I eat the same thing for lunch every day — vegetables, hummus and pita bread. No, I’m not a vegan health nut. No, I’m not a rabbit. No, I’m not a vegan health nut rabbit. I’m a guy who sits at a desk all day and needs to eat.
My coworkers find it a little odd. They find it funny. They find it amazing that my steady diet of vegan rabbit food doesn’t drive me to afternoon microwave popcorn and pod coffee binges. That’s okay, I enjoy the ridicule. My behavior is odd and funny and amazing, at least within the mundanity of office life. It also makes perfect sense. So let’s unpack my lunch.
Lunch in midtown Manhattan isn’t cheap. Oceana, one block over, serves a tasty Salad of Grilled Louisiana Shrimp with mango, young coconut (none of that geriatric, senior citizen coconut), yogurt dressing and cashews for $27. The Capital Grille features a Wagyu Beef Carpaccio, dished up chilled with wasabi arugula, for a price that magically appears on the check moments before you lay down that American Express Black card. What can I say? Bankers like seafood and steak, and investing taxpayer money to make billions, which then gets funneled back into bonuses and expense accounts and spent on pricey lunches.