National (food) Service.

I dropped Thomas off at work yesterday. He’s banging the pans together at some burger place/cocktail bar on the other side of the river. It was a hot day, and the ferries were running slow and overcrowded because of New Year’s Eve.

As is his way, he casually dropped a hand grenade into the conversation, completely out of nowhere. He said, “There should totally be national service, but not for the military. Everybody should be forced to work for one year in a commercial kitchen.”

And that was it. He went right back to fiddling with his phone, leaving me to chew on the idea. Honestly, the more I think about it, the less crazy it seems.

Idiots are always banging on about how national service is great for “turning boys into men.” But honestly? A year grinding it out as a short-order cook or dish pig in a burger bar might do the same job—without the risk of getting your head blown off. As a happy side effect, it might even make people a bit more considerate of waitstaff.