Thanks for the show

I would like to thank all of you students who go out on the weekends – the ones who stumble out of bars, trip over curbs, lean on a pair of friends just to make it to McDonald's and mostly the ones who yell to the Domino's delivery cars.

Yes, I deliver pizza for Domino's until 2 a.m. on the weekends. Yes, it sucks and kills what little social life I have outside of school and this windowless, boisterous newsroom, but it's you – the drunken fools – that make my job survivable.

My shift usually starts around 5 p.m. and really drags on for the first few hours, but when 10 p.m. hits, the phones start ringing and I make countless trips to both campuses and the Heights. It just so happens that the time when we get a little busier is the time people start heading to the bars.

I used to try to avoid Main Street because of the ridiculous traffic lights and pedestrians, but now I take it as often as I can, just for the chance of seeing something funny happen.

I never realized how easy it is to spot someone under the influence of something, whether it's booze or who knows what grade-A stuff they were smoking.

When I knock on a door, I never know what's going to happen. I might walk into a beer pong tournament, a scene from Pineapple Express, a room full of nerds playing Halo, or just a normal person.

I will tell you, I've experienced them all – more than once.

I saw a guy so excited to get his pizza, that after his roommate had yelled to him that the Domino's guy was here, he came running down the stairs screaming 'Pizza! Pizza!' and in his excitement, forgot to set his bong down and answered the door with it in hand.

On a separate delivery, I took several large pizzas to what turned out to be a typical Friday night beer pong party. While I was waiting for the person who ordered the food to go get the money, his friends took it upon themselves to attempt to teach me the Crip Walk.

I told them I couldn't dance, but one person said, 'C'mon Domino's dude, I'm wasted and I can do it, you have to able to.'

So to really throw this kid a surprise, I told him I was drunk too and wasn't able to dance because I would fall over and drop the pizza.

Before I had to explain that I was joking, was completely sober and just didn't feel like looking like a fool by doing a gangster dance, the money came down the stairs and I was saved, then tipped four bucks.

I have also seen a woman so eager to get her pizza that she tripped over her coffee table and landed on her face while running to the door, but she quickly bounced back up and came to get her food.

After watching her face meet the floor, I had to move to the side of the door and focus as hard as I could to not laugh in this woman's face and pretend that I had no idea that she just took a nosedive in her own living room.

I couldn't believe what I had just seen. If I had been able to film it, I would have won an award on America's Funniest Home Videos. Perhaps she had a few too many drinks, or maybe she was genuinely delighted to get her pizza and wings. I will never know.

It seems now that I'm in my senior year and focused solely on graduating and finding a real job, I've passed the partying stage of my college career. Now, I spend my weekends shuttling pizzas around town so I can pay my rent and credit cards and get an occasional meal that isn't the cardboard tasting, poor excuse for pizza that Domino's serves.

But delivering pizzas late at night often leads me to places that remind me of all the fun I used to have and have grown out of enjoying. It's always worth a good laugh and my co-workers and I spend plenty of time talking about the variety of wild things we see.

So keep having your pizza delivered, keep up the partying and thanks for the show.

E-mail: matt.mosher@ubspectrum.com