Anachostic

Not Getting Sick

Posted by anachostic on September 25, 2017 No comments

I don’t get sick. The last time I mentioned getting sick was four and a half years ago. I described it as a “nasty cold”. In fact, that old post is talking about deviation, and my time for a major deviation was due.

I’ve been to the Sick AF Theme Park and I always manage to get out without going on any rides. Well, sometimes I end up on some of the kiddie rides like Shit Yo’self or The Dehydrator, and I’ll get on with my life. The bigger rides always kind of spooked me. This time, I must’ve gotten lost trying to get out because I ended up in line for the #2 ride in the whole park – IN-FLUUUUU-ENZA EXTREME. And let me tell you, it’s a long fucking ride. (Since I’m writing this now, I can say that I’m lucky to have not gotten on the #1 ride, Nu-Moan YAAAAAAAA.)

Day 0 – Wed

Getting ready to go to bed and out of nowhere a large sneezing fit hits me. A little later in bed, a second fit strikes. This starts my sinuses draining like mad. They drip into my throat all night. Ticket for one? Thank you, climb aboard.

Day 1 – Thurs

At work, the entire place is full of coughing and sneezing. I guess I got on board just in time. By the end of the day, my plan for when I get home is: sleep, eat soup, sleep more. When I do get home, I feel terrible. A different terrible, a foreboding feeling that something is not right this time. I check my temperature and it’s 99.6. Half an hour later it’s 99.9. I call my boss and take the next day off work.

And here’s the other huge issue with this. The next day, I am going on a trip to see my mom in her new nursing home digs. At this point, I’m optimistic I can bounce back enough to make a safe trip.

Throughout the night, my fever continues to climb, broaching 101. This is all new to me. I don’t get sick. Oh, first time rider? Have fun and enjoy. You’re going to remember this one.

Day 2 – Fri

Fever is hovering in the 101 range. Every joint and muscle in my body hurts. Even sometimes my skin hurts to the touch. I put on a brave face and go out to infect the world. I get some Dimetapp and Halls from Walgreens, a small pizza from Hungry Howies, and some Gatorade from Dollar General. I’m good. But I’m not. The smell of the pizza is turning my stomach and one tiny bite was spit right back out. Big ol waste of money.

Around 5pm, I capitulated and went to the Urgent Care. The receptionist took my information and commented, “Boy, you haven’t been here in a long time!” I said, “I know, I don’t get sick, but when I do, I do it with style.” My time there was short and I wasn’t admitted or anything. I got an Rx for a flu med, 10 doses over 5 days. Five days! I go back home and over the next 36 hours or so, I got to experience all the wonderful twists and turns in this insane devil ride.

For me, being under a constant fever gave my brain license to do whatever it wanted. And this is what I got. When I was unconscious, I was in some sort of disaster zone, providing help. All the rubble was black blocks (there’s more to it, but it’s too weird to describe). I had a special power that whenever I coughed, I could demolish a partially collapsed building. When I was more awake, it was kind of the same, except everything was white, not black. As time went on and my condition improved, so did the disaster. Then I had to start dealing with situations like “There are reports of water at this other camp, but we can’t tell anyone because they will overwhelm that camp.”

And everyone should be happy that I did not get on the plane. Everyone except my wallet. $600, everything nonrefundable. But I would literally be the grim reaper walking into a nursing home in my condition. Do something good for once, you dickhead. Don’t kill people.

Day 3 – Sat

My second full day of absolutely nothing. Probably 22 hours in bed. Can’t get up. Can’t eat. Only sleeping in 1-2 blocks, which involves the inescapable scenario of fixing a disaster scene. But at some point in the afternoon, I woke up and my fever broke (high score: 103.3). I recognized this because I was sopping wet. My clothes were soaked the whole way through and sweat running down my arms. That’s something that hasn’t happened to me even in my most careless hiking jaunts in the summer heat. My joint and muscle pain is gone, but something was traded for that relief. Now I have a pain that feels exactly like someone folding your ear cartilage. It doesn’t fade in and out, it’s a sharp, piercing pain that makes me convulse. And it comes along about every 15 seconds. Minute after minute, hour after hour. Sometimes it will pause long enough for me to get a small window of sleep, but it is relentless.

With the clearing of my fever, my continuing struggle in the disaster zone literally turned into an empty field. I think that’s a good thing? Anyway, good ride so far. Lots of unexpected surprises. What else ya got?

Day 4 – Sun

My fever is gone, but I’m still sweaty and temperature sensitive. My joints and muscles are not sore, but I’m weak. I haven’t really eaten anything in days. Looks like I lost about 7 pounds. I’m still laying around in bed, because I can’t do anything else. I can’t really sleep because of the constant ear stabbing. So I decide to listen to some recent CD purchases I hadn’t played yet. That was a pleasant reprieve. Then I picked out another song from a different album to play. It’s a favorite of mine – happy, joyful, and executed exceedingly well. When the song started playing, for absolutely no good reason, I started crying uncontrollably. I took a while to compose myself and clear out my sinuses (SO much!), but when I would think of the song again, I would start sobbing again. And again. And later on yet, again. What the fuck is wrong with me?

I reprise my earlier soup extravaganza, which is probably the most I’ve eaten since this started. I tried a burger for lunch so I could get some protein for some energy. Just a couple bites. Pathetic.

Now my sleep patterns are all messed up. Didn’t get tired until 2 in the morning. Even then, I only slept in 1-2 hour blocks, like I had been. I’d either wake up soaked in sweat, or with pain in my chest from sinus drain. It’s ridiculous.

Day 5 – Mon

Thanks for riding. I hope you enjoyed it. No, thank you for letting me get the fuck off the ride without dying.

Now, an attempt to return to normalcy, although I know in reality it will probably be a couple of weeks to get back to the way things were. Cleaning the sick bedding, cleaning the sick house, realizing I don’t have a lot of energy available to do any of this for extended periods. I break out in sweats easily. I tried a small meal at Panera and had to actually take my time and eat. Like every bite took a few minutes to settle. And people thought I ate slowly before… oh boy.

What a long-ass post. Six days wrapped up in a stupid story. I should have live-blogged the whole event, or maybe death-blogging would be more apropos. Next time I think I’m dying, I’ll try that.

The Social Security GUID

Posted by anachostic on September 19, 2017 No comments

With the recent Equifax debacle, I froze my credit file at all the places I was able to. But the news still keeps on coming. Whenever I read about these events, I think, “Why can’t we just request a new Social Security Number, like we can request a new bank account number?”

Well, for one, there’s not a lot of SSNs available. 1.2 billion at the max, and I’m certain that you can’t have SSNs like 000-00-0000, and there’s probably a few other notable blocks that couldn’t be used, so it’s less than that. And with people constantly dying and being born, those numbers are always getting used up. If we were to allow people to request new SSNs easily, we would exhaust the available supply very quickly.

So, if we were to reimagine how our country’s income tracking system could be implemented, we should make sure it’s not going to need an update for a very long time. And when you think of things that are going to last a long time, I think of 128-bit values – GUIDs.

I understand that the retrofit of a new field in databases around the world to accommodate this new ID value would be nigh impossible, so this is just a thought exercise in what we could want from a national identifier.

Foremost, we would want our ID to be replaceable at will, but we would also need to be able to keep a history of former IDs. For example, if your ID was stolen or leaked, you would simply request a new one, and the old one would be archived. The old ID would continue to be valid for existing credit lines and other previously established links, but would no longer be valid as a lookup for new lines of credit or other interests. Ideally, you would update your old accounts with your new number. Maybe it would be mandatory to keep your ID up to date within a year of changing it.

Second, your ID should not be able to be guessed or calculated. There are guidelines for the structure of SSNs that indicate approximate year of issue and state issued in. With a random GUID, there is no such pattern (although it could be somewhat implemented with the resultant loss of security). The vastness of a 128-bit space would nearly eliminate guessing. The length of a GUID also means it would be difficult for people to memorize upon overhearing someone else reciting it.

So, if we were going to do this, do it right, do it big. Go from 10 bits to 128 bits and never think about it again.

After Irma

Posted by anachostic on September 12, 2017 No comments

This guy.

Way back in 2004, after the rash of hurricanes that I went through, someone gave me this thing as a holiday gift. I’m completely stumped as to what it is. A talisman? Totum? Spirit ward? Golum? Gargoyle? Whatever it is, it was packaged with an explanation that the object was intended to ward away hurricanes. After being through 4, it was a thoughtful gift. It’s been hanging in the kitchen since the day I moved in.

Well, I’m not sure if the object has a shelf life or an expiration date, but 12 years later, along comes a hurricane. My initial thought was, the hurricane is going to miss us and go to South Carolina. Then the track changed and it was going to go just east of us. Well, ok. The west side of the hurricane is the less intense part. Then the track changed again and Irma was going to the west of us. That’s not so good. The track changed one last time and resulted in a direct hit on my neighborhood.

Good going, thing. Way to do your job.

The power went out at about 8:30 that night, with the eye wall expected to hit at around 12:30am, in the dead of night. We took in about 3 hours of sleep, which was becoming normal – 2 or 3 hour blocks of sleep here and there to keep alert. Woke up around midnight with the weather getting steadily worse. Since the bedroom windows were facing the storm, the rain was hammering the glass and being generally distracting. We then moved to the living room.

I planted myself in front of the front window, on which I had finished putting shatterproof film before the storm. Our neighborhood’s power was out, there was still light coming from somewhere in the distance, so you could see shadows of trees blowing around. Sometimes you would see flashes of lightning or maybe power transformers, or car lights or whatever.

The eye wall came and it was impressive, although not exactly scary. The only shocking moment for me was during one massive gust where the rain being carried dropped the visibility to near zero. It was like being in an automatic car wash. And within about 10 minutes, it was generally over. We went back to bed.

I woke up the next morning to see what was left.

My jerk neighbor, whose trees I’ve complained about for a very long time, finally got his comeuppance. One full tree down and many limbs broken off. One limb fell on my/his/our fence, but that section was already damaged from a previous fall, so it was not really new damage.

I knew those trees were going to be trouble, so we purposely parked the cars in another location so they wouldn’t take any damage. They got pelted with leaves, but that’s about it.

I immediately started clearing debris, and most of my neighbors had started doing so as well. The winds were still gusting pretty good, but the skies were mostly clear. The power came back on at 12:30 – an outage of only 16 hours. Much better than I expected.

And after all that, My house and vehicle took zero damage. No shingles were lost, no screens were torn, no windows were broken.

This guy. He’s still on the job.

Irmageddon Approaches

Posted by anachostic on September 9, 2017 No comments

Storm arrives tomorrow. All prep is done. Everything is stowed away and vehicles are strategically placed to avoid the inevitable fallout from my neighbor’s shitty trees. People have been contacting me non-stop. There’s nothing to report yet.

I went out to get mail for the last time and my neighbors were out and wanted to chat. They all consider themselves prepared as well. One has his windows boarded up. Another has what looks like painters tape x-ing his windows. I finished installing shatter-resistant film on my front window.

Gas in my area isn’t as difficult to find as I thought it would be. My car and motorcycle are topped off and the GF’s car is also topped off. We also have 10 gallons of gas in cans. I don’t know how much good it will do us now, since I was unable to get the generator started. The old gas has apparently killed the carb.

Last night we went out to Lowe’s to get paint, since we’ll be stuck inside for a couple days. It was rather what you expect. The line for plywood went from the front to the back of the store. The three people in front of me each had a window AC unit.

Today was a stop at Target for a few supplies, and a last meal at Olive Garden. The hostess said they had a lot of employees bail on their shifts. No rush crowd by noon, just a few tables. We sat at the bar and let the Weather Channel explain how death was coming, but during commercial breaks, “Trust the Weather Channel”. Kinda creepy when you think about it.

The cat was been acting super weird on Friday, very clingy and agitated, but today has been more calm and reserved. So now it’s just a waiting game. Oddly, Friday delivered the first rain band – a far, far outlier, but it still behaved like a tropical downpour. Today, nothing. it was nice and sunny, sometimes overcast, but no rain.

I’ve Got… Aunt Irma Visiting

Posted by anachostic on September 5, 2017 No comments

Prep day 1 for the natural disaster, Hurricane Irma. Recently upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane, which is supposed to be death from the sky, probably will be Cat 4 or even 3 when it gets here. But hey, 3 or 4 cats can make a significant mess of things.

I was here in 2004 when we had four hurricanes cross over us. I remember at the time it became a joke – another weekend, another hurricane. At the time, I was living in an apartment in a newer apartment complex on the middle floor. So I had no potential for roof damage and no potential for flooding. The events were all pretty easy going. The balcony was always to the back of the storm, so I just sat out there and watch thing go by. I saw part of a metal roof get ripped off and I saw a displaced alligator walking around.

When I got my house in 2005, I was fully prepared. I got a generator, a chain saw, a chest freezer and a dorm fridge. That should keep me going for as long as I needed. And when did the next hurricane come along? It never did. Until now, 12 years later.

Today, I dug the generator out of the shed where it hadn’t been used once except for a test of the electrical output. It was surprisingly clean, but its functionality is still unknown. I need to change the oil and get some gas in it.

Speaking of gas, there’s a general hysteria going around now. Of course, when I’m out of gas in my car right now. So I stop at one station. I tried a pump and it didn’t work. Odd. I went to another pump and waited for a guy to fill 6 five-gallon gas containers. That pump didn’t work either. But it was just working! It dawned on me that the station was out of premium gas. So I went to another station. As fate would have it, they were out of regular gas and only had premium. So I got my car filled up. But in both places, there were cars everywhere. Luckily, everyone was civil (so far).

I also noticed that people were eating out a lot. Everything was crowded. I guess people didn’t want to deplete their stock at home. After eating, I went to a small store and found pretty much what I expected: no water, no bread. I bought other things, like pop-tarts and canned tuna fish and chips. My idea of survival is different than others.

And you know what, there will be more shipments. I’ll get some bread eventually. I have cases upon cases of Coke and drinks. One paranoid thing I did get tonight? Cash. Can’t use credit cards when there’s no power.

Farewell Half.com / Dream On

Posted by anachostic on September 1, 2017 No comments

Yesterday, I learned half.com is closing. I had one day of notice, essentially. I had just purchased two things the previous day. How did I not know this beforehand?

Today, I’m searching for news stories about the closure. There aren’t any stories of significance. Maybe 2 or 3 in second-tier tech news sites. Then there’s a few stories about 6 months ago when the announcement was first made. Included in those stories is a posting about someone who only found news of the closing in the help section of half.com, and no contacts at half or eBay would confirm the closing. How weird. Supposedly, the sellers were notified of the closing, but for whatever reason, the users and buyers were not.

So, the expected plan is for everyone to move their listings to eBay. But as far as I can tell, eBay is not designed for the sale of media. The whole design of half.com was that you searched for media, then you see who is selling it. On Ebay, you would search for media and you get a bunch of listings selling that media. Every listing would be created by each person, so there would be little to no consistency between them. Amazon is better suited for sales of that nature, since they have a product, then they have sellers of that product. It’s the same way that Amazon is not well suited to sell things that eBay excels at, like collectables and one-off unique items.

At some point in the future (not near or far future, somewhere in-between), I was planning on opening an online presence to sell my excess CDs. Half.com was the frontrunner. Now I have to choose between eBay and Amazon. Or maybe Discogs, but I think the buyers would be more discerning there, which would require more effort.

Well, in the meantime, I have plenty enough going on to not worry so much about it, but it is sad to see one of the few physical media marketplaces close down. You know what would be cool? What if… Barnes and Noble, who isn’t doing all that well themselves, resurrected the Borders brand (which they bought in bankruptcy court) and re-launched it as a used media outlet. (I hate the word outlet in this instance, but juggernaut is a word that has to be earned). I’m going to call this idea “Boarders” to prevent any confusion or lawsuits.

So here’s how I would see it operating. We have to recognize that used media, whether it be books, CDs, DVDs, VHS, or cassette, has a low value – except to collectors. So, understanding this, margins will be low across the board, no one is going to make a real killing at this.

So you’d start with an online store, structured mostly like half.com. That’s the cheapest way to get things started. People make their listings, sell their products and life goes on. Admittedly, getting the momentum started so it looks like you have lots of items will be difficult. To help in this, the tools to create listings will have to be top-notch. Something like having a pre-populated database of UPC codes with product descriptions and stock photos. Maybe have automated imports of structured files to batch add items.

That’s all well and good, but it’s just another vanilla ecommerce platform. How’s that going to be an Amazon? So let’s go to phase two. Amazon is already at phase two, so nothing earth-shattering here. Phase two is having Boarders warehouse the inventory. The sellers use the site’s control panel to create a shipment of product to the Boarders warehouse. This submision includes the item and the price at which they want to sell the product. Then they box everything up with a printed submission sheet and send it.

When the shipment arrives, the warehouse worker scans the code on the submission sheet, then begins scanning barcodes on the incoming products. The items get added to the sellers listings immediately. I’m no logistics expert, but I’d assume the warehouse manages the inventory in the most efficient way. The warehouse also gets notified when items sell and would ship them out efficiently as well.

I’m not going to downplay the expense of shipping and processing hundreds of books or CDs or DVDs for both the seller and Boarders. That’s something that would need to be overcome by the beancounters.

Since we’re still having fun with this, let’s move on to phase three. Phase three is physical storefront. These could be built into existing B&N stores or could be standalone. Stuff that was sent to the warehouses is bundled up and sent to various locations. Why would the seller care where the product actually is? All brick and mortar stores become warehouses.

Since these are low-margin sales, you need low-margin maintenance. You also need to know your potential customers. So for CDs and DVDs, what is needed is a clamshell container that holds the CD/DVD case and the disc separate, so they can both be inspected for condition without needing an associate to assist. I would have to think about how books would be handled because buyers would want to see inside the book. But anyway, back to disc-based media. You also don’t want to have cashiers deal with opening clamshells and ringing customers up, so you would have a self-checkout machine that accepts the clamshell in a slot, scans the barcode, completes the sale, then releases the unlocked clamshells for the customer to remove and bag up their purchases. The money goes off to the original seller and life goes on.

It’s just kind of a pipe dream. Realistically, there isn’t enough potential profit to engineer a checkout machine like that, plus manufacture tens of thousands of cases to hold media that is selling for $1.00 or so. Not to mention the cost of processing other people’s inventory and shipping it to storefronts.

Or maybe there is, somewhere. Or maybe, there can exists a company that makes enough money to survive, and doesn’t have to make its owner a multi-billionaire.

A World Without Stereotypes

Posted by anachostic on August 15, 2017 No comments

The concept of stereotypes has been around for a very long time. It’s only fairly recently that “Social Warriors” have taken up the fight to eliminate the use of stereotypes using the universal weapon of shame. I’m not saying that I’m in favor of keeping or eliminating the use of stereotypes. I’m saying that the point is moot. There are no stereotypes anymore.

Stereotypes have historically been a “bad thing”, because they encourage prejudice. They allow you to assume the behavior or personality of someone based on external factors. I certainly don’t need to bring up racial stereotypes, we all have plenty of examples for that.

Stereotypes provide a slightly less offensive use, also. They are coping mechanisms, where one can sort of explain away behavior that they find objectionable. Like I say, that’s only slightly more offensive, since all you’re doing is reinforcing the stereotype in your mind for future prejudice.

Anyway, like I said, there’s no reason for any of that anymore. I’ll provide an example and you can build it out from there. Long ago, you could make an educated guess (which is just a polite term for prejudice) as to how a driver would behave on the road based on the vehicle they drove. BMW drivers? Women in minivans? Old, beat-up, rusty Toyotas? Little foreign cars with fart cans for mufflers, lowered to the ground? Are you developing mental images for each of these? Well, those images are all outdated.

You used to be able to see a car swerve on the road and say, “Typical (stereotype). No surprises there.” Or pull up behind a vehicle covered with bumper stickers and think, “Yup, pretty much what I thought” when you analyze the stickers’ content. But no more. Any car can surprise you. An “old-person Buick” goes weaving through the lanes; you get honked at by a fleet of micro-sized cars; middle fingers from corporate vehicles.

The reality is, everyone is an asshole. It doesn’t matter what car they drive, they are going to be an asshole on the road. Taking that a little further, it doesn’t matter what their gender is, what their race is, or what their religion is. They are going to drive like shit and put everyone at risk for their own selfishness.

Now, can this logic be applied outside of the highways and interstates? Maybe, but probably not yet. Over time, maybe we can eliminate our differences in the non-driving world and we can all be a common humanity of assholes. I can see progress being made on that front every day.

But more seriously, there are so many goddamned people now, it is not possible to be prejudiced. You simply cannot predict what any one people will say or do. You will consistently be surprised, for better or worse, and usually for the worse. If you try to create stereotypes, you will have so many distinctions that it becomes useless to try and refine them any further. It’s part of the individualization fashion, started when Windows 3.1 came out. Yes, I blame Windows.

They Robbed Me Blind

Posted by anachostic on July 31, 2017 No comments

Saturday morning, I went to get in my car and noticed the door wasn’t latched. Weird. I got in the car and my glove box was hanging open and my center console door was open. Really weird. Then it dawned on me. My car had been broken into. I use the term “broken into” loosely because I rarely lock my car doors. I figure there’s nothing really of value for anyone to steal, and if they do steal something, it’s just an excuse to upgrade.

I looked around and nothing was missing. This puzzled me. My CDs were still there, my GPS/dashcam was still there, my MP3 player was still there. A card wallet with probably $150 in gift cards in it was still there. Yeah, I don’t expect anyone to steal my CDs, and yeah, they could have grabbed the MP3 player and said, “Oh, it’s a Zune”, but hey, doesn’t everything have some value to a pawn shop? Are these smart thieves that only steal things of real value?

So whatever, I closed everything up and went about my day, puzzling over the experience. I didn’t feel violated or anything, just confused. Like I had such shitty stuff it wasn’t even worth stealing. As I think about it now, maybe someone just wanted to know what it was like to sit in a car like mine? But why wouldn’t they close up the storage areas before they left? By Sunday evening, it didn’t even really mean anything to me. As I was driving home, I needed to put on my glasses. I wear glasses only for distance viewing and I need them especially at night to reduce the halo effect of lights.

Where’s my glasses? They’re not in their usual place. Seriously? That’s what they stole, my prescription glasses? What good will my glasses do them? What a stupid criminal.

So now, I have to get another eye exam (which is overdue anyway) and get a new pair of prescription glasses. Like most “disasters” in life, it’s just an inconvenience.

He Who Controls The Spice

Posted by anachostic on July 24, 2017 No comments

This weekend, I picked up a couple of other CDs from my prime musical era: the 80’s. It would probably be interesting to poll people and find out what they consider the best music of their life. Based on anecdotal evidence I’ve seen, it would be the era in which a person became an adult, about when they were 18-21. But that’s not really the point of this post.

The thing I have discovered is that although we have all these eras of music: 50’s/oldies, 60’s/hippy, 70’s/classic rock, 80’s/glam/pop, 90’s/depression, and onward, each era has so much more than those generalizations I just assigned to them. And even when you explore those other genres, they are still consistent with other genres of that era and also different than the same genre in other eras. For example, Jazz in the 70’s sounds different than Jazz in the 80’s. But Jazz in the 80’s still has that production sound of pop music the 80’s. So the point I’m trying to make is that you can explore many genres within your prime musical era. The amount of music just within your preferred era is staggering. Believe me, I’ve been getting more and more daring and buying artists I only had a faint memory of. The best way to describe the result of that effort is like filling in a puzzle of the entire musical landscape of the 80’s. You see (hear) each album all in context and relation to the others and the era as a whole becomes more defined. But that’s not really the point of this post, either.

I had to put those thoughts out first because I am curious abut the future (and a little about the past). The 80’s could be the premier music moment in recorded music history, all due to the creation of the CD. Because of the mad rush to upgrade past recordings to CD, then because of the eventual low cost of CD production, there is an overwhelming amount of music physically available on CD, both past and present (present meaning 80’s).

However, as we know, streaming is becoming the new standard. Proponents of this format claim that it will encompass everything, where any music ever made will be available at a moment’s notice. But will it? It’s been shown many times over that an artist can simply refuse their catalog to be offered on a streaming service. Not only an artist, but maybe an entire label. If a label goes bankrupt, where do the rights go? The music is only available when everything is working perfectly – and I wasn’t even meaning the technical bits working perfectly.

With our massively analytical society and our ROI-driven corporate environment, what are the odds that a streaming service would look at some particular music and see it isn’t being accessed enough or isn’t generating enough revenue, so it is just removed from the service. It’s no longer available. It’s not lost, just unavailable, which is pretty much the same thing to an end user. I have seen news that some albums are no longer being released on a physical medium, therefore there is no way to own a copy of the music. If this pattern accelerates, then there will come a time in the future where music can be lost.

Of course, none of this matters to me, because I’m still filling in the gaps of my era, but future generations will end up having a very spotty image of what music was like in their prime. That would be a shame.

What’s Good For Us Is Good For You

Posted by anachostic on July 13, 2017 No comments

It was a while ago that I had gone to Pollo Tropical and ordered my usual, with a large drink. The cashier replied, “We only have one size of drink now.” Ok. But that is a medium cup. Right. That change, which I considered kind of significant, made me think about the whys of such an unannounced change.

For the company, the change would mean reducing the number of items they had to stock and order, which has benefit. Also, it’s less drink walking out the door, because who wouldn’t refill before leaving? So, there’s that savings. And finally, I assume it’s a preemptive move when the pressure comes on for the death of soft drinks. Kind of, “Hey, we’re not even allowing people to buy more than 20 ounces here.”

Although I was pretty displeased with the change, I accepted it and moved on. Then, yesterday, I went to Firehouse Subs and got a meal combo. I was given a 20 oz cup. Wait, didn’t this used to include a 32oz drink? I looked around and saw 32oz cups on other tables, so I don’t know what I did wrong. Oh well, I don’t eat here that often anymore, so I sucked it up and got on with my day.

Today, I go to Sweet Tomatoes. I get to the cashier and ask for a large drink. She hands me a 20oz cup. No, I want the large size. “We only have these now.” WTF. Just like Pollo. But, Sweet Tomatoes only ever had 32oz to-go cups, not the 20oz. So something’s afoot here. It’s not simplifying stock items, it’s shrinking things.

Fountain drinks are the biggest profit makers for a restaurant. It’s under a quarter for a cup, lid, straw and the drink itself. Considering many places I go charge $3 for a drink, you better believe I get refills and to-go cups whenever I can. And now, they’re shrinking the available cup sizes so you can’t leave with an extra 10 cents of drink?

For future reference, Boston Market still only has one drink cup – a 32oz cup. They’ve recently changed from a plastic cup to a paper cup. Let’s see if they shrink it down to a 20oz.

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