smokers etiquette

a. If you're going to bum a smoke off of me, at least offer to buy it. I won't take your money, but I appreciate the thought.

b. Please don't tell me that you're trying to quit. It makes me feel guilty, and I don't like feeling.

c. If you're 10, don't bother asking. Even I have my limitations when it comes to morally bankrupting children.

d. If I'm sitting outside Starbucks, sucking on a smoke like an asthmatic kid with an inhaler, do yourself a favour: leave me the fuck alone.

e. Ask politely. Don't yell at me from six patio tables over so you don't have to bother getting up if I say no. Which I will.

f. Don't ask me while I'm listening to my iPod. You are disrupting my period of meditative reflection before I have to haul ass back to work. Just don't do it.

Obviously, if you're an attractive, civilized dude, you are exempt and more than welcome to mooch off me.

the price is right, a-hole

A coffee at Starbucks does not cost five dollars. You can get a hot cup of coffee for under two bucks, actually, or a bit more if you want a venti, you glutton. If your drink is more than five dollars, it's because it's something ridiculous, like a quad venti breve white chocolate mocha. That is a meal in a cup, why the hell shouldn't it cost five bones?

Customers have ways to cheat the system, though, and it makes me really resentful when some cheapskate smugly asks if he can have his venti Frappuccino split into two cups, as opposed to just paying for two tall Frappuccinos. Like, "Oooooh, you clever little minx, you figured out a way to scam me out of that extra dollar something. Congratufuckinglations, shithead." Or people who try to order a kid's hot chocolate at full temperature. Guess what? If it's 170 degrees, it's a goddamn short HC, not a kid's. If you're old enough to have big kid drinks, you're old enough to pay big kid prices. And if I ever find the barista that sparked this whole chai steamed milk instead of a no water tazo chai thing, I'm going to punch them in the teeth. I really am.

Because customers don't figure out these little tricks on their own, it's baristas clueing them in. I don't know how many times I've explained to someone why I'm ringing in their drink the way that I am, only to have them say "But at the store I usually go to, they only charge me for a tall tea misto, because I don't want the extra tea bag in my venti drink," or whatever. Well, at this store, you're getting charged what I damn well charge you, and you can shove the extra tea bag up your ass, you entitled, snotty cow.

If you're too cheap to shell out some extra coin for your drink, go buy a two dollar latte from McDonald's.

kids today

I know this automatically qualifies me as old, and I'm okay with that: teenagers are fucking retarded. Okay, not all of them are. My sister is fifteen, and she would never use the Starbucks patio as a place to solicit weed, or get drunk in the bathroom, or scream conversations with her friends sitting right next to her, or spit all over the sidewalk, or spill popcorn all over the floor and laugh about it instead of cleaning it the hell up. Why? Because she wasn't raised by a gang of apes, and also, I would fucking kick her fucking ass.

What's the appeal of hanging out at Starbucks with twenty of your disgusting, greasy little friends? And why do you all need so much water? Do you just want to look cool, with your trendy little cups? Well, I'm sorry to tell you, but it only counts as cool if your drink is ultra-modded and costs at least 5 bucks (if you're the kind of douche that thinks drinking Starbucks makes you look cool, anyway). And is it so hard to not tear up your straw wrappers/movie tickets/napkins and litter them all over the floor? Or not yell curse words at the top of your lungs? Or just generally act like a goddamn civilized person, rather than a baboon recently introduced to society after years of living in the wild? Is that really too much to ask?

How to not get kicked out of a Starbucks:

1. Don't be a dumb motherfucker.

That's it. You'd be surprised at how many people can't handle that.

the rule of four

I made a resolution this year to write more, but my sister told me that fanfic is for geeks and pedophiles, unfortunately. So, I have a blog now. It will probably work out better this way, I do love to talk about myself, as well as every little thing that pisses me off.

Today, I will start small, as it is my first post and I don't want to waste my good material before I amass my cult following (i.e. my sister and maybe my mom).

I have something I like to call "The Rule of Four" at work. The Rule of Four is this: if you add more than four customizations to your beverage, you are an asshole. Quad, half-pump this, half-pump that, non-fat, 190 degrees, no foam (OF COURSE), caramel drizzle, stirred seven and a half times, the list goes on. FACT: No one is impressed with you and your pretentious drink, or the fact that you can rattle off your order like a pro because you probably spend $20 a day on what is essentially a status symbol. Congratulations, you are paid too much for whatever it is that you do and you are a twat.

Fellow baristas, you are not excluded from this rule. I still love you, but your drink is retarded.