Today’s Music: Electric Six – Senor Smoke
Today’s adventure: nothing worth mentioning…*sigh*
I was never a big coffee drinker. I used to say it wasn’t the caffeine that kept me awake, it was the taste, because how could I sleep with that vile flavor in my mouth.
I love coffee ice cream, or a coffee milkshake, but coffee itself? Blech. The only way I could drink it was with so much sugar that my spoon would stand up in it.
But then, a couple of years ago, I started commuting to the city via public transportation. I’d get off the train and walk to the office. Right past a Starbucks… Well, how could I resist? Isn’t that what people do on their trip to work? Isn’t that part of being an adult? so I drank the kool-aid coffee. Every day, on my way in, and then again around 4 pm after the market closed.
I didn’t try all the flavors. Just a medium cup of coffee. And I took a perverse thrill in not calling it a Grande (because really, it wasn’t that big).
My twice daily trips to Starbucks probably went on for about a year. They knew me. Didn’t even have to wait for the whole line. Once the counter-person saw me, they’d pour me my medium coffee, I’d hand them the $3+ and the transaction would be done. Ok, sometimes I would buy a donut or something too, but not that often. In fact it would surprise and confuse the usual person when I did. Then over to the fixins’ station, pop the lid, pour out 1/4 cup of coffee and refill it with 2 splenda and cream. And if there were seats, pause for a bit, or just head off to work.
But it was a small shop, with not alot of seats, and too many downtown hipsters (not often I want to smack someone in their head with their laptop. I guess the Starbucks crowd just has that effect on me…)
Then I discovered that there was an Au Bon Pain an extra 2 blocks past my office! Pour your own coffee! No need to waste half a cup to make room for cream! And are those Strawberry Croissants I see?
So I went there. It was a little more at my level of pretension. Plus they had more seats. And when I left each morning to trek back up the block to work, I could sneer at all the non-coffee drinking folk, who just weren’t as cool.
Then I looked at how much I was spending…2-3 cups a day, 5 days a week, plus a pastry or three per week… it adds up….
Aaand then I found another Au Bon Pain, right above the subway. Not out of the way. Clean, brightly lit. Coffee was fresher than the one I’d been going to. And I think I enjoyed it more. After a week or two they recognized me. “Hi” How are you” “nice to see you again”…it was nice.
I would grab my coffee, stroll over to work smoking my last cigarette of the morning…
I still don’t like coffee all that much. I get a cup in the morning maybe twice or three times a week. I still go for the afternoon one (that one covers my smoking habit), but I’m not as concerned about getting it. Don’t really care if everyone else does.
In fact, sometimes I’ll only buy one, because at that point in the day, I think I’d enjoy the test.
I know this post is sort of babble-some. Maybe as I do this longer, I’ll get a bit more precise…
I also know this post probably isn’t really about coffee. But damned if I know what it is about.
and you?
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Guapola 