madness and dizzy duck

Living here, miles away from a large city,
jobs, 10 years ago were pretty hard to find,
and as we all know today, harder now, due to
so many out of work, and jobs shipped overseas.

After we closed our coffeehouse of 4 yrs, I worked
a brief 2 years at a Starbucks, 45 minutes away.

My experience = here

During that time, the CD below was pulled:

click to enlarge

There was a CD we could play, 6 hrs of interesting
Blues music. Although the young ones didn't care
for it, 2X a week on my shift, they let me play it,
and people coming in enjoyed it too, which was a
surprise to us all.

Then the above memo was sent around, and we
were supposed to throw away the above CD,
due to one of the songs.

Can you guess what it was?

what kind of p

Now recently, they made themselves vulnerable,
due to letting people with guns, into their stores.

Hypocrisy?
Dispose of a CD, but
let people with guns in their stores?


Story here

1944 Ad
(click to enlarge pic)

Coffee when well prepared

is beyond question

one of the ambrosial luxuries of life.

William M Leszynsky, MD
Coffee As A Beverage (1901)

How an espresso should look after a good extraction.

During the Civil War,
the Union Army used an early
form of instant coffee:
a thick, gooey paste, made of
ground coffee, sugar, and milk.
All a soldier had to do was
open a can and add hot water.

Here's a link to a story about
Starbucks and what they are doing today.

Hint to SB:

Instead of giving new hires books to read,
and time at a drive-thru window,
maybe hire people interested in coffee
and perfecting the shots/drinks.

No one taught me anything I
didn't already know.

And if I had no previous experience, my
drink making would have been
quite nasty really.

This is quite surprising,
since most SB use automatic
espresso machines. That and most people
that work in their stores, do not drink
or are knowledgeable about coffee.

After working 2 yrs at a store out here,
99.9% of workers are not interested
in the products (frapps don't count).

To get a good espresso out of a machine
on a consistent basis, you need to keep an eye
on your grind, how much pressure you use
to pack the coffee in your group head,
and on your extraction that's a whole nother book!
You need to keep an eye on your grinder and adjust
it a few times a day, otherwise the shots
turn to piss water. No flavor, bitter, no crema.
Where I worked, I seemed
to be the only one on a shift that would
check and do this daily.

Maybe this one day event will change
the attitude of the baristas, but, aside
from a PR standpoint, it appears
that more will need to be done
for SB to rise above Independents.

Independents rule and care!

coffee break

(click to enlarge)

artist: norman quebedeau - 1983

chaen chan - 1993

The lithograph above was purchased from
the above artist who became a friend,
after meeting him at the Caffe Trieste.

He was at the time, an artist working on
the side. After many visits he invited me to his
house and studio. He studied in Europe in
his younger days and is very well known.

Last yr I wrote about my experience at
Starbucks, which can be read here.

It just so happened they opened a store 45 minutes
away from us, not long after we closed our
coffeehouse. Thinking it would be a good way
to get into management and be able to move
once again to a larger city, I hesitantly
applied. Although I was the only person who liked
and had coffee experience, it took me a yr to
become a shift manager.

I lasted 2 yrs and the rest is history.

It's with a bit of humor that I see McDonalds
getting ready to put espresso machines and
baristas in their stores. And with even more humor
that SB rehired Shultz to put it in order again.

After my experience and seeing that most people
who frequent SB go for the flavored, not real
coffee, I think McDs will effectively kick
SBs ass in their endeavor. There can
be no real difference in quality nor
appreciation of the coffee bean and
where it comes from.

Not the worker bee who makes the drink,
who doesn't know or care about coffee.