Coffee Lingo…

I love Starbucks. I hate Starbucks. But I really do love Starbucks. I mostly despise Starbucks.

I am apparently ambivalent in regard to Starbucks.

I like their coffee a lot. It is generally very strong  ( as opposed to the anemic Dunkin Donuts) and would raise the dead, if only the dead could get their hands on some. The retail stores have a wonderful aroma when you go in, and no matter how resolved I am to not succumb, I always do. So after a few pounds of exotic beans, a few cds, and a large dark roast… that comes to 36.50, sir..will that be all for you today?

Good Lord….yes, that will be all for me today. For several days, actually. And I hate you and your snarky attitude, little miss. And your smock. And that you sell coffee mugs for 12.00…and that people apparently buy them.

But not me. I have lost many a good mug off the roof of my car, and if I lost a 12.00 coffee mug, I would be on my hands and knees in the breakdown lane searching for all the pieces. Then to the nearest Target for Super Glue…and later that same day, a trip to the emergency room with acute Super Glue poisoning; or ASGP, as the ER nurses like to call it.

So I thought I would just try the drive-up window this morning, skip the aromas and cds and all that…just get the death coffee and go. I usually make my own at home and transport it in a thermos, but alas…a broken carafe emergency puts me once again at the mercy of snarky little Miss Starbucks poster girl 2013.

Now this really ticks me off…

I pull up and order a large dark roast, regular…

And the first thing they do is translate your order into a language that they find acceptable; so that will be a Vente Grande, sir? Will I be leaving room for cream and sugar?

I refuse to answer in their Italo/Hispanic hybrid language…

No…regular… is fine, thanks. ( This is the universal indicator for ” will you please put the damned cream and sugar in”…hence the term…) Why don’t they know that? Why??

So the coffee comes out with about three molecules of cream, and no sugar at all. ( I generally do not use sugar in coffee, but their Vente Sumatran Death blend does require it ) That will be 2.24 sir…will that be all for you today?

So I have to pull around to the front, go in, and fix it myself. Turbinado sugar, of course…( There is a Starbucks in Virginia that once actually removed all the brown sugar packets when they saw me come in again…sadly, I’m not even embarrassed by that…Starbucks owes me, don’t you see?? They owe everyone…yes, I’d like a dark Vente Grande with 76 Turbinado sugars, please…bitch….

And another 6.99 for a closeout Christmas cd of nuns singing in 16th- century French, a must-have for any civilized music collection…with the Boston Camerata doing biblical readings in Middle English– what great natural reverb you get from the pulpit of a cathedral… who could resist?

And one pound of Sumatran Death that was on sale ( only 11.99…and a slice of blueberry crumb cake, dammit…)

That will be 36.50, sir…will that be all for you today?

Why is it always exactly 36.50?

They’re probably just trying to make their money back on all the sugar. Well, two can play at that game. I happen to know exactly how many packets of Turbinado you can get for 36.50. Who’s smirking now, little miss?

And of course I was late for work.

*****

Starbucks Update; Later that same day, and I have just tried  the Jamaica Blue Mountain. I must admit that it is wonderful. Smooth, earthy, complex…  certainly no cream or sugar needed… All is forgiven. I might have to bring back a few ( hundred) packets of Turbinado, as a sign of redemptive good will. That should confuse them.

I love Starbucks again.