The WP Drinker's Club

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What does a serving of chips cost in a 'chippy' these days? When I was at primary school, they used to talk about 'three pennorth of chips' (three pennies worth of chips), and that's under the predecimal system, ie just under 1.5 pence in decimal currency).

f*****g hell DeepHour how old are you.

I went to the chippy the other day and got two lots of chips, two pots of curry sauce, a pot of peas and two tins of pop and it came to £15.

Could have gone to wetherspoons and got a full meal and a pint of lager for about £10.

Not telling you my age, but when I caught the bus to school in 1968, the fare was 6d (2.5 pence) for the three mile ride.

Sounds cheap.

Took one of my Godsons with me to that brew pub in Squamish after buying a new kite harness.

Our order:
1 starter of crispy deep fried pickles with ranch dip ($12 I think)
We each had fish & chips (2 piece cod, $20, quite inexpensive compared to restaurant prices these days)
I had 2 pints of different IPAs, one was on sale for $6 the other was $9

Total with tax & decent tip was $86.

Everything is expensive here. Everything.


JUST fries (chips) are probably near or above $10 at most restaurants now. Go to a poutine place and have them loaded with various toppings and I bet they’re $20-25 tax & tip in. Hell, 2 large orders of pho soup to go cost me $46 with tax and a $5 tip. A burrito with guac and a quesadilla with guac cost me $50. A donair with double meat cost me about $24.

It’s enough to drive you to drink.. but can’t afford that lol gotta be rich to be able to actually afford to be an alcoholic these days! (Most people who are alcoholics/smokers are poor af because of their expensive vices.)

Roll us your cap grandad

Its ridiculous. I mean they're only made out of potatoes. You can grow them in a bucket in your own back yard.

You're right as well. It is enough to drive you to drink. Lol

I hardly drank at all before the age of 40. My job drove me to it. Then it became a habit....

Well that's OK.

I started drinking again about 6 months ago after about 5 years of abstinence.

I don't know why I stopped to be honest because I don't regret starting again.

It's not the potatoes that have gotten so expensive.. not the labour cost, either. It's the rent & property taxes. Every property is astronomically expensive here now. A regular normal "working class," house in the suburbs that sold for $500k 16 years ago is now $1.8M. Condos in the city are typically over $1M. Commercial properties are equally expensive, or higher, and property taxes on commercial leases are all paid by the renter.. and property taxes are based on the highest and best use the land is zoned for. So, if there's a single floor building with a few shops in it, but it's zoned to have a 20 storey tower.. then the taxes are assessed as if there were a 20 storey tower there - because the City is going to take it's money no matter what, and wants to encourage redevelopment of properties etc etc.. so, property taxes often go up way faster than rent. There was some Japanese restaurant in business over 20 years.. their property taxes went up like $50k/year and they paid it.. then the next year the taxes went up another $200k and they were like roflcopter f**k it we're out of business no one can operate a restaurant here and come up with an extra $600/day for property taxes. etc etc it's all insane.

That's just crazy.

You had to pay for the school bus?

Mmhmm. We also have ~approx the most expensive gas (petrol) in North America. And amongst the highest food prices. (Alaska probably costs more as Everything is shipped in there. Maybe Hawaii, too.) The other day I mentioned someone having a $500/mo grocery budget and my mom said "That's not enough for groceries for a single person." I disagreed with her.. I mean, sometimes I spend more than $500 in a month on groceries for myself, but I don't shop with a set budget And I buy and eat Almost anything I want to (within reason, I almost never buy steaks, I'm not buying lobster and caviar etc) but I Could easily keep it under $500/mo and still eat a healthy diet by buying in bulk, being frugal, cooking for myself vs. buying convenience crap and pretty much Never buying solo portions of anything. I think $500 is a reasonable grocery budget these days, but I Know that there are a lot of people eating on less, with some resulting in poor diets. If my goal were to do it for much less, I could, too.. I'd just be eating some very basic boring foods as a result - but I'd still be pretty healthy.

Hmm, what else.. oh yeah, e v e r y t h i n g. You name it, it's expensive here. Tourists come from the USA or overseas and their jaws hit the floor when they see what it costs for a hotel room in the Summer (like $600-800/night at a nice hotel, IF you can book one) or for alcohol - drink prices at bars here must rival some of the highest prices on the planet.

And on and on and on.. which has driven probably the largest interprovincial migration in decades. Sooooo many people have left and headed East to Alberta somewhere, or even to Northern BC somewhere, where they typically earn more money, can afford to buy a home and raise a family. Even still, our population here continues to rise at breakneck speeds because as big as Canada is, we're still about top dog in terms of being the number one spot people want to move to.. but even some newcomers to Canada are beginning to throw in the towel and say F this and leave and head back to where they came from or to the USA or some other place where they can set up shop and do their thing and afford to have some sort of quality of life vs. having to work themselves silly at some low paying job just in order to have a roof over their head.

And yet, we (I) stay.. and I'm not a raging alcoholic. Why? Because it's worth it. As much as I describe the biggest negative of being Here (that e v e r y t h i n g costs an arm, leg, and your first born) it's "This Place," that keeps us here. There's nothing else like it. The ocean/beaches, mountains, lakes, forests, rivers, glaciers, desert, rainforest, plants, animals, scenery, sunsets.. anyone who can hang on and be Here doesn't really Want to go and I know Why! Plus, to be perfectly honest, I've had cheap rent at my parents' house for 11 years and with no dependents to pay for it's enabled me to save a significant sum of money. Maybe I could make more and save faster somewhere else, maybe not - being insulated from high rent costs is a MAJOR difference maker. And even if I move soon, locally, I have a plan A and plan B of how to keep housing costs minimal. I'd only ever leave if there were some temporary opportunity to build wealth, skills, or knowledge and I had a plan of going, doing the thing, and returning here. It's home And those of us who stay are blessed to have the surroundings we have for world class recreation in every outdoor activity you can think of. (but basement dwellers that never utilize This Place may as well move and have bigger bank accounts, IMO)

It's Sunday morning, guess I just talked (typed) myself into having a drink. Bailey's in my coffee it is!

He said "the bus," not "the school bus." The only kids I know that ride school buses go to private schools where many kids travel longer distances to school. Not sure if I've ever really seen school buses at public schools tbh. Not that I can recall.. not unless they were contracted for a day for a field trip.

For high school, I would often take the bus on the way there so I didn't have to leave early enough to walk 10 long blocks or so. Regular transit bus, which we had to pay for but at least got student pricing.

In them days in UK it was probably just a bus that went past his school and not an actual bus designated for the school. Could be wrong but I don't think I am.

It was an ordinary public bus. The services were run by the local councils in those days, not by private operators.

Public schools have buses here.