Tuesday, September 12, 2006

More about Coffee at Borders

Update on Borders Coffee.
2-18-8
Nothing has changed. The faces may be a little different. The piercings may have become more infected, but the style of service is the same. What is with these kids? The coffee is no good. They are too busy looking at their reflections in various shiny things to come take orders promptly. I asked for a bagel with butter. The guy just took it upon himself to toast it without asking. I don't want my bagel toasted. It hurts. He could have asked. How hard is that? What, he can't talk to grown ups?



I just wanted to reaffirm my opinion of the service at Borders.
My son and I went to Borders Books because we cashed in a bunch of change at a Coinstar. If you aren't willing to let the machine take a cut,you can choose a gift card. We had 48 dollars worth of change from cleaning the house, so we got a Borders gift card.

We got some books. I got one about the Dustbowl called The Worst Bad Time, or something like that. Then we went to the coffee counter. There were two people behind the counter. They saw us, but they were involved in a really awesome conversation,so we waited. Eventually one Barrista, or Barristo, or whatever the boy coffee pumpers are called, came near the register. I said, "Can you take our order?"

He responded, "Wow, I don't know if I dreamed some lady ordered a cup of coffee, or if it was real. I made the cup of coffee but I don't know what to do." I said, "Well, if you wait a while, she'll get mad and come to the counter, then you'll know if it was a dream or not." Then he walked away, but a lady came to the counter and he realized it was real and gave her the coffee.

I asked again if he could take my order. He said, "I don't know what I'm doing. They just fired everyone and I'm the only one here." (There was actually someone else behind the counter as well.) I asked again if I could order, and he said he was ready now.

I order two coffees and a brownie. He gave me the coffee and rang me up. I asked for the brownie a couple more times. He rang that up, and gave it to me. Obviously it was really difficult for him, so I didn't make a fuss.

I saw that there was a tip mug next to the register, but I thought it must be a dream, so I disregarded it. I didn't think he was using his money in a productive way and I didn't want to contribute to whatever it was that made him so crappy.

Wednesday, August 30, 2006

New Books

Paper Wings was good. Author info to follow soon. Better yet, look it up on Amazon.
Review to follow soon.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

Book Review -- About Grace

About Grace
Author Unknown. (The book is upstairs. I will update author information later when I go upstairs. I don't want to break the flow right now.)

This book starts out good. And by start out, I mean the back cover of the book. The guy lives in Alaska and has dreams that predict the future. I love books that have the person with a special power. But mostly this guy has nothing going on. He has a handful or less of these Special Dreams. They are mostly irrelevant to the plot.

The writer obviously knows a lot of stuff about water molecules and the book is mainly an excuse to show off that particular knowledge. And clouds, he knows what all kinds of clouds are called. Whoopie. "I was walking to the minimart and oh! there goes a subglomulous-semi-cirrhius cloud in blue winter sky." I'm all like, "Christ, can we hear about which direction the swirl went on the Sweet-Frostie you bought?"

I feel like kicking this author's ass. You can tell he thought he was writing literature. But, as I often say, just because its boring doesn't mean its art.

I bought the book for the magic and the fact that the snowflakes on the front cover look a lot like one of my blankets. The magic part was a rip-off. I can only blame my own poor judgement for the blanket thing.

I ordered the blanket on-line, and like more than half the things I have gotten online, it was not a disappointment. Ironically, I bought the book in a real bookstore.