Do you find your job, diet, and existence inadequate? If not, make sure to read this latest dispatch from the New York Times trend squad: the city's startup jockeys are spending day after day pressing "calorie-packed" things into their fat fucking maws, chugging beer, and taking naps. They'll also probably be billionaires.
The entire piece reads like a menu, a culinary tour through Silicon Alley. First up: Warby Parker, employer of the exposé's author:
On Monday, warm cookies from the Upper West Side bakery Levain appeared in the kitchen. Buttercream cupcakes followed; apparently it was somebody’s birthday. (It is always somebody’s birthday.) At noon, employees gathered for a catered lunch of barbecue. Two hours later, a Pinkberry station rolled into the office with the full battery of toppings. I helped myself to an incapacitating dose. By 5 p.m. my dress had grown so tight around the middle that I had to unzip it to my coccyx and put a sweater on top just to breathe.
These people are literally eating themselves to the point of physical transformation, all in an unceasing cronut-race to out-perk the competition. If you offer Pinkberry, the startup nextdoor will start putting truffle butter on the Pinkberry. Speaking of yogurt, did you know that it's possible to have a job that offers you complimentary gourmet yogurts? “I’m partial to Siggi’s Skyr, myself,” says one guy who works at ZocDoc. That's a brand of yogurt, trust me, I googled it just now.
What's to eat for a young man at Tumblr? "A plate piled with bacon. His co-workers nibbled at pastries." It's Versailles, with Real Housewives GIFs! Think of all the things they AREN'T telling the Times—champagne soft pretzels, orgies with cake batter used as prophylactics.
A dude at something called "StyleUp" says cold-brewed coffee is his "lifeblood.” Speaking of drinks, they drink! Booze! At work!
“Whiskey, tequila: it’s always available,” says a Birchbox employee “I don’t think having beer at the office is decadent,” his coworker chimes in. Decadent? Who said anything about decadent? It's terrific that, even if these companies go nowhere, they'll at least be able to live like they were acquired by Yahoo during the daytime.
(DISCLOSURE: Gawker Media has a cold-brew coffee keg, free breakfast on Mondays, free lunch on Wednesdays, and we used to have a pancake machine but I think someone broke it)