This is Why I Hate Starbucks People - Reason/Exhibit #2

Mother's Day forces dads to do a lot of shit they don't want to do.  Brunch comes to mind immediately.  Not getting drunk at brunch is the next thought.   A million other scenarios ending with me repeatedly sticking an imaginary fork in my eye flood my mind after those initial horrors.  The point is - great day for her and a shitty day for me. 

It was especially shitty this year since I decided to start the day's festivities off with a run to Starbucks with our 20 month old who is possessed by the exuberance and energy of a Jack Russel Terrier and the destructive power of a tornado wrapped inside a tsunami that has hurricanes for arms and legs and volcano head that shoots hot snot lava.  Small crowded places where she isn't allowed to touch anything just happen to set her off like a match to gasoline.  About one tenth of one second after crossing the threshold of the door at Starbucks - I realized I had made a major mistake.

As you all know, I hate Starbucks for numerous reasons.  I'll be spending the next few years listing all of them on this blog, so stay tuned.  The only reason I was there is because my wife loves Starbucks.  I figured I'd spare her the "best part of waking up" option we both hate (but refuse to change for some reason) that morning seeing as it was "her day" and all.  Like getting fouled while shooting the three and sinking it - I had a rare opportunity for a four point play.  She loves Starbucks = +2 points.  I hate Starbucks and she knows what a sacrifice it is for me to actually go inside one and be among Starbucks people = +2. 

It's 7:30 in the morning on a Sunday and I'm at the Starbucks off of Spout Run (next to The Italian Store!) hoping to have beat the morning crowd.  I'm quickly reminded of the fact that rich white people have nothing better to do than wake up at dawn and go sit around drinking very expensive coffee with complete strangers.   The place is packed.  Picture Pizza Mart in Adams Morgan at 2:30 a.m. and then imagine everyone  is the type of person who drives a Mercedes - that's what we're talking about here. 

The guy in front of me in line  is in his mid fifties, way too skinny for his age and sopping wet with sweat.  He ran to the Starbucks.  My kid wants to do only one thing in life at that point - touch his nasty ass sweat infused shirt.   I'm trying to keep my distance, but the lady behind me is literally standing on my heels as if applying pressure to my personal space will speed up the baristas.  It's a shit show from the word go and I'm stuck between the two leads.

Slowing everything down is not only the fact that lattes take longer to make than glaciers, but the witty morning banter between the baristas and the regulars that interrupts the actual making of the coffee.  I'm one of only a few people in the place who aren't on a first name basis with the staff.  If I was that chummy with the baristas I could  have easily let them know that the 30 pound human nuclear bomb I was holding  was about to lose her shit and turn this place into the scene of a Mexican cartel shootout if things didn't start moving along.  Unfortunately for everyone - I did not have that kind established relationship with the hippies on staff.

Once we're about three people back from ordering, my little baby girl's head turned all the way around 360 degrees a couple of times signaling the start of World War III.  She's flinging everything she can put her hands on across the room and what she doesn't throw, she puts in her mouth requiring that I buy it.  Sweaty old guy in front of me is oblivious to this and takes his time catching up with Hippie McDipshit behind the counter before he even starts to order.  In a sudden moment of awareness the lead hippie playing rover behind the counter decides it might be a good idea if they get started on my drink.  For that, I was grateful. 

Thank you lead hippie.  May your weed be sticky, purple and by prescription from now on.

Back to the show...

Sweaty old guy ordered three drinks, by the way.  Two lattes - one iced, one hot and some kind of ice-fruit-drink -coffee-thingy.  At this point I f*cking hate old sweaty guy like no single other person on earth has ever hated another person before.   I would punch him, but I'm afraid I might touch his shirt. 

I tell Hippie McDipshit what I ordered and place the dozen or so plastic wrapped chocolate nut scones on the counter that have been claimed via saliva by my daughter.  A mortgage payment later I'm declining the offer of a receipt and headed to a safe spot to wait for my wife's coffee. 

Tom Petty once said "waiting is the hardest part," and he was right.   I also think he and Dwight Yoakam are the same person, but that's another post for another day.

What makes waiting hard at Starbucks are the assholes who waited in the long line to order, know that there are lots of people waiting for their drinks that ordered decades before them, but decide to stand as close to the pick up counter as possible without actually touching the guy making drinks.   These assholes are shocked every single time the barista calls out an order and it's not theirs.  It's as if they have in their mind that the barista took their order and thought "f*ck these people who have been waiting, I'm going to bump this guy's order to the front since he's obviously awesome."

You would have thought that after the next four drinks called weren't theirs and people had to plow their way through them to pick up their drinks, they'd get the picture.  They didn't and they generally don't.  Being in the way isn't something a Starbucks customer is capable of noticing.  That would mean they would have to engage in some kind of self-awareness or self-reflection exercise and if they were aware of their status as the skid mark on the underwear of modern consumerism - they might stop going to Starbucks!  We wouldn't want that, would we?

Figuring out that you're a Starbucks asshole is a lot harder than dealing with the fact that you wore parachute pants or thought it was perfectly acceptable to play Chumbawamba's "Tubthumping" at full volume on repeat in your car as your drove through campus.  On the list of the hardest things to find out about yourself, being a Starbucks asshole is second behind finding out you're Hitler's love child and just in front of realizing you're being considered for the next season of the Jersey Shore.  It's pretty bad.

In the end Mommy got her tall double shot white mocha while it was still hot.  She's not too happy about the $50 of crap we had to buy because the kid either broke it or tongued it, but she'll get over it after she reads this harrowing tale of how her coffee came to be that morning.  Or... she'll be offended by this post since she likes Starbucks and I'll have to explain how she's different than the people I'm talking about even though she totally isn't. 

Wish me luck.  And don't you dare get me a Starbucks gift card.

Comments

[maryk]

Too Funny!

[Dave In Kensington]

Wow, you're kind of a self-possessed asshole. Is this the attitude you approach all facets of your life? Chill out and learn to live with the fact that the world doesn't exist for your edification. Your wife will eventually tire of you and your kids with think that you are a rage filled jerk; if they haven't already. I've seen it happen many times and you'd better find a way to fix it or you're going to be a bitter old twit. And no, your writing style doesn't come off as edgy like Hunter Thompson or P.J. O'Rourke. You're just angry.

[Dave In Kensington]

...and control your child. 20 month old children don't know how to control themselves, so you have to occasionally pick them up to restrain them. The second time I read this I figured out that not only are you angry, but you're a tool and a douche as well.

[brad kanus]

Dave in Kensington,

three comments on a blog that is obviously full of hyperbolic comedy - really? I think you're the one with anger issues. Hell, if I lived in Kensington I'd be and uptight asshole too.

Remember - the second you take time out of your day to let someone know that they're an opinionated asshole - YOU'VE BECOME ONE YOURSELF.

Be careful crossing the street - we wouldn't want a bus to make the world a better place at your expense.

[BRAD]

Sounds like you were the asshole in this situation with your out of control kid ruining everyone's morning.

Tool.

[BRAD]

P.S. If you can't control the one child you do have, Please stop breeding!

[C]

You are a "Starbucks person" so you must hate yourself as much as you hate your own spawn.

What's it like to be so self-righteous?

[brad kanus]

C - BRAD - Dave in Kensington (I know you're the same person - nothing anonymous about the internet these days),

what's it feel like to be so self-righteous? You know that feeling when you walk down to the metro platform where an almost empty train is waiting with doors open to take you to your destination - almost better than that.

[DaveInakensington]

Sorry, I'm not Brad or C. Believe it or not, not everyone thinks that you're the "people's poet" like you, apparently, do. I don't need to hide behind a second personae to voice my opinion. You act as though you have some super secret web tool ( which you are) that allows you to see who's who on the internet. So it's pretty obvious you're a delusional paranoid as well. Kensington is nice, we drove the douchebags out decades ago.

Your self-described hyperbolic comedy is neither; obviously. You're a douche and you can't accept that you're not funny; hiding your hate behind a thin veil of supposed humor. My three observations about your "piece" are few compared to the remaining spite fueled ramblings. You make cruel judgments about people who don't meet your standard. Sweaty old guy, Hippy Dipshit, people who wait for their drinks in front of you; you obviously think you're better than them. Your "I'm cooler than you" style of prose is used throughout your writings. Apparently, you belittle others to hide your own self-loathing.

I'm not self-righteous, I have plenty of faults. I just don't ridicule others to make me feel good about myself.

[brad kanus]

Daveinakensington,

You've used the word "douche" or a variation of it more than once today - your arguments have been ruled "invalid" by the International Commission on Internet Arguing (ICIA). The commission demands you get a hobby that doesn't include trolling blogs immediately or be sentenced to your mother's basement for eternity or the termination of the Simpsons series - which ever comes first.

My blog just happens to cost me $14.95 a month and it has a handy little feature where it tracks what IPs are used for comments. There are several million reasons they do this, but the most important one is spam. I just happen to use it to catch guys like you trying to increase the size of your one man army. I also have magical internet powers - I just don't like to brag about them.

[DaveInakensington]

You're so funny. You think you know things....

[DaveInakensington]

I tried to use a thesaurus to be more creative, but every time I put the term Brad Kanus in the seard field, the word "douce" and "douchebag" kept popping up. And that old "mother's basement" saw is so 1990s. You need to find better anecdotal terms.

[Dave In Kensington]

Okay, I've put the question to the people of DC via Craigslist; where you also post. Is Brad K Anus (Beltway Critic) funny or just a sad, angry, hateful little boy who's lost in the big, bad city of Washington, DC?

By the way, you do use the word "hate" throughout your blog quite a lot.

I can't wait to find out!

[Dave In Kensington]

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/mld/rnr/3017638529.html

[Brad kanus]

Dave in Kensington,

Dude you're having a very public breakdown here in the comments section of my blog and it went from funny and sad to just sad. And I mean sad like the guy sitting in a puddle of his own urine outside Lucky Bar explaining to everyone who walks by that you should be let back in because you have "rights."

Sleep it off my friend. You can quit me if you try.

[drew]

Brad, your description of a toddler is one I will use henceforth. The massengil stockholders can chill out

[brad kanus]

drew,

I'm honored to have captured the age in a way you'll remember.

[Matt]

brad- I stopped going to the Starbucks in Tysons Corner because of all the "Daves in shithole Kensington." Your story hits right at home. I must be a douchebag and have anger issues too! The assholes who crowd the barist are fucking joke!

There is the "just-got-done-excercising-so-let-me-come-to-starbucks-still-smelling-like-a-rooster-humping-a-duck" guy in line.
There is the "way-too-big-for-this-skirt-but-sort-of-cute-brunnette-haired-chic-who-I-might-do-after-a-few-beers-if-she-would-only-stop-staring-at-the-floor" chic."
There is also the "my-stay-at-home-life-is-so-boring-that-I-must-bring-my-not-school-age-brood-to-Starbucks-because-all-the-other-loser-moms-are-there-while-my-husband-is-in-Colombia-screwing-hookers" mom.
Or how about the gaggle of "high-school-oriented-who-are-late-to-their-Sidwell Friends-or-Bishop Ireton-classes-who-talk-incessantly-about-the-latest-BMW-or-Porsche-that-Muffy-got-for-her-17th-birthday" girls.

This is why I now get my Starbucks coffee when I run out of Mayorga coffee at the house from Starbucks of Leesburg, VA. You should visit this one. No crowding, no sloppy athletic people, no gaggles, no soccer mom meetings, etc.... Just somewhat normal people.

[brad kanus]

Matt,

Awesome - that's the kind of starbucks I can enjoy... or at least tolerate.

I also think you're right-on with the different sets of annoying customers and the hilarious, but true descriptions you provide!

[caryl]

came for the blog post, stayed for the Dave/C/Brad shit show.