No, it's not about the alfredo.

Within my psyche, there's a bit of a battle going on. Pizza as religion vs. pizza as a business. It's giving it all away to serve the cause and helping others experience my bliss (and expecting nothing in return) vs busting my ass for more than a decade and a half to learn everything I possibly can, and expecting gratitude and compensation when I help someone up their game.

An easy way to balance these forces is to give away anything and everything to amateurs, but to expect something in return from professionals. If someone profits off my knowledge, then I expect, in a small way, to profit as well. But the line between amateurs and professionals is sometimes blurred.

I know that you have no professional aspirations, but profit can come in the form of influence. I think we both can agree that in your insatiable quest to win over the industry's heaviest hitters, my knowledge has been beneficial. In all of my years helping people make better pizza, I've never consulted a stopwatch to see how much time I've given anyone, but, looking back at our correspondence, I counted at least 75 hours of my time- which, in itself, wouldn't be a huge deal, but it was 75 hours of pulling teeth. "Do this""Why?""Because of that""Why?"

If someone helps you, you say 'thank you.' I would never expect anyone in this sub to say thank you (but am grateful when they do), but if I give you at least 75 hours of my time and help you take your pizza game from fairly mediocre to something worth noticing, which, in turn, helps you gain influence in the industry, I had better be the one to get the shoutout, not Alex Delany.