We live in a world of fast food, convenience food, food on the go and meal deals.
It is not just down to clever marketing and incessant advertising that we now find ourselves more likely to be eating whilst walking, shopping or just going about our busy and high tempo lifestyles but because it is just accepted that we dine like that nowadays.
It is a long way from how I was brought up.
I come from a normal working family but great emphasis was placed on a proper and structured meal time, around a table cloth covered table, place settings and a formal seating arrangement with Mother and Father as joint heads of state and so seated and us kids almost in age order arranged to the sides.
As a parent, later on myself, I was keen to keep this tradition alive, not just for a semblance of order out of the chaos but as a valuable time for all of us to just talk and be sociable.
Gradually, with the children growing up and having other commitments and places to be this regime became diluted and even now we only really get to share a meal on a more relaxed weekend, a birthday or other celebration.
I look back on family dining with fondness as it gave me an appreciation of making conversation, pausing a while to listen to others and just absorb the stories of the experiences, good and bad, of others.
Good manners were not enforced at the table but came to be regarded as something just nice and civilised and therefore adopted as a natural characteristic.
We are certainly a long way from that now.
I do consume fast food, indeed, I regularly rely on snack and convenience food regularly to get me through my working day. I am certainly not alone. This is evident not from having to wait in a queue at the checkout or serving window but from the sheer mass of litter and debris that clutters our highways, byways and public spaces.
The discarded wrappers, bottles, cans and general packaging are a major downside to our modern lifestyle although I am increasingly convinced that it is a British phenomena, not otherwise practiced or tolerated in our European neighbours or wider afield.
I have picked up, swept up and shovelled considerable volumes of trash and detritus whenever I come across a particularly bad patch, no where more currently than along the course of a narrow cut through pathway that links my local area to a supermarket on a nearby main arterial route to the city centre.
The footway is only about 50 feet long but in my most recent effort to make it passable on foot, I scooped up enough to fully fill a large green garden waste bag.
Using a snow shovel, a wide plastic one, I ploughed up and down each side.
The larger items rolled up and in by themselves, aluminium beer cans, glass beer bottles and take-out coffee cups. The former used to be a ready source of pocket money when presented to the recycling depot but with the recessionary forces in the Tiger Economies the salvage price has plummeted and does not justify Joe Public collecting them up or actually subsidising the staffing of a collection point.
Other items in the alleyway were more resistant to the shovel, typically sticky sweet wrappers, a syringe, decomposing disposable nappies, broken glass, half eaten foodstuffs and cigarette butts.
My own survey of the cartons used to sell McDonalds breakfast wraps showed brown sauce to be more popular than ketchup.
I do not make a big deal out of my street sweeping. The best time to scrape the surface of the tarmac is about 7am before the regular users are up and about. I do it quietly because there are residential flats flanking the walkway and even at that early hour there are lights in kitchens and bathrooms as someone's day begins.
My motivation is a bit flawed I must admit.
I am not seeking recognition from neighbours or my peers. I do not "tut-tut" at the thought of those who dropped the stuff in the first place.
I am in my own small way trying to re-enact a past era when people took pride in their streets and actively kept their country tidy.
I get the feeling that I am fighting a losing battle.
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