I started working from coffeeshops recently. It breaks up the tedium of working from the Oak Lawn apartment, and reminds a lot of my days studying for the bar exam.
I started working from coffeeshops recently. It breaks up the tedium of working from the Oak Lawn apartment, and reminds a lot of my days studying for the bar exam.
We’ve had unseasonably cold weather in Dallas recently — days in the low 40s and evenings in the 30s. Everyone’s pressed, especially Gunter, the Chiweenie.
Gunter hasn’t gone on strike yet and refused to do his business outside (like he did in Minnesota), but after a few minutes outside he’s standing by the edge of the dog park, glaring and shivering.
I am thrilled by the new coffee shop on Oak Lawn Avenue & Congress Ave. They are quick, friendly, and it is really easy to hitch up the dogs while running in to get a mobile order.
However, walking up to the coffee shop during the mornings is cringe-worthy because I see near-miss traffic accidents several times a week in front of the store.
Coffee cups couldn’t be big enough when I was in college. I would order my coffee in the largest cup possible, even if it meant ordering one of those unsightly gas station buckets designed for truckers.
Now I order my coffee in the smallest size available.
Sure, I’ve reduced my overall caffeine intake over the years, but the shrinkage of my cup sizes has little to do with caffeine or my budget. I simply realized one day that I was throwing out half-full coffee cups because I could never finish my beverage before it went cold.
Here’s what I’m talking about this morning:
1. Expensive coffee: Starbucks recently opened a high-end version of its stores in an attempt to attract “millennials.” Apparently, millennials are really into $10 cups of coffee.
I’m at the tail-end of the millennial group and a $10 cup of coffee doesn’t appeal to me at all. Maybe the younger kids have expensive tastes?
2. Trump is Time Magazine’s Person of the Year: And it was well-earned.
Remember that this is an award for the most influential person, not the best. Hitler and Stalin also earned the title.
Some mornings I venture to a Starbucks on the outskirts of Oak Lawn near the Medical District.
This is a unique Starbucks because you can’t go inside – it only has a walkup window and an extremely busy drive-thru.
The walkup Starbucks at the edge of Oak Lawn.
Ingrid the Labradoodle at the walkup Starbucks. She’s being patient.
My regular barista says that the walkup Starbucks has a reputation for making terrible drinks. I thought this was unnecessary shade until the walkup Starbucks botched my usual order of coffee with cream.
One morning I noticed a woman exit Starbucks and give her yippy dog a small cup of whip cream.
Apparently this is a “secret menu item” called a “Puppucino.” Some Starbucks locations insist that you use that cheesy name when ordering, but most baristas just look at me crazy when I ask for one.
So it’s a thing, sort of.
Gunter and Ingrid at Turtle Creek Park with Puppuccinos.
It is 5:15 a.m., and I am typically one of the first people at the café. (It is the first stop on the morning dog walk.)
Aside from the normal collection of doctors and nurses, there is a strange, short man standing by the half-and-half. He’s mumbling and shaking.
I look over to the barista, who is glaring at the man, who is apparently high.
This caught my eye at Wal-Mart few weeks ago:
After much debate on twitter, I decided to buy an espresso maker but I opted not to buy the $100 Tassimo espresso machine because it is expensive and requires special espresso pods.
I am in line at one of the many Starbucks in the Mall of America.
In front of me are two African women. In front of them is a middle aged woman. She’s soaked with sweat.
Of course she turns around and addresses the African women:
Here’s an outline of my spring semester. A lot happened…
January: The semester starts.
Stella and I are holed up at Starbucks studying for finals.
The law school building contains brilliant people, but has the aesthetic appeal of a leaky basement. This is why so many of us sneak over to the business school, which has windows and a full-service Starbucks. Behold:
Usually the view is great, but today’s snowstorm makes the usual view of Downtown Minneapolis a little hard to see…
Downtown is still there, somewhere, sort of... but the snowed-out view is still preferable to the dungeon law school building.
My latest post for The Shark has a very simple message: use a tumbler, save some bucks. Read it here.
I’m at the Starbucks in the student union.
Barista #1 is a middle aged black woman with an accent.
Barista #2 is a teenage Hispanic student.
Me: “May I have a venti dark roast with room?”
Barista #1: “Sure. Hm, this is a refill so it will be 54 cents.”
I pull out my card.
So I walk up to the Caribou counter,
Me: “May I have a large dark roast with room for cream?”
Barista: “Sure, anything else?”
Me (pulling out tumbler): “Yes, may I have a latte with six shots of espresso in the tumbler?”
Barista (gasping): “You want what?”
Me: “A latte with six shots.”
Barista: “How many?”
Me: “Six.”
Barista: “Six?”
Me: “Yes. Six. I basically want you to fill up this tumbler with espresso and put a dash of milk on top for show.”
The cashier-Barista gives me a filthy look and then puts the order in. There was another Barista who was making the drinks. The drink-maker looked at her order screen and gasped.
Drink-Barista: “He wants what?”
Cashier-Barista (calling over): “Six shots.”
Drink-Barista: “Six shots?!”
Cashier-Barista: “Yes.”
Drink-Barista: “Of espresso?”
Me: “Yes. Of espresso. Don’t judge.”
And no, I’m not crazy.
My new tumbler1 actually keeps beverages hot. Plus, milk at my job is free.2
So the purpose of getting a 6-shot latte for the tumbler and a normal cup filled with coffee is that I can make lattes on my own without having to run back to the store throughout the night. So it’s really only like order 3 lattes over a 6 hour period… which isn’t that bad. Or so I tell myself…
1 This is my new tumbler. My old Starbucks tumbler was horrible. It constantly spit out liquid even when “shut.” It was like coffee volcano.
2 The cafeteria has those lift-the-lever dispensers.
The University of Minnesota has a fairly good selection of coffee shops: 3 Dunn Brothers, 2 Starbucks, 2 Java City stores, Einstein Bros, and various campus convenience stores.
I refuse to go to the Java City cafes. I started boycotting Java City because of the bitchy anti-Starbucks comments from the baristas. They see my tumbler and start brewing the hateraid:
I give my tumbler to the Java City baristas and hear:
“Ew, Starbucks! Gross! When are you going to get a Java City tumbler?”
Um, excuse me? Do they even make Java City tumblers? That’s like rocking a Ross T-shirt…
Java City is the Cooley Law School of coffee shops. Java City is what university dining services uses when it can’t attract a real coffee franchise. That’s right. The Java City baristas aren’t even Java City employees*, and yet they bitch about my Starbucks tumbler. Pfft!
Besides, the constant tumbler comments are simply bad customer service. You don’t have a tip jar because it would hurt your feelings…
Hence the boycott – I refuse to accept snark from bootleg foot court baristas who can be transferred to Panda Express tomorrow. I’m taking my money to a real coffee shop**.
*They work for University Dining Services (UDS).
** I also really like the off campus Dunn Brothers and Caribou Coffee… the neighborhood Caribou shut down though…
LexisNexis is pretty much a big deal.*
Lexis has a very liberal point system. You get points for researching, tutorials, and 400 points-a-pop for those goofy searches that the Lexis rep emails.
Lexis will give you a $5 Starbucks gift card for 400 points, and a $10 gift card for 715 points.
I’ve received five $10 gift cards so far.
That’s right. $50 in coffee. Thank you mam.
Today I’m studying for my contracts final at Starbucks, courtesy of Lexis. I hand the gift card to the chipper Barista and she asks, “Haveya registered your card yet?”
Me: (mumbling) “no… I haven’t… it’s only for $10 so…”
Barista: “Well! If ya register it you get free refills dontcha know! That’ll be 54 cents, oh, wait! Someone registered it for you. Your refills are free! Here-ya-go dontcha know!”
Holler Lexis. Holler.
Despite Lexis’s bribes, I still do most of my research on Westlaw because I’ve learned Westlaw’s shorthand for restatements… for example, “Rest 2d Contr 90” will pull up “Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 90: Promise Reasonably Inducing Action Or Forbearance.” I’m sure Lexis has a similar shorthand… I just haven’t bothered to learn it yet.
Westlaw also has a point system, but doesn’t offer gift cards. And uh, everything I’ve seen on Westlaw Rewards costs about 10,000 more points than I have. Maybe I’ll get a highlighter someday…
* No, I’m not a student rep, nor am I being paid for this.
Update **********
Apparently the coffee is so delicious that I feel the need to pour it all over myself. Wee! ITS SO WARM! (but not scalding) I’m not getting up for a while…
Update #2 **********
The fun continues on facebook…
I obviously have little experience with Breakfast Burritos…
Last night I was revising my legal writing assignment at the Freighthouse when I suddenly became hungry.
Dunn Bros (like Starbucks) sells an assortment of overpriced sandwiches and Naked Juice. They also sell breakfast burritos.
So I bought a breakfast burrito around 6pm.
And it did not occur to me at the time that breakfast burritos are typically put out…at breakfast.
Dunn Bros opens at 6am. So yeah, that egg-based burrito was probably sitting out for 12 hours.
No. It was out for 12 hours – because within 20 minutes I was furiously biking home,…and yeah…I was ill for the rest of the evening. Bleh.
[the gory details omitted]
I’m making up for yesterday’s lack of productivity between classes today. Hm, hm, hm.
Yesterday’s lesson: think before you eat.
