It didn’t take long for good ol’ FreshDirect to get back to us:

Dear MrLittlePants,

Thank you for contacting FreshDirect. We appreciate your feedback regarding the fuel surcharge and your thoughts are important to this company. We will advise upper management of your feedback. It is possible that consideration can be given to lowering the fee or abolishing it altogether. As a courtesy, since you have been a good customer of ours, we will apply a delivery fee credit towards your account.

[…]

Golly, almost makes me feel bad for complaining. FreshDirect is usually quick to throw money at a problem, and that works pretty well on the cheap queens of this household. The small credit they gave us will cover about ten stupid fuel surcharges.

The point is, though, that the fuel surcharges are stupid. I hope F.D.’s “upper management” (who I’m sure is pouring over my complaint letter as I write this) soon realizes they can’t bamboozle New Yorkers with their silly chart, which shows that crude oil has gotten more expensive (next week: FreshDirect discovers Lindsay Lohan) but doesn’t explain why they don’t just raise the prices of eggs & bacon to compensate.

Never mind, I’m sure that chart has got half the city bamboozled. I need to make my own damn chart.