I dunno, man. My in-laws love going to Applebee's. So when Grandma and Granpa really wanna go, we'll go... but that shit is fucking inedible. It's one thing to choose from Sysco Assortment #7 but it's quite another when they even fuck that shit up. And I love how somehow the fact that nobody wants 2700 calories worth of nachos for $11.95 means that "millennials" are skunking Cheesecake Factory. Perish the thought that a predatory dining experience suffers mightily when their existing demographic stumbles toward senescence and the new demographic doesn't want to eat a platter of deep fried pig's assholes. Meanwhile, millennials are poor because they spend too much on food. Yet they're not spending it at fuckin' Applebee's. It's fuckin' Schrodinger's Millennial - half not keeping your shitty publicly-traded Sysco-enabled chain restaurant in healthy dividends, half blowing all their money on restaurants you despise. And, of course, let's not talk about the broader retail collapse because ohhhh shit then we might have to recognize that these are all troubling warning signs of an economy in jeopardy. That restaurant the millennials are eating at? It's not in an ETF in your 401(k). The apartment they're paying too much for? That REIT definitely is. I can walk to a cratered Chevy's (we call it the Lost Chevy's of Angkor Wat - it's been dead since 2007), a dead Hooter's (it's been through five other iterations since 2009) and a dead Alfy's (closed since 2006 but it doesn't have stucco on it so it's not nearly as picturesque as the Chevy's). Taco Bell? That fucker remodeled. Wendy's? Refaced last month. The poor are gonna keep eating. The rich are gonna keep eating. But neither of 'em are gonna eat at Applebee's and that demographic is gettin' squeezed. Office Space is 18 years old. The argument could be made that the fast casual chains were cool back when Must See TV was Friends, Mad About You and ER but it couldn't be made successfully. Fast Casual was shutting down and dying in 2006, back when I had to design the AV systems for Hooters and Maggiano's and the fact that they lasted this long says more about the dead tastebuds of baby boomers than the fickle tastes of millennials.Anyhow, this probably has more to do with people my age not having the money to buy food someone else microwaved, rather than any shifting preferences away from buying food someone else microwaved.
Specific trends aside, when Smith says that millennials tastes differ from what casual dining chains can offer, she's avoiding a more blunt statement: that casual dining brands just aren't cool any more.
My parents have pure shit taste in restaurants. Bob Evan's out here is a Denny's without the charm of a Cracker Barrel and a lower food quality than a Shoney's. Mom and dad love the place though and I ate at a Bob Evan's in four states when they came out here last year. Want to know what food is good and making money hand over fist out here? Fried Chicken places. There are small independent places all over, a few local chains that always have lines of people and then you have KFC (always empty) and Lee's (for when you hate your food to have flavor and nutrition). The one chicken place I go to is in the edge of the bad part of town and I am often the only while guy in the place. I've been there enough times that they people there recognize me. I do not give a flying fuck about the 'experience' of dining. The shit on the walls does not add to the food, and ambiance does not really do anything for me. I've eaten some damn good meals in places that maybe should have had a health inspector take a closer look. A few weekends ago I had a damn good meal in a bar that served 20 different beers on tap but had a food service attached. I want a hamburger cooked medium, and not burnt into a hockey puck. I want to be able to order a steak and have a few good sides. I want to be able to order a main dish that tastes good. Coincidentally, one of the absolutely worst pieces of meat I have every had was at a Ruth's Criss. How can a steak house fuck up a steak? Chain restaurants have a Fox News level problem. The demographic is dying and the people who partake have driven off the GenX and Millenials to the point where no amount of re-branding is going to work. The kids that came in right after me were shooed out of the malls and now they don't bother; malls are dying. Who's fault is that? Definitely not the people that kicked the kids out, nope, not them. Applebee's etc are going to be gone in 10 years when the Boomers finally get around to dying in large numbers. Can't come soon enough.Fast Casual was shutting down and dying in 2006, back when I had to design the AV systems for Hooters and Maggiano's and the fact that they lasted this long says more about the dead tastebuds of baby boomers than the fickle tastes of millennials.
Yo, I landed in Tennessee yesterday, and I'm in the airport urinal when I hear a dude at the other end holler back over his shoulder to someone in the stalls, "We goin' to Shoney's again fer Christmas this year?". Almost peed all over myself. It had to have been sarcasm/joking, all things considered. I decided I'd probably hang with them, Tennessee twangs and all. The occasional piece of reddit fodder worth posting:
After I posted that, they divided the dining room up into "South" and "North" for the livestock competitions. The only black person (sample size: ~500) happened to get seated one spot north of the room's Mason-Dixon line. Not a single vacant handicapped space parking lot. A small family, in the act of taking a selfie, accidentally fooled a performer into posing for a picture oriented 180 degrees the opposite direction. No. Booze. Anywhere in the building. Dolly Parton, wtf is wrong with you?? People unable to clap on the beat, and I don't mean some minor rushing or delays. Nowhere close to the appropriate BPM. Not a big deal, if you don't look inbred and/or you're drunk. But please see the previous paragraph. We've gotta send whoever covered those Trump rallies here to do a piece. This is so ripe! Hell, I might write up a small bit myself, later this summer.
Seems pretty normal compared to some of things that just went down here at Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede, in Pigeon Forge. Let me know when you see one of those man-rompers in the wild though, I think you have the better shot.
I complain about living in the city a lot. In short, the sheer size of everything is overwhelming. If there's one thing I love about it though, it's the choice of restaurants and bars. Off the top of my head, places that we go to on a regular or wish we could go to more often, fit the list of . . . Barbecue, Indian, Indian, Greek, Greek, Thai, Thai, Chinese, Pizza, Cajun^, Tex Mex, Mexican, Mexican, Mexican. I don't think any of them would fit francopoli's definition of sketchy food safety, but the majority of them definitely aren't trying to look fancy. They're all best enjoyed with the company of others, of course. That said, if given the option between a place like Wendy's or a place like Applebees, I'm doing fucking Wendy's drive through, because the food quality is about the same, Wendy's is cheaper, and I can eat it in the privacy of my own home with my dog watching me beg as I remind her that that's the rudest thing a dog can do but I'll allow it cause she's cute as a button when she begs. You can't get entertainment like that at Applebees, even with shit on the wall. ^It's been literally years at this point since I've had Shrimp Etoufe. Dala and a bud of mine promised we can get some this month so I'm excited as shit about that.
I've been casually browsing rural land for sale, and restaurants and coffee shops are things I'd miss living 45 minutes from the city. I remember sitting at home one weekend for close to an hour debating which of a half dozen different breakfast places I wanted to go to. And that was after eliminating the ones on the far side of town and the ones I didn't want that day. There's a great Cajun place here. I had a fantastic crawfish etoufe there, served in a plastic takeout dish. I'm probably going to miss Sunday breakfast today, so maybe I'll do Cajun for lunch instead.
I live roughly 35 minutes outside of the city. I own just shy of 2 acres. My house was under 100K. Yea, I have to drive 15 minutes to get anything that requires an exchange of currency, and yea we don't have the new, hip, hot, exciting crap. But if I decide to fuck-off of computers, I can take a third shift stocking job and live decently. Everything in life is a set of trade-offs. I choose to have a life that is not centered around the stress of a 4K/month mortgage and am willing to deal with the consequences of that decision. Living in BFE is definitely not at all for everyone. But the advantage of living somewhere quite, almost serene, affordable, and with enough space around me that I am not on top of my neighbor is worth it for me.
Yep, this is basically why I still live in Kansas. Flyover land is fucking cheap. We've got a roughly 1100 sqft apartment, built around 2000, for $750 after pet rent. My neighbors keep remarking on how expensive it is compared to the rest of the rental market here. Multiple local roasters in town. Two brewpubs, soon to be three. Three farmers markets. And we're able to live working part time so we have the time to enjoy the above. We'll probably buy a home here, but I want to travel to a few places first. See if there isn't a part of the country I'll fall in love with before I take on a mortgage.
Buying a house is one of those moment where a whole ton of doors slam shut, and a hidden series of new adventures open up. If travel is the plan, do it before the house. Hell you may travel somewhere and decide "this is where I will grow old." Remember that a house is not something that you can get rid of at a moment's notice, and the further you are from a city center the longer it will take to sell when things change or you get the chance to move elsewhere. Buying a house/land does give you a bit of certainty that you know what it costs to live. And assuming we all don't go to shit here, you do build equity and if you get with a good bank or credit union you have a pool of money to borrow against when things go bad. With land you can grow food which trades money for effort and time, but eating food that you grew on property you own is a great feeling. Kansas ain't that bad. Kansas City and Wichita were not bad places to visit. It seems like every time I go across the country on I-70 I somehow end up in Salina and that Pilot station there. Skies are dark if you are into astronomy, the August eclipse goes right though the state, weather isn't bad. You can certainly choose worse places to live.
Wanna be a hip millennial and still be a foody? Learn the 8 zillion ways you can prepare dishes with potatoes. They're like a damn wonder food for broke people. They're cheap as dirt, delicious as fuck, and fill you up quick. Even more importantly, you can have friends over for dinner and impress them with your cooking skills. Then everyone can enjoy the starchy goodness that is the magical potato.
And if you fuck up and let them go bad in the pantry, you can cut them into chunks and plant 'em to make more fucking potatoes. Fuck diamonds. Potatoes should be the universal symbol of enduring love.