9 ms·

At least from my perspective, COVID broke everything. People are more awful, quality is more awful, and prices are way up. I dread even eating out anymore as

by silisili 11mo ago

At least from my perspective, COVID broke everything. People are more awful, quality is more awful, and prices are way up. I dread even eating out anymore as I fully expect to overpay for bad food and service. There's an argument to be made that inflation is ultimately the driver of all three complaints, but boy did that all happen seemingly overnight.

conception 11mo ago
Both are tied together. The stock market didn’t double during Covid because we were making more. The US printed a lot of money. A lot.
ta9000 11mo ago
The secret is to eat out less often and spend more when you do. Service is fantastic still at higher end restaurants.
- graemep 11mo ago
  Probably varies where you are, but in the UK (especially outside London) there are lots of places you can have reasonably good food an service at a decent price. A lot of pubs with good food now, for example.
  - hexbin010 11mo ago
    For £15-35 for a main course sure. Even the weekday specials are £18-22. Sandwiches £15. Food is usually just average and service below average Not the south Gastro pubs are mostly full of land owners, rich pensioners and dual income high earners...
  - ta9000 11mo ago
    If Dishoom would come to the US I would be so happy.
goku12 11mo ago
> I dread even eating out anymore as I fully expect to overpay for bad food and service. I don't know if HN is the place to say this. But, it's just infinitely better these days to cook your own meals. With some modest initial investment and planning, you can minimize the average time and cost of doing it, while still having access to a reasonaly healthy and delicious menu, though slightly repetitive. But if you really want to indulge, setting aside a couple of hours will give you dishes that taste way beyond anything you can afford from outside. Some people are natural born chefs with an intuitive understanding of tastebuds. But if you're like me in that you're clueless about it, there are still some exceptional recipes you can steal online. I treat cooking more like chemistry, insisting follow exact measurements and time. It still works out really well for me. You might even tweak the recipe over 4 or 5 repetitions to your at most satisfaction. Anybody who hasn't given it a try really should, at least once.
- ctchocula 11mo ago
  You can't finish your comment without sharing some of your favourite recipes =P
  - goku12 11mo ago
    Practically anything you can find online videos for are better than their counterparts from low end restaurants. I have a lot of favs, but most are regional dishes that are not very well known internationally. Pastas are an exception. Cakes too taste a whole lot different and much richer when you do it.
- auggierose 11mo ago
  Yup. Something really simple and cheap, and definitely not worse in nutrition than McDonald's: Buy a pack of chicken legs, marinate them to your liking (for example: olive oil, salt, pepper, smoked or unsmoked paprika, onion powder, garlic powder, chicken or veggie bouillon cube), let them sit for an hour. Put it into the oven for 50min to an hour at 160 degrees Celsius. Cook rice on the side. After chicken legs are done take them out, and mix rice into the juices. Add some ketchup if you like. Put chicken legs back on top. Bake for max 4 minutes at 200 degrees. Enjoy. Now, that will take you about 2 hours to make in absolute time, but the actual time to do this is very little, a few minutes.
GOD_Over_Djinn 11mo ago
Absolutely. I feel bad for young people growing up in this broken world. They will never even know what was taken from them. I realize that I’m probably going to get dogpiled for saying it, but I think that the response to COVID (ie lockdowns) did far more damage than the disease itself.
- whiplash451 11mo ago
  Genuine question: do you think that the lockdowns had such long-lasting effect on people as to explain the problems described above? Why would a few months of a “bad idea” induce decade-long changes?
  - lotsofpulp 11mo ago
    It wouldn’t. The response to COVID merely accelerated the changes that were happening due to changes in the population age histogram.
  - aleph_minus_one 11mo ago
    > Why would a few months of a “bad idea” induce decade-long changes? I don't know about how COVID-19 was handled in the USA, but in Germany it rather was "many years of bad idea".
  - bragh 11mo ago
    It wasn't a few months, it was a few years of back-and-forth political and corporate shenanigans with a new narrative every few months that the $CURRENT_THING crowd happily ran along with. January 2020: there is nothing to afraid of, the new disease is mostly harmless and affects only the elderly and immunocompromised. Closing down borders is xenophobic. March 2020: do not go outside unless critically necessary and if you violate the rules, we will severely punish you May 2020: it's fine to have large public gatherings for BLM protests. February 2020: masks do nothing and actually are harmful unless you are trained to use a mask, do not buy any masks. April 2020: wear a mask if you go outside, or you kill everybody else. Your own fault that you don't have a mask. Summer of 2020: look, it's actually so great that we are all working remotely now, the nature is healing, all the emissions are so much reduced, this is the new future! Summer of 2023: everybody back to the office, real estate is suffering. People who joined during COVID time? Your contract is now altered, pray we do not alter it any further. The promises around vaccines, printing money and "loans for struggling businesses" are even more stories of their own. Beats me why after a few years of these kind of shenanigans people would generally get tired of other people.
bamboozled 11mo ago
A packet of crisps is now $4, yes they are fancy gourmet but they were three last year, it’s just insane . Next year they will be $5 I guess?
- butvacuum 11mo ago
  Blame the spud monopoly for that one. I wish I was joking.
thelock85 11mo ago
I have a slightly different take that everything was really broken right before, but Covid and its response brought everything to bear. I see this play out a lot in ed reform politics where leaders conveniently compact decades of prior failure into the “Covid gap”. To be sure Covid and the response produced a slew of new problems, too, but I think they are massively inflated by prior failures.
- georgefrowny 11mo ago
  The UK is still blaming all sorts of stuff on the pandemic that are actually structural failures showing effects. It's a especially convenient time for cover considering Brexit happened in early 2020 and between then and now no major party has been willing to come out and say that Brexit has been damaging. I don't even think it was necessary for Brexit to have been a net negative. There are plenty of ways the UK can thrive outside the EU, but the UK governments have basically done the square root of fuck all between 2016 and now to plan or execute on anything substantive. That said, long-term problems included a lot more than Brexit, like the slow euthanasia of the industrial base and the parting out of anything but nailed down to the highest bidder.
LocalH 11mo ago
COVID isn't the only thing that broke everything, but it was quite the accelerant
illwrks 11mo ago
100%. My wife thinks I’m crazy, but every issue she observes my answer tends to have its root in covid. An economy is an ecosystem and it’s been seriously knocked out of balance by covid, annd the fuel issues aa a consequence of Russias war hasn’t helped either. Everything that was, no longer is.
- hopelite 11mo ago
  You’re not crazy and don’t let your wife say that to you, since it’s clearly ignorance or possibly rationalization to justify her positions during that time. People will rationalize immensely just to avoid having to admit they were wrong in general or also possibly that they contributed to their own consequences.
  - illwrks 11mo ago
    Don't worry, we know each other well enough at this stage. From her point of view I think she's tired of me relating every issue to covid (which is mostly correct). But you're right, people can get caught in their own filter bubble, build walls and be defensive, rather than open their ears to a second opinion.
BizarroLand 11mo ago
I don't think COVID is responsible. I think COVID was the straw that made more people use doordash and then retailers saw that doordash was making profit on their product by bundling a service and they got greedy for that profit. After all, if you'll pay $8 for a big mac + tip delivered to your door, then you'll pay $8 for a big mac. Then to get it delivered is another $2 or so, so you'll pay $10 for a big mac. Then to get it delivered is another $3 or so, so now you'll pay $13 for a big mac. The only losers are the customers.

conception 11mo ago

Both are tied together. The stock market didn’t double during Covid because we were making more. The US printed a lot of money. A lot.

ta9000 11mo ago

The secret is to eat out less often and spend more when you do. Service is fantastic still at higher end restaurants.

graemep 11mo ago
Probably varies where you are, but in the UK (especially outside London) there are lots of places you can have reasonably good food an service at a decent price. A lot of pubs with good food now, for example.
- hexbin010 11mo ago
  For £15-35 for a main course sure. Even the weekday specials are £18-22. Sandwiches £15. Food is usually just average and service below average Not the south Gastro pubs are mostly full of land owners, rich pensioners and dual income high earners...
- ta9000 11mo ago
  If Dishoom would come to the US I would be so happy.

goku12 11mo ago

> I dread even eating out anymore as I fully expect to overpay for bad food and service. I don't know if HN is the place to say this. But, it's just infinitely better these days to cook your own meals. With some modest initial investment and planning, you can minimize the average time and cost of doing it, while still having access to a reasonaly healthy and delicious menu, though slightly repetitive. But if you really want to indulge, setting aside a couple of hours will give you dishes that taste way beyond anything you can afford from outside. Some people are natural born chefs with an intuitive understanding of tastebuds. But if you're like me in that you're clueless about it, there are still some exceptional recipes you can steal online. I treat cooking more like chemistry, insisting follow exact measurements and time. It still works out really well for me. You might even tweak the recipe over 4 or 5 repetitions to your at most satisfaction. Anybody who hasn't given it a try really should, at least once.

ctchocula 11mo ago
You can't finish your comment without sharing some of your favourite recipes =P
- goku12 11mo ago
  Practically anything you can find online videos for are better than their counterparts from low end restaurants. I have a lot of favs, but most are regional dishes that are not very well known internationally. Pastas are an exception. Cakes too taste a whole lot different and much richer when you do it.
auggierose 11mo ago
Yup. Something really simple and cheap, and definitely not worse in nutrition than McDonald's: Buy a pack of chicken legs, marinate them to your liking (for example: olive oil, salt, pepper, smoked or unsmoked paprika, onion powder, garlic powder, chicken or veggie bouillon cube), let them sit for an hour. Put it into the oven for 50min to an hour at 160 degrees Celsius. Cook rice on the side. After chicken legs are done take them out, and mix rice into the juices. Add some ketchup if you like. Put chicken legs back on top. Bake for max 4 minutes at 200 degrees. Enjoy. Now, that will take you about 2 hours to make in absolute time, but the actual time to do this is very little, a few minutes.

GOD_Over_Djinn 11mo ago

Absolutely. I feel bad for young people growing up in this broken world. They will never even know what was taken from them. I realize that I’m probably going to get dogpiled for saying it, but I think that the response to COVID (ie lockdowns) did far more damage than the disease itself.

whiplash451 11mo ago
Genuine question: do you think that the lockdowns had such long-lasting effect on people as to explain the problems described above? Why would a few months of a “bad idea” induce decade-long changes?
- lotsofpulp 11mo ago
  It wouldn’t. The response to COVID merely accelerated the changes that were happening due to changes in the population age histogram.
- aleph_minus_one 11mo ago
  > Why would a few months of a “bad idea” induce decade-long changes? I don't know about how COVID-19 was handled in the USA, but in Germany it rather was "many years of bad idea".
- bragh 11mo ago
  It wasn't a few months, it was a few years of back-and-forth political and corporate shenanigans with a new narrative every few months that the $CURRENT_THING crowd happily ran along with. January 2020: there is nothing to afraid of, the new disease is mostly harmless and affects only the elderly and immunocompromised. Closing down borders is xenophobic. March 2020: do not go outside unless critically necessary and if you violate the rules, we will severely punish you May 2020: it's fine to have large public gatherings for BLM protests. February 2020: masks do nothing and actually are harmful unless you are trained to use a mask, do not buy any masks. April 2020: wear a mask if you go outside, or you kill everybody else. Your own fault that you don't have a mask. Summer of 2020: look, it's actually so great that we are all working remotely now, the nature is healing, all the emissions are so much reduced, this is the new future! Summer of 2023: everybody back to the office, real estate is suffering. People who joined during COVID time? Your contract is now altered, pray we do not alter it any further. The promises around vaccines, printing money and "loans for struggling businesses" are even more stories of their own. Beats me why after a few years of these kind of shenanigans people would generally get tired of other people.

bamboozled 11mo ago

A packet of crisps is now $4, yes they are fancy gourmet but they were three last year, it’s just insane . Next year they will be $5 I guess?

butvacuum 11mo ago
Blame the spud monopoly for that one. I wish I was joking.

thelock85 11mo ago

I have a slightly different take that everything was really broken right before, but Covid and its response brought everything to bear. I see this play out a lot in ed reform politics where leaders conveniently compact decades of prior failure into the “Covid gap”. To be sure Covid and the response produced a slew of new problems, too, but I think they are massively inflated by prior failures.

georgefrowny 11mo ago
The UK is still blaming all sorts of stuff on the pandemic that are actually structural failures showing effects. It's a especially convenient time for cover considering Brexit happened in early 2020 and between then and now no major party has been willing to come out and say that Brexit has been damaging. I don't even think it was necessary for Brexit to have been a net negative. There are plenty of ways the UK can thrive outside the EU, but the UK governments have basically done the square root of fuck all between 2016 and now to plan or execute on anything substantive. That said, long-term problems included a lot more than Brexit, like the slow euthanasia of the industrial base and the parting out of anything but nailed down to the highest bidder.

LocalH 11mo ago

COVID isn't the only thing that broke everything, but it was quite the accelerant

illwrks 11mo ago

100%. My wife thinks I’m crazy, but every issue she observes my answer tends to have its root in covid. An economy is an ecosystem and it’s been seriously knocked out of balance by covid, annd the fuel issues aa a consequence of Russias war hasn’t helped either. Everything that was, no longer is.

hopelite 11mo ago
You’re not crazy and don’t let your wife say that to you, since it’s clearly ignorance or possibly rationalization to justify her positions during that time. People will rationalize immensely just to avoid having to admit they were wrong in general or also possibly that they contributed to their own consequences.
- illwrks 11mo ago
  Don't worry, we know each other well enough at this stage. From her point of view I think she's tired of me relating every issue to covid (which is mostly correct). But you're right, people can get caught in their own filter bubble, build walls and be defensive, rather than open their ears to a second opinion.

BizarroLand 11mo ago

I don't think COVID is responsible. I think COVID was the straw that made more people use doordash and then retailers saw that doordash was making profit on their product by bundling a service and they got greedy for that profit. After all, if you'll pay $8 for a big mac + tip delivered to your door, then you'll pay $8 for a big mac. Then to get it delivered is another $2 or so, so you'll pay $10 for a big mac. Then to get it delivered is another $3 or so, so now you'll pay $13 for a big mac. The only losers are the customers.