Fast Food Weakness

[fusangite]

It is a modern, American thing. Usage of the term "fast food" is more than just "food you get fast." It carries with it the connotation of going to a restaurant where you order at the counter (or the drive-through), get your food there too, take it back to your table where you get no further service in terms of, say, waiters, and you bus your own table. It carries with it also the connotation of a "kitchen" where mass produced food components are assemblied in modern factory-like assembly line processes by "workers" that nobody even calls cooks in the loosest sense of that word.

Interesting point. You're right. For me, "fast food" has only some of the connotations you list. I don't drive and, when I get those Sausage McMuffins I love so much, I always get takeout. So, at the level of individual experience, there isn't a whole lot of difference between standing in line on the street and getting a sticky rice wrap in a brown paper bag and standing in line in a McDonalds and ending up with a Sausage McMuffin in a bag. Also, don't you find that Subway's emergence as a fast food model has challenged some of this?

Maybe usage is different in Canada, or quite likely in places like Northern Europe where English isn't the native language, but in America, if you say "fast food" that's what you mean. It's quite distinct from getting pre-cooked food from, say, a street vendor. It's not at all just food you can get fast. When I lived in Argentina, I ate a lot of food that was available immediately upon order, but I only ate fast food once. And that's when I was at MacDonald's in Buenos Aires.

I'm just musing here but I think another factor in how I think about fast food may be the change in McDonald's ownership model in Canada since I was a kid; some McDonalds stores are now small franchises, owned by families, with limited menus that don't include everything you get in the big stores they built in the 70s and 80s.

 

[fusangite]

I'm sorry you feel that way. Well, don't let me bother anyone anymore. Guess I'm not cool enough to hang with the /ooc clique.

Wow! I'm one of the cool kids somewhere! Hurray for small ponds!

 

[Desdichado]

Also, don't you find that Subway's emergence as a fast food model has challenged some of this?

Possibly, although it's still "order at a counter, no waiters, and assembly line building of your product of mass-produced food components." Subway not being "cooked" as part of the assembly seems to be the biggest difference. Although the customer being the supervisor and telling the worker exactly how to assemble the sandwich is pretty significant too.

But I agree that what can or cannot pass muster under daily usage of the term "fast food" is undergoing a bit of evolution, partly because of new chains that are deliberately trying to expand what types of things can be offered. Subway was one of the first of those, but Quizno's and others are expaning it as well.

 

[Voadam]

It's the great pumpkin, Charlie Brown...

How does everything always return to pumpkin toting?

 

[Queen_Dopplepopolis]

How does everything always return to pumpkin toting?

*innocent look* I don't know. Ask Rel. He knows.

 

[Rel]

How does everything always return to pumpkin toting?

Because, you silly, pumpkin toting is the most important thing in the universe (not to be confused with The Universe).

 

[Desdichado]

Because, you silly, pumpkin toting is the most important thing in the universe (not to be confused with The Universe).

Great, now I've got images of The_Universe inserting all kinds of things into his orifices. You just aren't giving the mind's eye any breaks lately, are you?

 

[Rel]

Great, now I've got images of The_Universe inserting all kinds of things into his orifices. You just aren't giving the mind's eye any breaks lately, are you?

You mean like a bacon double cheeseburger?

I get enough grief about my own filthy mind without you trying to make me responsible for yours too.

 

[Desdichado]

I get enough grief about my own filthy mind without you trying to make me responsible for yours too.

In the spirit of "blame society, or at least someone else, for your own problems" which we've had in this thread so far, I am absolutely trying to make you responsible for my dirty mind.

 

[reveal]

You mean like a bacon double cheeseburger?

I get enough grief about my own filthy mind without you trying to make me responsible for yours too.

"Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun" just took on a whole new meaning.