With Whom The Fellow Toys

Tonight is Farmer H's bowling night. The Pony has Scholar Bowl practice on Thursdays. And Mrs. Hillbilly Mom has declared this evening a No-Warm No-Heat night in the kitchen. The Pony loves to strap on the Domino's feedbag. It was kind of a regular routine, but over the past month we have taken our business elsewhere for convenience, or whipped up a quick pan of pasta for Pony.

This evening, though, we jumped back on the wagon. The wagon that rolls to Domino's for the mid-week special of a large three-topping pizza for $7.99. I called from T-Hoe as we left school. Not right after we left Newmentia, mind you, because that's a dead zone. But as soon as I got to civilization, The Pony dialed and handed me the phone. It's our routine, you know. I have it down pat.

Not so the Domino's workers. I declare. Each week there's one dumber than the week before. I ordered a large hand-tossed cheese pizza, and an order of breadsticks with an extra sauce. The dude first asked me to hold on before he took the order. Then it sounded like he stuck the phone in a wind tunnel. Then he came back to take the order. He said, "That will be $15.65."

"Wait. Don't you still have the mid-week special?"

"Um. Hold on..." More noise. Like he was rubbing the receiver on a piece of silk, generating mass quantities of static electricity. "Yes."

"Well, I want the price for the mid-week special."

"You have to get three toppings for that."

"THE NOT-HEAVEN I DO! No, I don't think so. It's a large pizza. I don't have to get all three toppings. We get this all the time for the mid-week special."

"Um. I'll see what I can do." More noise. Like we were under the Hoover Dam, listening to the generators. "Okay. Ma'am? I can get that down to $13.48."

"Well. Is that using the $7.99 mid-week special price for the pizza?"

"I am able to bring it down from $15.65 to $13.48."

"I'm not sure what you're doing."

"Is $13.48 okay?"

"I guess so. My son wants the pizza."

Silence. Breathing. I was not about to hang up on this little weirdo. I held on. Breathing. DAGNABIT! That little weirdo was a championship chicken-player.

"How long is that going to be?"

"Ten or fifteen minutes."

"Okay. I was waiting for you to tell me that." I hung up.

"Mom. When we get two pizzas and breadsticks, it's $21.10. So I think that's right."

When we pulled up to the store for The Pony to trot in and get the pizza, I told him: "You ask that little weirdo there behind the counter, 'Are you the one who gave my mom a hard time when she tried to order the pizza?'"

"Um. No."

"Heh, heh. I'm just messing with you. Here. I don't have another dollar. So you'll have to take a ten, two ones, four quarters, and the 48 cents as a quarter, two dimes, and three pennies. Now they'll KNOW who they're messing with. I only with I had counted out 100 pennies for that other dollar."

I think you really CAN hear eyes roll.