This place has 'sketchy' written all over it.
FYI: the name of this business has changed from 'Herbie's' to "La Parma Pizzeria" (I checked the menu to verify the address and confirmed that it is indeed the same place).
I came in a few minutes after midnight and wanted to order a 10" 'Californian V' pizza. The guy behind the counter tells me that the restaurant doesn't have some kind of "license" required to accept payment after a certain time, but...that they can deliver to my hotel. The same hotel that I just walked all the way down here from.
Strange, but ok... let's do that.
He also suggests that I can wait outside (in the dark, on the street corner, after midnight) for my pizza, and that he'll sneak the credit card machine out to me so I can pay.
Wait, like a drug deal?!
I give him the hotel address and the phone number, and tell him that delivery to my hotel will be fine. He hesitates to take my order, saying that first he needs my personal phone number for the order. I inform him that I have no cell service here and tell him that the hotel phone number should suffice, especially since I will be waiting in the lobby for my order. He says he has to check with someone else to make sure that that's ok, and before I can say anything, he disappears into a back room.
A minute or two later, this other guy wordlessly and aggressively approaches the register. Then he stands there and just looks at me. Confused, I ask the first guy who this other person is and why he was staring at me like he's waiting on something.
Aggressive-eye guy tells me the same stuff that the first guy had already told me about the payment license and the delivery whatever. He then asks me for my hotel address... which I *just* gave to the other guy a few minutes earlier.
Then he asks for my hotel phone number... which I provide, again.
Then he asks for my hotel room number. I repeat again, to this guy, that I'll be in the hotel lobby waiting for the food, so that my room number isn't necessary.
At this point, the guy gets visibly angry and demands my room number. I told him that I do not feel comfortable giving him that information, especially since it's not necessary... since I'll be waiting in the lobby. Again he demands that information and threatens to cancel my order (which still has not been started my this point) if I don't give him my room number. I try to reason with the first guy, and ask him to tell this dude that
since I'm going to wait in the lobby for the food, that there is no reason to provide my room number. The guy says he can't do anything since that's his manager.
At this point, I'm fed up with the dubious stories, the sketchiness, and most of all, the rudeness. I got the hell out of there and set out looking for other, safer, more legitimate late night dining options.
With management like this, this place won't be in business long. read more