I’ll cop to a major character flaw. I like the McRib. I absolutely crave those greasy death bombs! I assume you’re sane and won’t touch anything that gross. Good for you. It means there’s extra pressed pork mystery meat for me!
Now I’ll mention a character trait I don’t consider a flaw. I hate eating in my truck. It’s crude, ridiculous, uncivilized, and undignified. I don’t care if it’s Filet Mignon or a McRib, an adult should endeavor to eat at a table when possible. I get it, there are exceptions. Sometimes you’re in a hurry and need to cram calories down your gullet like a human garbage disposal on hell’s own treadmill. But in general it’s better to eat like a civilized human being. I view meals at the wheel as degrading lessening of the human condition. That’s just me. YMMV.
It should be a harmless preference. However, it’s 2021 and the world has gone to shit. The nearest McDonalds has closed its dining room. I’m not sure the explanation du jour for closing dining rooms. For a while (over a year ago) it was based on some voodoo explanation about viruses. Honestly, I laugh at that. The dining room of a McDonalds is only marginally cleaner than the floor of a subway urinal. Yet the black death of 2020 crossed some sort of virulence threshold and we can save humanity by eating in a car’s cab; which is apparently sterile. Now it’s 2021 and the dining room is closed exactly like it was before but for entirely new and improved reasons.
There’s not enough workforce to staff the place.
My McRib addicted self has noticed that McDonalds dining rooms are open in fits and starts. Though recently everyone within a few hundred miles of me just plain gave up.
This is why I notice it. If I want a McRib I have to eat at the wheel of an idling Dodge…. like a disgusting uncivilized animal. Gross. (McRibs are gross too but, as we’ve already established, that’s different.)
During the brief unknowable season of the McRib I’ve started playing a game. I’ve started watching which fast food restaurants have open dining rooms and which don’t. A large number are reduced to hurling food at plebeians like feeding hogs in a automotive livestock chute. The pattern, or lack thereof, is interesting.
The game expanded and soon I started counting who’s wearing masks and who isn’t. Sometimes it’s “required” because some jackass in politics thinks this two year old idea matters and they’re just the God to have such control. Sometimes it’s not required by regulation (never law) but corporate asshats require masks anyway. Why wouldn’t they? I’ll politely receive a McRib from a masked employee but there are shrieking Karens who won’t do the opposite.
Then the game became tracking the fading hours of operation. In the hinterland, fast food restaurants are struggling. Not only are they running out of employees to mop the floor in the dining room but they’re running out of employees to man the drive through. They’re closing earlier and opening later (don’t get me started about Egg McMuffins). Hours are irregular. Sometimes they’re closed during hours they’ve posted as open. Sometimes they run out of people and close right then.
Wherever you go, they’re hiring. These are different than the hiring signs from the Trump boom. It went from “good pay, decent hours” to hands and knees begging; “for the love of God, please work here!”
Meanwhile, getting served by masked subservient (and almost universally female) servants feels hinky. It makes me nervous. It feels like they’re lower class and I’m upper and I hate the very ide of that! (It’s a damn McRib… nobody in that exchange is anything but low class.)
I truly believe all humans are created equal and the masks clearly seperate servant from customer. When someone at Starbucks or McDonalds has their face covered they start feeling less… human. They become depersonalized food serving units. I can’t see them smile. I don’t hear what they’re saying. The interaction becomes clipped and short.
For the unmasked I might try a humorous connection “I love McRibs… you’re doing God’s work m’lady!” For the masked, a formal line is drawn and they’re clearly lesser beings than the unmasked freak driving the truck. I try to mumble “thank you” but they almost subconsciously have eyes averted like there’s something unclean about their job at the drive through.
The phrase “supply chain disruption” does not explain any of this.
Employees locked behind a face burka don’t look safe… they look chained. As far as I can tell none of them like it. Then again nobody gives a shit about the employees’ opinion… which is why employers are scrambling to keep the whole thing running.
Ace of Spades has a good take on it:
I think there is a darker undercurrent in all this, and the COVID vaccine mandate may have been the last straw. Why do people work in the first place? A big answer to this, of course, is “for the money.” This is certainly true, but it is only true to a point. It’s different for everyone, but at some point – and I suspect it is a lower point than most would expect – money becomes less important than intangibles for a lot of people. The big intangible is respect. The vax mandate is a respect black hole. The aggressively pro-vaccine crowd is pissed because it took so long and the companies lacked the courage to act independently. The anti-mandate crowd is pissed because no one at the company stood up for them. The neutral crowd who couldn’t care less one way or the other resents all of the jawboning and time wasting and paperwork hoops they have to go through. Absolutely nobody feels respected in this matter, and it is a major matter.
While supply chains have been disrupted, that’s just a symptom of a bigger problem. People who’ve never heard of Ayn Rand and don’t give a shit about politics instinctively knew when to “Go Galt”. They’re not going Galt… they’ve already gone. That’s why you could fully staff a McDonalds in 2019 and can’t in 2021.
Rand was something of a bitch, and so she missed the change among the working classes. Rand fretted over captains of industry and genius materials scientists, but it never crossed her cold heart that the honest hard working entry level McDonalds floor mopper had a breaking point too. They’re not NPCs, they’re people. When that line is crossed (as it has been) they’ll “shrug” just as much as a pissed off brain surgeon. (It’s also much easier for them to shrug than the brain surgeon. They can always find another McDonalds job if they change their mind. A pilot at United Airlines has a lot more to lose. Which is why shortages are coming from the bottom up.)
This isn’t just “supply chain disruption”. After all, the supply chain (barely) held. McRibs are present and on site. The lights are still on. There’s no shortage of the buckets of BBQ sauce that I’m addicted to.
Overworked skeleton crews slowly losing the fight are not “supply chain”. They’re mistreated humans. Whether on purpose or by accident, whether through well intentioned but unwise micromanagement or revoltingly elitist snobbery they’ve driven workers out of the workforce. President Potato, whom it’s said has earned the greatest number of votes in all of America’s history, can’t see the problem. Nor can half of society. The other half isn’t about to explain the obvious.
For good or ill, this is almost a permanent change to society. It’s not a temporary situation. It’s not going away. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to get another McRibs.
Masks are mandated at my workplace by my employer and by the county. We don’t wear ’em anymore because we’ve been together every day for years and by now everybody has everybody else’s germs. (there’s a joke in there somewhere about us all being sick of each other). Masked outsiders come and go regularly with not one of ’em caring that we aren’t masked.
“like a disgusting uncivilized animal ” Now just a minute, AC! You’re welcome to eat where and how ever you wish. After driving 50,000mi/yr doing field service, I prefer my clean, comfy car seat and music of my choice while facing whatever scenery is least nauseating rather than sitting on an unhygienic hard plastic bench while being blasted with pop tunes ‘n advertising as I try to avoid eye contact with…well, whatever they are. So, there! 🙂 Good post, BTW.
Ha ha ha… I knew I was going to piss someone off with that one. 🙂
If I had a van or rv I’d probably never eat in a dining room again. I like to get out from behind the wheel to give my back a break to straighten out or whatnot but if I was carrying a din8ng room around with my rig that would be great. Plus I hate ketchup spills in my truck. Yuck!
It pleases me to make you laugh. Not pissed at all.
“give my back a break’ Yer preachin’ to the choir, Brother!
“I hate ketchup spills
I usta live on the road. I was eating at McD’s (in my company car, dammit!) wearing a new white shirt just before going into the client business next door. Pro tip: if you avoid squeezing the catsup packet after opening it insufficiently to prevent pressure build-up, your shirt won’t look like you were just machine gunned. Sigh.
Just wait until you see the new Progressivist drive for a “thriving” wage at McD’s – $25/hr. Ulterior motives of course, it’s an attempt to destroy the low level wage hiring industries.
For several weeks now I’ve been thanking counter, service, food prepper’s, cashiers, anybody doing their job taking care of me. I tell them they are the new hero’s, keeping civilization going. AND thank you for your service. I made an older black woman cry, I felt horrible, She said “It’s alright, I needed to hear that.” Some just looked at me blankly, trying to process it, and lots of reactions in between. Doesn’t cost a thing to be nice to our fellow travelers. My weakness is the squish fish.
I try to warmly thank all servers too. They invariably seem frazzled and everyone needs to be appreciated once in a while.
Do you appreciate them with a generous tip?
THAT is what they really appreociate!
Of course. Though I’ve never tried to tip at McDonald’s… I might try that sometime.
“They’re not NPCs, they’re people.”
Back in Ayn Rands day corporations had personnel departments. Now it is “Human Resources”, with the “Talent Acquisition” branch doing the gatekeeping. Resources, as you know, are what a firm uses up, then goes out and gets more of. Needless to say you well described what people think of the matter.
“Employees locked behind a face burka don’t look safe… they look chained. ”
It’s a slave colar imposed by every two bit bureaucrat and authoritarian out there. Good luck finding a McRib.
You spoke my mind. I hate the term “Human Resources.” I’m not an effing resource, I’m a person with wants, needs, desires and if the job I’m doing satisfies my needs then I’ll keep doing it, otherwise I’ll fire the company and sell my wares elsewhere.
I have never had a McRib. Not a snob, just never been there at the same time and place when I wanted one . . .
Road trip! I heartily recommend you go on an adventure to acquire one. They’re not necessarily good but it’s a shared experience… like skydiving.
What I mean is having gone skydiving even once you can talk with someone else who’s done it and you know the feeling. But if you haven’t, all you can do is guess. Man, that’s a weird analogy… then again I’m drinking whiskey and it makes perfect sense to me.
McRib is good but I’ve learned to ask them to go light on the sauce. Otherwise finish with about 1 fourth of the sandwich dripping sauce every 3 second. I guess one could extend this by having a slice of bread to soak up extra and add extra bulk.
Have noticed same thing about fast food staff. Far less chatter in back and far more purpose related than light banter. Corporate is feeling the pinch. I hate waiting at the drive-thru – far better for me to eat inside. Refills are also done.
Carls Jr used to be my choice. Far from heart healthy, those double jalepeno mini burgers were the shizzle ! Pity they closed down in my area.
jrg
A mcdouble is normally dry enough to take every extra drop of McRib squeezings.
Hey AC, just so you don’t feel alone in the Wilderness, I love McRib’s too.
I was actually a McDonald’s employee when they first came out and I’ve been in love with them ever since.
I’m kind of glad they don’t serve them year-round because I can hear myself gaining weight as I eat one. Apparently the body expanding at a rapid rate causes low frequency harmonics or something like that.
Anyway, your admission encouraged me to come out too. Hey…does that make us an oppressed minority? “You need to check your Double Cheeseburger Privilege!”
You just need to find a state that has not yet gone full Communist. My local Mickey D’s has McRib and indoor dining:
https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/location/fl/port-st-john/6857-n-us-hwy-1/12732.html?cid=RF:YXT:GMB::Clicks
The closed indoor dining I’ve seen is often related to manpower shortages… which doesn’t rule out communism but is more of a downstream effect.
The way it’s handling Covid, Florida has gone waaaaay up in my mental list of which states I prefer. Who thought FL would merge out TX in the race for freedom?
Most of Texas is doing okay, just not as loud.
OTOH a local furniture store has a sign on their marquee offering a signing bonus for warehouse personnel.
Im with you on eating behind the wheel, you say it so well.
i live and work in Tn.
The government is a bit go-along-to-get-along, but no mandates for State and local.
The only EO outstanding is for the Guv to set up pandemic hospitals and staff them if the need arises.
What i see is employees at corporations and more lefty businesses sporting the face attire.
Plenty of folks wear masks, but all understand it’s a choice (outside of corporate domain).
Local businesses and companies, from the capitol city to the hills, hollars, and plains are just going about the business of gettin on with it. I’ve been patronizing businesses that never had a mask sign up in all of the last two years.
I think that is where i see the restuarant business being as you describe. A table of suites in a Blue state setting corporate policy that means the manager of a fast food dive has to be in compliance or gets canned. Even if its lost in some godforsaken village in the middle of flyover country. Which would mean the franchisee loses their franchise.
I know it wasn’t the point of the blog post but try an Arby’s Rib sammich, pretty good for fast food and actually real meat. Their Brisket isn’t bad either.
Big box store employee here and yes, we’re all burning out hard at this point. I thought the burnouts were bad last year. Even the kids who’re just starting their first jobs are feeling the burn.
I’ve been out sick for 2 weeks (I had the plague, I’m fine if still unable to taste things), and go back to work tomorrow. Relieved I didn’t have to work Black Friday weekend, and dreading going back to work. The company requires masks, though strict enforcement varies between stores, in my case as long as no one complains that you pulled down your mask management isn’t going to make a fuss. But still. I hate them, I hate having things on my face, I hate not being able to see faces. I have co-workers who I have no idea what they look like because they were hired after the mandates started.
I have been working remotely since The Plague started and have been in a handful of times. There are groups of people that have started, worked, and left and I have only seen a video or nothing at all. It is definitely an odd thing.