The Breads Roundup No. 55

Restaurant Etiquette, Police Training and Digital Advertising

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Hello Big Ballers,

Welcome back to The Breads 2021! What a day yesterday huh? I almost didn’t send out an email today but figured you folks might want things to read about other than a flipped house (yay) and domestic terrorism (boo). I won’t bother writing about the coup yesterday because I’m sure you watched it on the news all day yesterday and have read things from far smarter people than me.  Plus I already put most of this together before the siege befitting a Workaholics episode went down. 

But first, oh man. This essay from Ann Patchett is a beautiful heartbreaking piece about friendship, the pandemic, chemotherapy and life. It's a rather long read but very much worth it.

Anyways I know why you’re here. The linkies! Enjoy.

The Customer Is Not Always Right

Gimme Dat Synopsis Quickie:
A deep dive into how the pandemic has impacted servers and restaurants and how many, many diners are colossal assholes. This piece has a ton of sources and first person accounts. Very worth reading if you haven't thought about how tough people in the service industry have it right now.

And A Quote From The Article Please:

The American approach to dining is very individualistic. It is about what the diner wants, when they want it. It does not matter what is happening at the restaurant, which in many ways is a choreography as precarious as a set of spinning plates. It does not matter that there are other diners with needs, too. There is a belief the rules apply to everyone else, except them. “It’s a continual championing of the individual,” writes Priya Basil in her 2020 book, Be My Guest. “The hospitality industry thrives on the message that you are the only one who counts: you should come first, your every need considered and catered to. You deserve it, after all, as long as you can pay.”

And Tell Me Why I should Care:
If you're going out to eat, or ever plan to go out to eat again you should think about these things. If you've never worked at a restaurant before you should definitely read this as I think a lot of people don't quite understand how the American restaurant industry has evolved to essentially place all of the power in the hands of diners and leave servers practically powerless. It really shows people's true colors when they have a bit of power, and surprise, a lot of people are shitty, so be one of the good ones when you are at restaurants during the pandemic and beyond.

Society Is Paying The Price For America's Outdated Police Training Methods

Gimme Dat Synopsis Quickie:
An article outlines how the US has no uniform methods or standards for training police. Much of what exists sets a very low bar (aspiring officers can sometimes find themselves on the streets before they are certified) and often times that low bar is not even met before officers hit the streets. It's an antiquated, broken process that needs an upgrade.

And A Quote From The Article Please:

Though some independent academies may provide excellent training, criminal-justice experts say there are inherent problems in outsourcing police training to schools that have a financial incentive to enroll as many people as possible. Among them: problem cadets are less likely to be flagged before they graduate; the policing methods taught vary drastically across schools; and with no formal oversight, instructors with racist and sexist attitudes may continue to teach for years.

And Tell Me Why I should Care:
I'm not here to tell you what your opinion on Defund the Police should be (if you've read this newsletter often you should be able to infer my stance), but I am here to put before you some very illuminating and revealing information in the form of an article that does a good job of laying out facts objectively without using any emotional language. Whatever your opinion on what the police's level of involvement in society should be you can't possibly think the system in place works well right now and in this you’ll read some eye opening stats and anecdotes about how the system works at face value. Give it a read.

When Big Brands Stopped Spending On Digital Ads, Nothing Happened. Why?

Gimme Dat Synopsis Quickie:
If you're involved in any way in running ads on the internet via the monopolies of Facebook and Google you should give this a quick read to help think about how you spend your advertising budget. Spoiler alert, there are a lot of bots and click farms you need to worry about.

And A Quote From The Article Please:

Much of the problem with digital advertising today stems from marketers’ obsession with big numbers. But big numbers of ads and clicks do not translate into more business activity and sales. They are just large numbers in dashboards and spreadsheets. Marketers could be spending far fewer dollars and getting the same levels of business outcomes; or spending the dollars more smartly in digital and getting even more business outcomes than they are now. How?

And Tell Me Why I should Care:
Not sure you should feel entirely bad for these huge companies that are losing money to bot farms, well actually I am sure you shouldn’t, but it’s something you should definitely be aware of it you run a small business or do any sort of ad buying as part of your job. There’s a whole buncha robots out there that aren’t taking your jobs, they’re taking your money.

How Things Indicative Of The Past Year Began

• A Brief History Of Nachos
  I always make brief history of nachos whenever I have a plate of them in front of me. Heyo! I'm fat! But seriously as would be expected of any great culinary achievement, nachos were born out of scarce ingredients, necessity and brash decision making.

• What The Troubled History Of Telecommuting Tells Us About Its Future
  Working from home isn't all about taking midday blunt breaks and wacking off while accidentally still on video calls, no it's about productivity people! The original apprehension wasn't about creativity and being around more ideas, no, it was all about surveillance. And now that there has been a major catalyst forcing people to work from home (pandemic) and employers now have the tech needed to keep tabs on employees, things are a-ok with the corps. So now everyone wins, well, except for the employees who now live at the office.

• A Plague Of Madness
  This is an oral history on the time-travel pandemic classic 12 Monkeys, which if you've never seen I'd highly suggest. It's trippy as hell and has a young, clinically insane, Bradley Pitts. Yum.

I Have Increasingly Become Interested In Food

• The Tasting Menu At The End Of The World
  With three Michelin stars, SingleThread, located in Sonoma, is one of the premier farm-to-table restaurants in the world. Given its location, it has also had to deal with some environmental shit in the past few years. This is a rather optimistic look at how things are moving forward and how a restaurant can combat climate change.

• Why Is There A Bucatini Shortage In America?
  I know y'all can't keep all the pasta varietals straight so bucatini is the long spaghetti with a hole in the middle of the noodle. It literally looks like a mini, edible pool noodle. There is a shortage of it in America and it's not because people are buying it way more than other pasta shapes. This was one of my favorite articles of the year as it delves into food culture, consumerism and bureaucracy. And the writer is honestly hilarious. I laughed multiple times reading this. If you don't read this you ain't a real pasta fan.

• After Dining On This Fish, Your Next Course Might Be 36 hours Of Hallucinations
  I'm pretty sure last newsletter I had an article about fugu in here. Well this fish ain't fugu, but it will make you trip your balls off and possibly see demons while you’re chilling on the beach along the beautiful Mediterranean Coast.

Let’s Just Look At Art Because Reading Sucks

• A Trucker’s Photographic Ode To America

• Inspired By Propaganda Posters, Xinmei Liu Challenges The Norm In Model Citizen Guidelines

• Kat Tzingounakis Illustrates Like A Modern Dr Seuss

Other Interesting Things From The Past Year You May Or May Not Care About

• What The NBA Bubble Taught Scientists About Jet Lag
  Who would have thought playing a rigorous NBA game and then flying halfway across the country at 2 am for a game the next day would make it so that players did not perform at optimal levels. Frankly, I am shocked.

• How Bubba Wallace Pushed NASCAR To Evolve In 2020
  Some really interesting and important information from a guy who is a professional at a sport I know pretty much nothing about. But I'm impressed.

• The Most-Read Wikipedia Page On Each Day Of 2020
  This is a really good snapshot of the past year and also will have you truly believing that time does not exist, because some of these thing in the early part of the year feel like they were in the 1980s.

• The Journalist And The Pharma Bro
  Wowwowweewow. The Shkreldawg courted a journalist who was covering him and she left her husband for him but now he is in jail and not talking to her because he found out she was writing this piece. It's a wild ride of journalistic integrity, romance nobody asked for and, luckily, no sexy time.

• The Full(est Possible) Story Of The Four Seasons Total Landscaping Press Conference
  Oh man oh man oh man what a saga. This will go down with the Dyatlov Pass Incident and DB Cooper as one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of our time. What the hell happened on that little strip of paradise between a crematorium and Fantasy Island? We'll never truly know.

Brands I Quite Like

There are so many brands out there that are not cool or unique that I thought I would highlight new brands that I think are in fact doing dope things and are worth knowing about. This is not sponsored or full of affiliate links.

Rains - Dope Scandinavian Rain Gear

They are Danish. I have never been to the Kingdom of Denmark, but I bet it would be a nice place. They seem to make really good rain gear, and you can always judge the quality of a country by the rain gear they make. I, in fact, have a jacket from Rains courtesy of my girlfriend and it has served me well. If you wanna walk down the street in a minimal waterproof banger that is pretty affordable for the quality this is what you should holler at. You’ll be walking in slow motion looking like Mads Mikkelsen or Nikolaj Coster-Waldau or Alicia Vikander (I know, she’s Swedish, but still fits with the Scandinavian theme) while the rain flies off your body like the true sex lord that you are. Ok I gotta chill, they’re nice rain jackets though. Check them out.

Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous

• 121 Minutes With Guy Fieri
  No, this is not some weird pre-pubescent party game all the kids are playing nowadays. It's just a profile of the Mayor of Flavortown who seems pretty awesome despite his gauche persona. He is just a good dude who wants to give back. Also listen to this Shane Torres standup bit if you've never heard it, it's a dandy.

• Exploring James Baldwin’s Old Haunts In New York And Paris
  Man how cool would it have been to roll around town with Baldwin and hit up some of his favorite haunts getting drunk with him. It’s also a really cool site design if you’re into that sort of thing.

• This Artist Posed As A Hungarian Billionaire Buyer To Get Into 25 New York Penthouses
  It turns out it ain't all that hard to fake your way into checking out luxury apartment buildings and turning the experience into an art project. Curbed speaks with Hungarian artists Andi Schmied about what it was like to shoot the most expensive apartments in New York under the guise of a prospective buyer.

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