Caviar Shortages & Sewage Explosions: It's A Rich-Person Apocalypse In The Hamptons

If your richest friends haven't completely flown the coop this winter (read: retreated to Florida), chances are they're still hunkering down in the Hamptons. But if the off-season flock was considered disastrous last spring, at the very start of pandemic panicking, then these days it's a full-blown apocalypse. For once, you probably don't want to take up that invitation to visit.

According to a recent report in Vanity Fair, summer-turned-winter residents are facing a deluge of decidedly not-chic catastrophes. On-demand food delivery, for one, is seasonally scarce with most restaurants shuttered or only open a few days a week, while supplies of East End culinary staples, including caviar, uni, and truffles, are running dangerously dry. It's "a different type of winter than ever before," said a Citarella spokesperson.

Think things can't get any crappier? Well, there's the whole issue of the wave of backed-up septic systems in homes that aren't used to having their owners around so often.

"When you’re not using the house all the time, it gives the system time to drain," Danielle Quackenbush, the co-owner of Quackenbush Cesspool Services, told Vanity Fair. "Each system is designed to handle only a certain amount of flow per day." Without a municipally-maintained sewer system in the area, even the fanciest houses out East are facing three-month waitlists for servicing. 

It's a (literal) shitstorm, people. Drive out at your own risk!

[Photo via Unsplash]