Uber Eats is coming for your forks.
Beware of the man with only one gun, he may know how to use it. - Col. Jeff Cooper
We own exactly 5 forks: one salad fork and four dinner forks. We’re now handwashing our 5 forks because we don’t run the dishwasher enough to prevent running out of forks. This is not some minimalist thing. We’ve been slowly losing forks over the last few years. Adult children at home, combined with the rise of food delivery services, appear to be the culprit. The children are all out of the house now, but as post-college adults with jobs and different schedules, they would order food and eat it in their rooms, often while playing video games. When they finally cleaned out the mess, forks would end up in the food bag that went into the trash.
I thought this was unique to us, but friends have confirmed that this is true for them as well. Maybe other generations didn’t have food delivery at scale so this wasn’t a problem previously and no one could warn us. Well, I’m sounding the alarm, Uber Eats is coming for your forks!
We’ve had these utensils for a long time and my wife likes a matching set. As a result, southern-style mismatched silverware is off the table. Pun completely intended. I’m not dying to drop money on enough silverware for the limited times the whole family comes over, mostly because I’m being stubborn. I’m thinking of making each kid + spouse bring one of their forks to make a point.
My preferred solution is to get rid of our existing silverware and switch to actual silverware, that is our sterling silver set. I’ve mentioned before that my mom realized her sterling silver didn’t have any real value. We’re in the same boat. I say we use it every day and live like kings and queens. If we use it all the time we wouldn’t bother polishing it and we wouldn’t worry if the dishwasher damaged a piece.
I know this idea may horrify a few folks, but I’m tired of storing stuff we rarely use and I’m not thrilled with spending money on something we already have an alternative for. I think this is the equivalent of driving the aging Corolla with 200k miles and an oil leak so we don’t put miles on the pristine Mercedes in the garage. I have yet to convince my wife of the value of this plan, so it’s a work in progress. Wish me luck.