One of my duties as a columnist is to make the world a better place by sarcastically complaining about trivial things that I think need improving.
Someone has to do it. You’re welcome.
Today’s complaint is fast food. I typically don’t eat in fast food establishments because I have this irrational desire to live beyond 60.
Nonetheless, I found myself inside one the other day to pick up food for my teenage son, to whom the four food groups are Qdoba, McDonald’s, Taco Bell and Burger King. This place, however, was none of those. This was … well, let’s just call it, “Bendy’s.”
He doesn’t usually eat Bendy’s but he felt like “something different,” meaning he wanted the same things he gets at the other places, only from a different place and in a slightly different form. He’s a real gourmand.
Specifically, he wanted a “large combo meal” and a spicy chicken sandwich. That sounds like a lot of food but I will remind you that he is a teenager and a distance runner, meaning that when he’s hungry the dog runs and hides.
“That’ll be $14.37,” the counter person said. My inner grandpa was immediately activated. “Fourteen dollars? That’s outrageous! That’s highway robbery! It’s just two sandwiches, a potato’s worth of fries and some sugar water! Why, in my day, that food would have cost HALF that much …” and so on. Inner granddad can really get cranking. Stay off his lawn.
I didn’t actually say any of that out loud, by the way, because I try to remember that counter people have tough enough jobs as it is.
So I went home and said it.
“Good god, not this again,” was the lovely yet formidable Marcia’s eye-rolling response. “I suppose now you’re going to launch into your theory about how if fast food is going charge so much money maybe we should stop busing the tables for them.”
The woman knows me well.
But it’s true. I have never understood how fast food restaurants ever convinced us to bus our own tables. I’ve never been told or asked to do it. I’ve never seen a sign telling me to. And yet I do it anyway. But why? So-called sit-down restaurants don’t ask me to bus the table, throw out the scraps or sort my trash by disposable, compostable or recyclable.
So why does fast food? Better yet, why don’t they do it themselves? It’s their restaurant. I wouldn’t invite them to my house and ask them to clean up after dinner.
I’m a curious sort, so I’ve actually asked fast food customers why we do it. They usually say, “I don’t know. To keep the cost down?”
OK, that makes sense. But if we do in fact have a tacit agreement to clean up after ourselves, I would submit to you that fast food restaurants have broken it by increasing their prices to the point that my inner grandpa is activated, and it is thus null and void.
Thus, from now on, when I eat in a fast food restaurant I will finish my meal, wipe my mouth with a napkin and leave the clean-up to them. I encourage you to do so as well.
And now you know why my family refuses to go out to eat with me anymore.
Image credit: Brandon Morgan on Unsplash
Suze says
It’s the fault of school lunch room ladies. Marge with her spray bottle and cleaning rag yelling across the room “ You forgot something here ,Missy!” Rumor was Marge would do something unspeakable to your food if you got on her bad side.
Uncle Mort says
Andrew, who picks up after you in your house ? You wouldn’t last long as a guest in our home.
Do you leave a trail of trash everywhere you go ? I’m sure your mother raised you better…
Andrew Heller says
Nope, mom was from a culture of dirt people who lived underground and viewed dirt and grime as virtuous. Do you clean your table at sit down restaurants?
Uncle Mort says
every time
Andrew Heller says
I call b.s. So you go to a tablecloth restaurant – steak, wine, appetizers etc. – and when you’re done, you walk your dishes to the kitchen and clean up the table. Riiiiight.
Uncle Mort says
Andrew, you’re just trying to stir the pot, you know exactly what I mean …
Ernie says
Hey! You guys try to get along!
Jims says
Same thing with self serve gas stations. They used to practically wash your car and do all the mantinence for you! Money saving and speed I guess has a lot to do with it.
Andrew Heller says
I really don’t mind busing my table, but if they’re going to have sit down restaurant prices, they ought to have sit down restaurant services.
Jims says
Halo burger never had trash receptacles years ago. I remember asking what am suppose to do with my trash and tray? The worker told me leave it we take care of it. Not anymore.
Jims says
Two happy meals and a medium smoothie. 13.64. It is getting outrageous!
jbcsfl says
Excellent solution, …… Do Not patronize these fast food establishments.
Working Dad says
Fast food restaurants are better avoided in my opinion. The food is just horrible. Many Asian countries have a self bussing expectation, even at nice restaurants. I have experienced this in China, Japan, S. Korea and India.
I would point out that nowhere have I seen customers sweep up floor fries of clean off the table with disinfectant spray. We just toss out our trash which to me is no biggie.
If you truly want to get good value for your money, don’t eat at restaurants. Prepare all of your food at home. It will reduce your costs by over 50%>
Jims says
Ya and your probably a master chef that’s cooked in various restaurants in France Italy and Greece. Haha
Jims says
You are not your!!!
Working Dad says
Try not to obsess so much. I am extremely talented on the back yard grill.
Jims says
I am sure you are. Ever hear of humor???
ann b says
I love humor, Jims says, but what you are doing is not humor. You can’t seem to let “Working Dad” give an opinion without denigrating him and assaulting him personally. As for the fast food places, if you liberals had your way for them to raise the minimum wage to $15.00, see what that would make a small cheeseburger and fries.
Jims says
You must not follow this blog much because he can get a lot nastier than I. Either that or your his Mother.
Tom says
Ann. B: We denigrate Working Dad because Working Dad usually denigrates us, with far-out baloney. And, now, Working Dad is trying to impress us all with his far-flung travels in the Far East. Do they serve baloney in the Far East?
Working Dad says
Obsession!
Carmen Cramer says
Not too sure on that one. 5 of us out for dinner cost $55.00, next night went to grocery store and spent $49.00 to feed same 5 people. Plus took 1.5 hours to prepare.
Linda Ann says
I never gave a second thought to how we automatically clean off our tables when we are done eating; and curse the patrons who were at the next table and left all their stuff.
I don’t know if I could get up and leave my tray, containers and napkins. Then it takes a while for the staff to come around and wipe the tables off. It just seems that it goes against all of our germi-phobias. As far as money, they aren’t saving me any money. The prices go up and we still clean off our tables.
Lisa Jay says
Just by the sandwich and the value or jr fry and have them drink water, no one needs that much pop or sugary lemonade. A large triple thick shake you can eat with a spoon adds almost a half days worth of calories to your diet. Complaints? Point them to the PB&J and suggest they make themselves a sandwich.
Jim III says
As my father opined years ago: Someone starts a business and they produce a good quality product, but they sometimes do not make a good profit or they make a good product and the owner dies and the children do want to have anything to do with the business. So they sell it.
Then comes the accountants, MBA’s and lawyers. They change things. In order to make more money they change the product. Rarely for the good of the customer. They make a lot more money but, the quality goes down. Sometimes the business goes out of business.
That is what has happened to Halo Burger. The family sold the business after their father died. The new owners came in and changed some of the menu. That is when they changed it to where the customer had to bus their own table.
How many remember Bill Knapp’s? Bill Knapp’s was sold to an investment group from New York. So they decided to change the type of food sold among other things. Their New York style of food and other things did not go over well with long time Bill Knapp’s customers. They went out of business about a year after they took over.
A college degree in business does not mean that a person automatically know everything about running a business. Sometimes I think that MBA does stand for Master of Business Administration. Sometimes I think it means Mindless Brainless Asinine.
Oldugly says
Sorry Jim III, MBA does not mean what you wrote. It actually means “Mediocre But Arrogant.”
Jim III says
I like your definition of MBA oldugly says. I am going to add that to my definition of MBA.
chazbo says
“Fast food” is an oxymoron!
Tom says
Andrew: Will you please post something political? I have a political thing I want to post.
Tom says
May I open our discussion of Gina Haspel, Trump’s pick for CIA Chief? She was in charge of a secret black dungeon in Thailand. She was in charge of torturing people. She was in charge of destroying the torture evidence.
We do not want a torturer anywhere in our government service, not anywhere in our country! She is a devil. Trump proves he is crazy, even to think of nominating her.