like to come out of the bathroom...

Mcbunni: Welcome to the meetings! I've actually read your blog, but have yet to comment, I think. Let's unite against pizza! Until we get hungry!

Sarah: Oh, yeah. Didn't think of that either. Now that I think of it, it was strangely crunchy...

Maggie: I think the pizza cartel was fixing our little league games, but I'm still gathering evidence...

catching up is hard to do....


oh, free pizza. Let the guilt begin... with peppers on the side!

Oh, won my iPod from Kaboodle. You rock my gravity-defying friend.