Le Piège

Lyrics

The waiter has departed.
The bill is settled.
Here, under the dim, buzzing light,
sits the object of your investment.
Le Piège. The trap.
The steak, a perfect grey.
A monument to thermal indifference.
The sauce has formed a skin, a patient, glossy film.
You lift the fork. It weighs more than it should.
Every principle of economics, of simple pleasure,
screams for you to stand up. To walk away.
But the numbers on the receipt are etched behind your eyes.
A cost, already sunk.
Sunk like a stone in this cold, greasy plate.
And so you chew.
A deliberate, joyless motion.
Because the money is already gone.
And to waste the food on top of the money...
it feels like a second failure.
This is the psychology of sunk cost.
Continuing the error, because the error has a price tag.
You are eating the receipt now. Not the food.
The same logic keeps you in the cinema seat,
watching the hero's terrible dialogue.
It kept the engines firing on the Concorde,
that beautiful, ruinous bird.
Hal Arkes and Catherine Blumer, back in '85,
they drew the map of this specific cage.
They proved the more you pay for the ticket,
the longer you'll endure the terrible show.
From a bad filet to a bankrupt nation. The pattern holds.
And so you chew.
A deliberate, joyless motion.
Because the money is already gone.
And to waste the food on top of the money...
it feels like a second failure.
This is the psychology of sunk cost.
Continuing the error, because the error has a price tag.
You are eating the receipt now. Not the food.
It's the burden of responsibility.
Your choice. Your money. Your mistake.
To leave the plate full is to admit it, aloud.
So the ego commands the jaw to grind on.
They've seen it in pigeons. In rats.
Pressing the lever for the reward that will not come.
You are in such good, simple company.
The last bite.
Swallowed.
There. The plate is clean.
Nothing has been wasted.
Except, of course, for the past ten minutes.
And the meal.
And the money.