QUALITY v QUANTITY

Some of us are judgmental about the expression “quality time” and think it is a euphemism for “other things are more important to me.” I am not so sure. Everything in life can be voluminous without being good… witness the typical Amish restaurant. They serve buckets of mashed white potatoes and string beans, corn, and some unidentified beige meat, a loaf of bread with brown gravy and second and third helpings. What do you get from all this? Follow a few Pennsylvania Dutch women from behind and see for yourself. The same goes for McDonalds with their super-sized fries and gallons of high fructose corn syrup laden soda. Now I am not here to be critical of the yummy-ness of a single McDonald’s cheeseburger or even a McChicken sandwich. I am not fond of McNuggets as the anatomical parts of the chicken chosen for this delicacy are not completely clear to me. I am thinking that the part of the chicken that goes over the fence last may be in there somewhere. Just saying. It is after all, a “chicken product.”

Gastronomically speaking, I prefer a spicy perhaps “hot” morsel in lower volume, THE "PERFECT BITE" with more adventurous taste. I guess “quality time” can be that. The very busy father who comes home from work late and sits on the floor and plays with his kids and lets them jump on him is as good or better as the one who just sits there like a bowl of Amish white potatoes in the room for hours and does not interact. Worst of all is the “pretense” of quality time, which is both “very little time” and “no active involvement.” Ideally lots of involvement many hours per day is a good thing too but that kind of blows my Amish metaphor out of the water so I will just ignore that. Anyway, if you are employed full time, mom or dad, that option is off the table, or off the floor as the case may be.

The same goes for cars and houses. People in America are finally coming to their senses and have halved their average home size expectations. No more football field sized master bathrooms and kitchens, gyms, and 5 extra bedrooms in case the Lakers come to visit. Sure, we still love our SUVs but in the day of 5 dollar per gallon gas looming just over the next (capitol) hill we are looking more for “crossovers” that carry almost as much as an SUV but ride and get miles per gallon closer to cars. Is seems that Ms. soccer mom does not really need a 5,000 square foot house and a 6,000 pound truck as much as she thought.

We may never get down to the MINI-everything they have in England and Japan but if the economy does not turn around, it is more likely than not that everything but our rear-ends will get smaller in the next decade. The Amish family style buffet and a smaller car are a mismatch. Then there is air travel where sooner or later you may have to buy your ticket based on your body weight. You think checked baggage is expensive? We may be forced to eat less so we can fit into the things we can afford like smaller houses and cars, and airplane seats. Or, alternatively, maybe our cars and buildings will be Quantity and not Quality because it is hard to have both at an affordable price. Perhaps we can aspire to be like Eskimos except for our Igloos will be made of the plentiful and ubiquitous mashed white potatoes instead of snow. Two birds with one stone…now we’re talking.