Bizarre delivery and takeout experiences

[LindsayAnn]

That's crazy! Someone stole your food?  Did you ever figure out who it was? I assume it's someone who lives in the building.

←

NO I never did figure out who it was...somebody really cheap,stingy and mean. Who steals someones much desired and awaited chinese food? MEANIES!

[Darcie B]

I delivered pizza for a short time during college in western Minnesota. Once I got pulled over for speeding and begged the cop to let me finish my delivery before he gave me the ticket because I was running behind. He followed me to the delivery, but didn't give me a ticket. Guess I won the award for most original excuse that night.

Same job, different occasion: We kept getting complaints from customers about the pizzas being messed up. Turns out one of the new delivery drivers was carrying the pizza bag on edge, thus allowing all the toppings to slide off the pizza. He never did get it and only lasted a couple of nights before he was fired. What a maroon!

One night a guy called and wanted a pizza delivered. It was the middle of a blizzard, the roads were closed, and we were in the process of closing up (luckily we all lived within walking distance of the store). We said, "if you can make it here, we'll make you a pizza." He said, "it's not possible to drive on my road." Then how the hell were we supposed to deliver a pizza to him?

Ever try keeping a pizza warm, even in the insulated bags (no electric bags then), in 20 degrees below zero?

Got a lot of free beer offers (always declined), party invitations, and, uh, other invitations (always declined those too) with that job. Lots of free pizza, too, natch - I don't get the guy who bought back a slice of pizza from a customer. Couldn't he wait the 10 minutes until he got back to the store??

[I_call_the_duck]

We came to refer to him as "the guy with the maniac laugh."

←

I have a cousin who does that. "Hi, Karen. Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh. How are you? Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh." We call him Elmer Fudd.

[jsmeeker]

That's crazy! Someone stole your food?  Did you ever figure out who it was? I assume it's someone who lives in the building.

←

NO I never did figure out who it was...somebody really cheap,stingy and mean. Who steals someones much desired and awaited chinese food? MEANIES!

←

at least they sent over another order and "supersized" it.

I don't really have any stories to share. I've actually NEVER ordered delivery to my apartment. Out here in suburbia, there really isn't much except pizza and some random Chinese places. Who knows if they are any good. Also, I always worry about them getting in the complex (the security gate calling system is very flaky), finding my place, etc. I fiugre if I want pizza and don't want to make it myself, I'll just go pick it up. There is good local place very close by.

Out in the office in L.A., there is a group of co-workers that would sometimes order in some Chinese for lunch. Always a crap shoot. They forget the drinks, bring the wrong type of soup, can't find the place (even after having delivered to us the previous day) etc. etc.

I'm just not much into delivery, I guess. But am enjoying the stories so far.

[Pan]

In the Dark Ages before Grand Sichuan St. Marks opened, there was a time when the now-defunct Mee Noodle House that was on 13th St. and 1st Av. was my standby Chinese delivery place. I was poorer in those days and usually tipped $1 for my $5.95 noodle soup then. The delivery men complained about that, and I think that's probably why I got rusty nails in my soup TWICE. I explained to the restaurant why I would never get delivery from them again, and I now tip at least $3 for delivery from Grand Sichuan St. Marks and Congee Village, my current standbys. The delivery guys are happy and my food is tasty and usually comes piping hot. I save a little of the wear and tear on my wallet and get more exercise by getting takeout more often.

[Nina C.]

My old apartment was a fifth-floor walkup so I would tip well. One delivery guy was an older man who looked surprised the first time I tipped him and after that, always wanted to hug me after I tipped him. It was awkward, to say the least, and soon I would only send my boyfriend to the door or order from a different place.

My worst delivery experience ever was from Five Spot in Brooklyn. It was my first and last time ordering from them. I had people over, we were hungry. After about an hour I called, wondering where the food was, and was told it was the next order to go out. We got to talking, I got distracted, all of a sudden I realized it had been an hour and fourty five minutes since we'd ordered. I called, and was told it was out with the delivery guy. I said "um, it's supposedly been ready for over 45 minutes. It's going to be cold when it gets here." and the guy insisted that no it wouldn't! they package the food very well. Well, when it finally arrived 2 1/2 hours after I had ordered, it was ICE cold, and two out of the four things we had ordered were wrong! I called the restaurant and was like "I'm not paying for this. It is aggregiously late, cold, and wrong. And you're not taking it out of the delivery guy's pay." we argued for a while, finally I told him I was a food writer and this shouldn't be the tactic he was taking, and he said fine and hung up. Imagine my surprise when at 1:30 in the morning, the police showed up at my door. He had called them and told them I had taken the food and not paid.

But fortunately, these are the few and far between stories.

[Badiane]

Imagine my surprise when at 1:30 in the morning, the police showed up at my door. He had called them and told them I had taken the food and not paid. 

←

The NYPD has time to investigate that kind of complaint? Gawd...must have been a painfully slow night!

[Kris]

We used to order from a Chinese place called Hunan K, until it closed without warning back in '02.

The delivery guy always came up the stairs (my apartment door is at the top of a flight of stairs) laughing. "Ha ha ha ha, hello how are you sir. Ha ha ha ha ha. Ten ninety five. Ha ha ha ha ha. Thank you very much have nice day. Ha ha ha ha ha." We came to refer to him as "the guy with the maniac laugh."

Once I was walking on Park Avenue and the guy with the maniac laugh rode past me on his bicycle. As soon as I registered in his consciousness, he slammed on his brakes. "Ha ha ha ha ha. Hello sir! Ha ha ha ha." And then he observed, with existential flair, "You on the street! Ha ha ha ha ha."

←

LMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is the funniest thing I've read/heard all day.

[Idlewild]

We order too much chinese from our local place.

So. A couple of weeks we tried eating healthier, ordering out less, you know. Eventually we give in. The lovely husband makes the call. I heard his end of it. He gave our address, then this:

"No, we haven't ordered in a while. Uhhh. I've been kind of busy."

I bust a gut laughing. It's a restaurant, not some girl he ditched without calling back. The delivery guy comes around with our food. I hear him at the front door talking to my husband:

"So, I hear you've been busy.

Oh dear lawd. We have the kind of relationship with our takeout place that they lay guilt trips on us? That can't be good!!

[Jason Perlow]

"So, I hear you've been busy.

Oh dear lawd. We have the kind of relationship with our takeout place that they lay guilt trips on us? That can't be good!!

Yeah, we're on first name basis with the owners of our local chinese takeout/delivery place as well. We actually go in there to eat sometimes, it has a few tables and frequently we end up playing with the owner's rambunctious five year old. We're at the point now where he is making off-menu customized stuff for us or he tells us what stuff he can make us with fresh stuff he gets in. If he hasn't seen me in a week, he gives me the "you travelling again?" speech too!

Edited July 30, 2006 by Jason Perlow (log)

[Dignan]

Since I often bought a bag of chips or something, I'll call it a takeout story, though it was essentially a Quik Gip and not a restaurant. But I would stop in this store by my home every morning on my way to work and buy a diet coke and a bottle of water, and got on friendly chatting terms with the fella that worked there (and seemed to never have a day off). Well, for various reasons, I didn't stop in for a week or so. When I did return, I recieved such a boisterous welcome that I felt absurdly guilty and I lied to the man and made up a story about being out of town. I even had to fabricate a destination because he wanted to hear all about it. When another interval of no visits occured, I just decided not to go in there anymore when he was working, which seemed to be about 80 hrs of the week.

[...tm...]

My brothers and I still laugh about this one...

Back when I was 12 or so and in charge of babysitting my brothers for the evening our parents had ordered pizza for us and left a check for us to pay the delivery driver with (back in the days when people used checks). Anyway, the delivery came and everything seemed normal. We were pretty excited because there was a large order of breadsticks with the pizza and the parents rarely let us get extras such as breadsticks. So of course we dug into those first. About five minutes later the delivery guy comes back and tells us that he needs the breadsticks back because they were part of someone else's order. We told him that we'd already eaten half of them, but that didn't seem to bother him a bit. He told us we hadn't paid for them and really needed them back. So we packed the remaining breadsticks up and handed them back. I still feel sorry for the people who actually ordered the breadsticks.

[Fat Guy]

Just this very afternoon I had a bizarre experience worthy of reporting here.

As in most New York City apartment buildings, we get a lot of menus in the lobby. Unlike most people I know, I'm in favor of the practice, because I find a lot of new places this way (I also like junk mail and spam email; call me crazy).

Today we got a menu from a restaurant that apparently has no name or address. On the front of the menu it says "Good Chinese & Mexican Food." It's a professionally printed color menu with two Asian fans and two cacti on the front. Sample item from the menu: "Super Special: Grilled shrimp, chicken, sweet banana, sauteed broccoli w. rice."

I suppose it's possible that the name of the restaurant is "Good," though I think there's already a restaurant by that name downtown. Or perhaps the name is "Good Chinese & Mexican Food." Careful examination of the menu, however, shows no address. I'm tempted to call them and place an order, just to see what comes.

(P.S. The other day I got a menu from a Halal restaurant called, curiously, "J.F.K." I didn't feel it was remarkable enough to post about, but since I'm posting anyway I note it here for the record.)

[sandercohan]

I suppose it's possible that the name of the restaurant is "Good," though I think there's already a restaurant by that name downtown. Or perhaps the name is "Good Chinese & Mexican Food." Careful examination of the menu, however, shows no address. I'm tempted to call them and place an order, just to see what comes.

When I lived in New York, the most horrifying thing was to see the storefront of the chinese place from where you got delivery -- not for good chinese, mind you, but for the terrible kind that your body requires every so often and then regrets later.

It usually went something like "Hey! That's where [name of restaurant] is. Oh god...."

Anyway, funny delivery story -- my roomate in college had a very specific pattern most days of the week.

5PM -- go to the gym.

6PM, upon arrival at home, call chinese place, order chicken with broccoli and vegetable dumplings with extra duck sauce from the chinese place on the corner.

Not long thereafter-- Greet delivery guy, Generously tip.

It got to the point where two really interesting things started happening. We'd call to order, and the person on the other end of the phone would answer "Hey Tom!" [they had caller ID, of course]. What got scarier was when the food would arrive not 10 minutes after hanging up the phone. Since it was about a five minute walk to the chinese place, we figured that Tom had gotten so predictable, that they were either rushing his food, or staging the meal, so that it would be ready to go as soon as he called.

I've never seen that since.

s

[I_call_the_duck]

That CallerID is a real hoot. My former roommate used to order pizza once a week from a place around the corner. He'd call, and before he would even say hello, the person on the other end would say, "large pizza with mushrooms, right? OK, 20 minutes."