Image Is Everything #4: "Speed Rack"

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"Flavor Shots"
Tate Street Coffee House, Greensboro, NC - October 2009 (Click to Embiggen)

Image Is Everything Thursdays on Why? What Have You Heard?
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My World Tuesday #52: Waking Up Greensboro Since 1983

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"Tate Street Coffee House"
Greensboro, NC - October 2009 (Click to embiggen)

"Do the guys at Greensboro Daily Photo know about this?"
Greensboro, NC - October 2009 (Click to embiggen)

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Every morning I drink my coffee and I say, "Thank you Coffee". That's one of the several witticisms scattered around the Tate Street Coffee House on (wait for it) Tate Street in Greensboro, NC. Situated, as it is, practically on the campus of UNC Greensboro, it's not surprising that TSCH (as it's commonly known) has thrived in every economic environment for the last 26 years. This is about as far removed form the generic Caribuck chain coffee houses as you can possibly get, and the owners and staff understand a basic concept of marketing to a clientele largely composed of college students. Give them a good product, make it affordable on a student's allowance and don't make a career out of making a latte. And it doesn't hurt that the employees (the ones I've met at least) are friendly, smile a lot and -- most important -- know a little somethin-somethin about coffee. Because while the t-shirts and faux movie posters and atmosphere are all nice added touches, this isn't the Tate Street Movie Poster House or the Tate Street House of T-Shirts. There's Open Mic Jazz Night on Thursday night, which I look forward to attending at some point, but all they really needed to do to impress me was make a really good double-shot latte that I could get for two bucks and change without my beard growing visibly while I waited. With a business model like this, I'd expect TSCH to be waking up Greensboro for another 26 years and beyond. Whatever the economy comes to.

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Not enough caffeine in the Western Hemisphere

Another night where sleep will ... not... come. Was it the Canes losing in a shootout to the Devils? Could've been. Was it the fact that my bedroom had become something of a sauna? Maybe. Was she dancing in my head? Welllll... yes, but was that cause or effect?

Better question: does it matter?? Insomnia blows.

So... now I'm facing the morning with a couple of fresh complaints.

• Somebody booby-trapped the cabinet in the kitchen where the coffee mugs and filters are kept. As a result a rouge mug escaped when I opened the door to get a filter and fell directly into my Disney World souvenir Pluto Mega Mug. The kamikaze mug made what I thought was a perfect landing, shearing off its handle and falling right side up nestled inside my massive Pluto mug. I thought Pluto had escaped serious injury at first. But on closer inspection I saw a hairline crack that ran from top to bottom. Sadly, Pluto was mortally wounded, struck down in his prime by an unadorned runaway. No doubt there were some envy issue on the part of the rogue. After all, it was designed with only the capacity of a standard dose of Arabica. And its maker had chosen to leave it undecorated, and not even an especially striking color. Obviously it was jealous of Pluto, as he was not only comically clad, but capacious enough to hold nearly half a pot of the Elixir of Life at a time. Alas poor Pluto, I knew him well. I will miss you old friend.


• I've known this for quite some time, but it's especially irksome this morning. Who was the rocket surgeon who decided that nine minutes between blasts of the snooze alarm was too long? My alarm clock only allows seven minutes between wakeup calls. I thought at first that it was just a quirk of this particular clock. That, I could live with because it made it unique and therefore special in a quirky sort of way. But now I'm seeing that the industry standard for MTBW (Mean Time Between Wakeups) has been changed from nine minutes to seven. I feel cheated. In the first place, what focus group decided that nine minutes was preferable to say, a nice round 10? And was it that same think tank that decided to change the standard to seven? Why seven? Why not five? This is an important issue to me -- especially on days like this one where the majority of my sleep comes in snooze-sized segments. I want my two minutes back. Dammit.

Letters From The Senate

There's a pile of unopened junk mail (at least I hope it's all junk mail) sitting here in front of me. (Well, okay, not directly in front of me kind of to the side... like 10-o'clock.) Old-school spam I call it. How many credit card applications does a bank have to send before they get the message? Why is Southern States Nissan sending me a reminder that "service may be due" on a car I haven't owned since last April? Why am I still getting paper statements from my bank and my insurance company and my credit card company? Haven't they figured out yet that I've set all those up on electronic billing?

Then there are my favorites. My collection of letters from Senator Richard Burr. Apparently the senator thinks that having a hard copy of his drivel will somehow make it more palatable to me. He's really reaching on that one. For instance:

• The ANWR? Hey, nobody lives there and thar's oil in that thar frozen wasteland. Nobody's gonna mind if we start knocking holes in it and suck out some of that black gold. Sorry...Dick... I mind. So do a lot of other people. You want to reduce dependency on foreign oil? Try putting some of that money you're spending blowing up the other half of the world to use finding an alternative energy source.


• On the NSA's unchecked wiretapping: "The President has maintained that the NSA surveillance program is 'strictly' targeted and that no domestic phone calls are tapped without court approval". And we all know how honest and forthright the President has been on such issues, right? Try again ... Dick.


• On the Valerie Plame case: "On October 28th, 2005, I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, Chief of Staff to Vice President Cheney, was indicted on one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of perjury, and two counts of making false statements...
  "He was not charged with vilations [sic] of any laws regarding the actual disclosure of Ms. Plame's identity." Oh. Well, I guess that makes it okay. Right... Dick?


• On Samuel Alito: "It seems clear that he has the qualifications to serve on the Unites States Supreme Court. This is reflected in his many years of experience in the judicial system." Pardon me, but since when is occupying a position for a number of years in and of itself a legitimate "qualification"? How about the decisions and opinions he rendered during all those years? What about that... Dick?

And the hits just keep on coming. How did we wind up electing a US Senator that's little more than a mouth breathing meat puppet for the Bushists? I guess independent thought isn't a "qualification" for a seat in the Senate. You just have to be a lockstep sycophant. I have one I haven't opened yet, but I'm way too sleepy to digest it. Maybe later.Stumble This!