The gift that keeps on giving...

Facebook is a huge time sponge, but quite addictive also. I'm amazed at the sheer number of my friends from days gone by that have show up on Facebook. In reconnecting, there are many things I've been reminded about that were filed in the recesses of my mind.

In December 1996 I moved to Lake Charles, LA to take a job as a Producer for an insurance agency. At one point while I was there, the opportunity presented itself to rent a small house instead of the apartment I had been living in. I met a guy named Hank through some mutual friends, and he moved into the house with me. This is where the story gets funny. The house was pink, and it was on California Street.

Being quite secure with our manliness, neither one of us was overly bothered by this. Some good times were had in the "Pink House". As I remember it, there were always people hanging out at our house. Maybe it was because many of our friends still lived at home with their parents at that point, or maybe it was that we were so damn cool, but we always had a couple of people hanging around.

Food was a major deal around a house with 2 guys in residence. We generally either grilled something or ordered pizza. At one time, Dominos had a deal where you called a number for a phone survey after you ordered a pizza. Probably 1 in 5 surveys received a coupon in the mail for a free pizza. So, being guys, we figured that if you called the survey phone number each day, you would get a free pizza 5 or 6 times a month.

Armed with a decent stack of coupons, we started calling to order free pizzas. We very quickly figured out that if you tipped a driver $5 in a town where they get stiffed on a regular basis, they are so excited about the tip that they forget about the coupon. We figured a $15 pizza for $5 tip money was a pretty good deal. We even had our little "free pizza dance" we did when we closed the door after receiving the pizza. It was like the gift that kept on giving.

But, all good things come to an end. After 8 or 10 free pizzas and the same number of coupons that we had started with, we took delivery of yet another free pizza, tipped the driver, and closed the door. About halfway through the dance, there was a knock on the door. Crap. We briefly contemplated not answering the door. You know, hollering through the door "Nobody's home!", but like a big dummy, I opened the door. We were busted. They were onto our scheme, and the driver was warned not to come back without the coupon.

After that, we still got several free pizzas, but for whatever reason, we never won another coupon from a survey, and the drivers never forgot the coupon.

I'll post more Pink House adventures later. Definitely some fun times in that house.