Instant ramen servings consumed worldwide

Two items that could easily describe a 2020 bachelor's evening: instant ramen and a podcast. Apparently the rest of the world had the same evening. Repeatedly.

Both curves leapt in 2020 for the same lockdown reason. Global instant ramen production jumped about 9% as households stockpiled the cheapest shelf-stable carb on earth, while the global podcast count surged past two million as millions of would-be broadcasters started recording. The common variable is time — a specific surplus of it, delivered indoors, by a virus.

So the correlation is a sketch of a year lived quietly at the kitchen counter. Bowl in one hand, headphones in the other. Both were made to be consumed alone.