Eating Habits and Diet During Covid19

[casimira]

Bixa, a huge number of these restaurants are providing takeout, curbside and delivery services.

But, it's not enough for many of them to cover the exorbitant rents, knowing how much food to order from purveyors, paying their utility bills, and a number of other factors. Most are just getting by with the skin of their teeth.
Also, many people are wary of ordering out food as they are being super cautious.

It's really a roll of the dice for a majority of them.

NOLA has a lot more restaurants then most major cities as you well know. (And since you were last here which was right after Katrina many had not reopened after that catastrophe. But, over the years since then, I would guess the number of eateries has doubled and then some.)

[bixaorellana]

May 3, 2020 12:19:46 GMT casimira said:

the exorbitant rents

Factors such as amount of food to order are a built-in risk for restaurants at any time. But if landlords want their city to be able to wake up and thrive after the virus, they'd better start thinking about reducing rents, which long since went past what the traffic will bear in New Orleans & other places. As far as utility bills, state & local governments have the power to subsidize part of those bills.

[Kimby]

Trump said early on “the restaurants will be back. They might have different owners, but...”

The man has no empathy at all.

[lagatta]

Yes, especially for an entrepreneur (?) in the hospitality business. And I'm sure he'd prefer conglomorates rather than local restaurant café and restaurant owners, and related businesses, involved in their communities. Several restaurant owners nearby here have a sock drive for homeless people before winter sets in (and get monetary donations and other garments as well as socks); one of them has held benefits for a community centre, others mentor youth.

We can also clearly see how Trump views this crisis as an opportunity (for him). Like Katrina.

[casimira]

There are some landlords that are cutting their tenants some slack but, others, greedy developers from the get go who seized up properties on Oak Street for instance, renovated them and now charge these exorbitant rents are not cutting their tenants any slack. 

I personally know of two of them in particular. (And, they don't live in this neighborhood but in tres chic mansions in the Garden District or out in Lakeview (another bastion for the rich and greedy).

[cheerypeabrain]

I've just had to update my grocery order, couldn't get a delivery slot so I did 'click and collect" which means that the supermarket brings my order into an area in their car park for us to pick it up. I did the order 2 weeks ago and had no idea what I would need so I went online today to amend the order. I will check again tomorrow.

Jeff thinks that I'm crazy. He'd rather use the corner shop.

[tod2]

Something I was not aware of until yesterday was that our lockdown permits us to shop for food not further than 5km away from your home. Now, my favourite Woolworths Food store is 8km away in another village and is seldom packed with shoppers….. We have a much larger Woolworths about 2km from my home but its huge and in a busy shopping mall…..something I'm trying to avoid.
I'll have to plead ignorance if stopped in a roadblock because I intend shopping at the smaller shop.

[lagatta]

It is obviously far safer to shop in the smaller one that isn't as crowded. I certainly understand why they don't want congestion, but sometimes the law is a bit of an arse...

[kerouac2]

Do they count the number of people allowed in a supermarket? In France they do. 10 people out, 10 people in.

[bjd]

In my local Leclerc, which is really big, they don't want more than 100 shoppers at a time. If there is no line, you just walk in, but if it starts getting crowded, people are allowed in as others leave.

The local Lidl has no lines or controls.

[kerouac2]

My own Leclerc where I went this morning is just a supermarket and not a hypermarket. I think they allow 50 people inside. Unfortunately, everybody is attracted to the same aisles.

[Kimby]

I’m not aware of number limits at our supermarkets, but they have changed the aisles so they are one-way in alternating directions. And finally masks are required for everyone.

[onlyMark]

It's all a matter of scale - I went to Ikea a few days ago. There was a man at the only entrance and a man on the only exit. They were about twenty metres away from each other. Each had one of those hand held clicker counters.
As I left I heard the man on the exit shout to the other one, "Ok, another hundred."

[tod2]

As far as I can see, there is nobody counting at the supermarket door. They do however watch to see that you sterilise your hands, and of course everybody is wearing a mask.
Disturbing news is that our local agricultural Showgrounds have been converted into a hospital and the ice rink in Durban 75km away, has been set up as a temporary morgue.
I think that is why the government added on another two weeks to our lockdown and even now at level 4 we all have to be in our houses by 8pm. You can come out for a jog or walk between 6-9am that's it.
The police have been handing out fines left right and centre. One chap was arrested for being on the other side of his fence mowing a patch of lawn for his dad. Arrest took place on a Capetown beach because a young man took to long after he pulled his kayak out of the water. Tried to explain he was exhausted and resting but the police would have none of it. Arseholes.

[kerouac2]

Excess enforcement is always annoying, but at the same time it is very useful for convincing the rest of the population that rules should be followed strictly. There have been some cases like that in France, but one is allowed to contest the fine and some of them are cancelled.

[lagatta]

True, but it can also be dangerous if people actually aren't allowed to shop. I'm in one of those weird bits where I thought it was very early in the morning and it is actually still the evening - just hope I can get back to sleep. I have very little appetite. I have a wee bit of dry white Portuguese wine left and am nursing it slowly and hoping I can stay asleep overnight.

Very quiet outside. Usually there is loud music from somewhere in tropical South America at this hour. Colombia? Venezuela? There is nobody outside, though it isn't quite 8 pm/20h. The small bit of dry white Portuguese is delicious and I'm hoping it will ensure a decent sleep at a time when I thought it would be getting up and dark coffee! Now Livia is playing with her mouse and I checked to be sure it was a toy one! The idea of not a sound this time in the early evening (and not frigid) is very strange indeed. No pedestrians, no joggers, no cyclists, no motorists... No laughing lovers or weaving pub-goers... Where the fuck am I? Going to bed, trying to sleep.

[questa]

Our supermarkets and hardware shops work on the count of so many people per aisle. The big hardware place has workers each end of the aisle and others stationed near the entrance who know the location of what you want and scuttle off to get it. If you are not sure what you want they are there to advise and demonstrate if necessary.
Reminds me of the 1950's when this was the accepted manner of buying and selling. It was called "Service".

[onlyMark]

Our house in Spain is in a big farming area, so there are plenty of hardware shops around. In the large local town there are two big ones at either end.
When we first went to the area, if you wanted anything from the shops, you just had a counter where you told them what it is and they scurried into the back to get it. Always a problem for me because I had no idea what the Spanish name was and neither did Mrs M even though she spoke it because a ten mil rubber grommet didn't happen to often come up when she was learning the language.

Then one of them closed down over the winter and made it all open plan so you could wander round at will. It got nearly all the trade so the other one made theirs the same the next winter. Now I take visitors to one of them that sells everything as it is really interesting inside and has anything from olive tree pesticide to cookers, fridges, and serrano ham stands.

[bjd]

My husband usually hates going into stores but will happily browse in those big hardwares stores.

[kerouac2]

I finished all of my tomatoes, cucumber, capiscum and lettuce at the same time so I need to buy some more fast or else I will open my huge vacuum pack of confit de canard and seal my fate.

[casimira]

I would love that hardware store Mark. I just know it.

Whenever we would go to Mexico one of my favorite paces to scope out would be the hardware stores. They always had the coolest stuff and never disappointed.

When I come to visit I want to go explore yours please.

[onlyMark]

It would be a pleasure. My kids laugh at me because I pretend to cry if we go past it and I don't have time or a reason to go in. I wave at it and say I will see you later, I won't leave you.
Last thing before we move back to the topic at hand - this is it -

[kerouac2]

We have two "big box" hardware chains in France (and they have been allowed to reopen) -- Leroy Merlin and Castorama (but there are at least 5 or 6 other chains in category 2). One interesting thing about them is that it has been found (and it is also my experience) that just about all of the people who contact the staff and ask lots of questions are women. 1. They are tired of asking their "man" to do things, and 2. They are not at all embarrassed to admit that they don't know how to do things, unlike we men. I envy them.

[bjd]

Well, they are open but you can't go in and browse. You order online and they bring the stuff out to the parking lot and you pick it up and load your car while the clerk stands back.

"They are not at all embarrassed to admit that they don't know how to do things, unlike we men. I envy them."
It's well known that men won't ask for street directions either. Why do you think Moses wandered in the desert for 40 years?

[tod2]

You know bjd I think you've got something there!

[htmb]

I love browsing in interesting hardware stores and I quickly learned, as a young bride of 22, that if I wanted something done around the house that involved wiring, plumbing, or remodeling, I’d damn well better learn to do it myself because my spouse was clueless and wished to remain so. I’m still proud of the new electrical cord I attached to the old clothes dryer someone gave me. And it worked for at least ten years, until the rest of the dryer gave out.

[bixaorellana]

May 8, 2020 4:20:04 GMT onlyMark said:

I had no idea what the Spanish name was and neither did Mrs M even though she spoke it because a ten mil rubber grommet didn't happen to often come up when she was learning the language.

There are language-to-language picture dictionaries for adults, but I've been unable to find the kind I'm thinking of to show here. There used to be a series that were extremely specialized, with elaborate line drawings and photographs showing something like a factory floor or a shipyard with every single thing identified. So handy!

May 8, 2020 6:56:29 GMT bjd said:

My husband usually hates going into stores but will happily browse in those big hardwares stores.

I adore hardware stores & have been fascinated by them since I was a child. My grandfather & uncle had a general store with hardware and all kinds of stuff for rural needs. My great-uncle had a full-service hardware store as well, which also was tons of fun to be in.

[bjd]

I used to have a dictionary like that for English/French. Tons of drawings of all kinds of technical things by subject and the name in both languages.

[kerouac2]

I do have one of those illustrated dictionaries, and it is wonderful. Even when you know how to say door, hinges or doorknob in a language, you often do not automatically know how to say door frame, lintel or deadbolt.

[onlyMark]

I just downloaded a special builder's dictionary where it had all the Spanish translations. After a while I didn't need it.
My Spanish vocabulary is 60% building terms, 38% food, 1% numbers and 1% for anything needed to string a sentence together.