Starbucks and realizing that I am Special

By Mink

It’s been a while since we last spoke but in that time I've been doing some thinking. By the way, has that statement ever been followed by something positive? It’s usually something like “I’ve been doing some thinking……we should just be friends.” No one ever says “I’ve been doing some thinking…..you really are great” Anyway after doing some thinking…. I realized that I am special. That statement also is never used in a positive way but instead has become the gentler way of describing someone who is a mentally challenged or disturbed individual. And that is exactly what I mean here when describing myself.

So as I was saying, I had one of those “I am special” revelations and this one occurred at the starbucks near my office. A couple of the ladies at the office invited me to join them on their daily stroll over there and me being a Dunkin Donuts man, was a little intimidated. But I decided to join them realizing full well that if I ordered anything besides a cup of water, the trip could turn into a full blown disaster. You see at Dunkin its as simple as “coffee cream and sugar please.” (Unless I make any insensitive remarks about Sikhs or take money from the tip jar---which I always mistake for the give a penny take a penny jar.)

At Starbucks however, even ordering just a normal coffee requires slang-words such as “grande” or “tall.” I never remember which is which and inevitably piss off the counter-girl by asking how many ounces each one is. I also don’t particularly enjoy their regular coffee which I find very bitter but remembered that once or twice in the past I have enjoyed their specialty drinks with the fancy names (Caramel Machiata very well could be the name of my future child). But being the cheapskate that I am, my eye was drawn to the espresso, which was significantly cheaper than those fancier blends. So after the girls ordered their impressive sounding drinks I proudly proclaimed with a big smile “I’ll take an espresso.”

I then stepped to the side and waited proudly for my special drink. But when it was ready I was majorly disappointed. You see I learned about the espresso the hard way. The espresso apparently isn’t one of those nice fancy drinks but instead is a small shot of bitter tasting extra strong coffee or something like that. The nice counter girl could see from my disgusted face that I had not ordered what I wanted (and that I must be special). She said “I can turn it into a latte.” So I thanked the magician starbucks girl and waited for her to transform it into a vanilla tasting delight. About a minute later she called out “latte!” and I tried to take the drink from her magical hands.

But it turns out that my drink wasn’t ready yet and I was in fact trying to steal the latte of another customer who happened to be a police officer. For some reason I continued to firmly grasp the hot cup of fancy coffee as the counter girl tried to transfer it to the short haired husky cop. I finally started to recognize that maybe it was not mine but inexplicably shook the cup as I attempted to dismount.

As I did this coffee began to ooze out of the small hole on the top and all over the counter. As the disgusted officer began to gather napkins to clean up the debacle, I tried to save face by sincerely stating “Sorry bout that sir.” I was puzzled when the cop rolled her eyes. I realized I was a fool but I did make the effort to apologize and she totally shot me down. I was pissed until my co-worker elbowed me and said “Jon, that police officer is a woman.”

So to summarize I messed up my coffee order, attempted to jack a policeman/woman’s coffee, shook it up and spilled it all over the counter, and capped it off with an apology that featured me calling a woman “Sir.”

It doesn’t take much thinking to realize only a special person has episodes like that.

Awkward

By Mink

One of the problems with being awkward is that you tend to always do say or do something that deviates from the socially acceptable norm.

By the way I think that the word “awkward” is way overused. Since about the year 2002 I have noticed that people have been really forcing that word into daily conversation. And half the time nothing at all was awkward until the label has been vocalized. Example:

Me (in front of my friend’s parents): Sara, so how’s that rash you were telling me about?
Sara: Um…..better….thanks
Sara’s friend (standing right there): All right this is awkward; I think I’m going to go.

Well maybe this wasn’t the best example but you get the point. Things often would not ever be considered awkward until a third party casually drops the A-word, creating quite an uncomfortable scene that ultimately enters the realm of awkwardness.

Anyway despite my little rant on awkward over usage, it is certainly fair to characterize me as awkward and I definitely have a problem of saying and doing the wrong thing nearly all the time. I was actually pretty excited the other day when I heard speakers at a crisis readiness conference discuss how to deal with what I thought was my exact condition: “Foot in Mouth Disease.” However, I was quickly educated by my co-worker that “Foot and Mouth Disease” is actually a pretty serious epidemic plaguing thousands of livestock. I guess cattle can be awkward too.

One of the ways that I awkwardly do the wrong thing is by non-discretely staring at people. This is a major problem especially on subways where the non-awkward obviously realize that you are supposed to stare at the ground and avoid eye-contact at all costs (see singerz’s subway piece from December). I also noticed last night while watching a comedy show that I have this tendency to stare directly at the person seated closest to me who is a member of the ethnicity that the comedian just made a joke about. Finally, I non-discretely gaze at pretty girls, unattractive girls, women with mustaches, suicide bombers, and at people in mid-brawl or mid-arrest. So far I have yet to get my awkward ass kicked but that could change any day.