Delivery story 58 Adam S writes: I worked for several months (Summer/Fall 2002) delivering for Pizza Hut in Milledgeville, GA, a town best known for its mental hospital, which at one time was the largest in the world. Near the hospital were five state prisons; the neighborhoods around such an area could only be so good. I knew where all the crack houses were. I delivered to houses with bullet holes in the door. A great many roads had no street sign, and the houses were usually unnumbered. Trailers almost never had a number. The dogs were vicious. There were 30 streets to which we wouldn't deliver after dark, and a couple where we wouldn't go at all. Worst of all was that almost everybody paid with exact change; I got a tip at maybe 1 in 4 houses. Here are some of the more amusing stories: The manager didn't really run a tight ship, and didn't procur a uniform for me for a good three weeks after I started. To keep from looking like a bum, I made every delivery for three months in a Starbucks apron. No one noticed. On one occasion a group of drunk rednecks, after paying with exact change, decided to frisk me to see if I had any marijuana to sell them, then insisted that I tell them where the whorehouses were. I gave them directions that would put them between two of the prisons. One four year old kid tried to mug me. Prison workers and mental hospital workers ordered pizza regularly, but only one ever tipped. Many wouldn't give very good details as to where in the hospital they worked (there were several buildings) and I wound up in some scary places trying to find them. I only delivered to a mental patient once; he kept saying he was supposed to have Sprite on his pizza. I was very glad that the nurse supervising him was able to talk to him; they don't tell you how to deal with that sort of thing in training. On a couple of occasions, after I made a delivery, I'd be questioned by cops to make sure I was really a pizza man, not a drug customer. Since the town had a rather storied history, there were lots of weird places to discover. Old plantation houses, which hadn't been painted since reconstruction, were sometimes still standing in the middle of the ghettos.A historical marker marked the old capital square, at which prisoners were executed and slaves were auctioned. The only bookstore in town was a joint called All Eyes On Egypt, run by the local UFO cult. There was a trailer that was also a sex toy shop, and one place called the Super Motel, which was a gross misuse of the word "super." It wasn't just a motel; it was also a liquor store that only accepted cash. Many people didn't know exactly what street they lived on when I called for directions. People answering the door naked - invariably unattractive men - wasn't that uncommon. Several people accused me of being racist for being five minutes late. As though I had looked at the name on their receipt and said, "Hmm, they sound black. I'll just take my time!" The map indicated that there was an intersection of Wolverine Street and Panic Avenue. Unfortunately, there was no street sign to indicate a Panic Avenue. One person who only had a hundred dollar bill asked me to go to the store with them to get change. I naturally refused, but they called my manager, who told me I had to go with them. They didn't tip, and I gave the manager hell for that one. After a while, I started to lecture the non-tippers about wasting my time and taking advantage of me. On one very rainy night, a guy with a dirt driveway made me stand outside while he haggled with me over the price and then dug in his couch for pennies. After I left, he had two dirt driveways. I could go on for many hours, but I'll just say that after one Friday night on which I made a total of $2.31 on 22 deliveries, I quit. The bad roads were hell on my car, anyway, and once daylight savings time came around and the days got shorter, the job got to be much harder than it was worth. (Finding houses was hard enough during daylight hours.) While I'm still living in Milledgeville (attending college) I now drive an hour and a half up to the suburbs of Atlanta every weekend to deliver for Papa John's in an area where all roads have signs, all houses have numbers, all roads are paved, and nearly everybody tips. I now make at least three times what I used to make and the work is a lot more pleasant, even though I don't get nearly as many good stories to tell. The lesson is clear: stay away from the middle-of-nowhere towns full of middle-of-nowhere people. I should point out, of course, that there were also plenty of friendly people in town. People in the projects and trailer parks were usually pretty nice (though their dogs weren't.) But even most of the friendly people usually didn't tip. return to top