First let me just segue into this post by admitting to you that I am a complete moron for a) not bringing my camera and b) not remembering that I have a camera on my phone.
That said, let me tell you what a great time I had at the Starbucks on Rte. 100 in Exton, PA last night! Marsha, my friend who taught me how to knit, arranged a knitting-group meeting for a bunch of us knitting folk. Marsha thought a "first Tuesday of the month" regular get-together would be neat idea, and indeed, it was! Also in attendance were Beth and Katie, who I already knew and who are also SP9 participants, and I met two new awesome ladies named Bobbie and Linda.
I was, by far, the least-experienced knitter there. But I in no way felt discouraged or "out of my league," so-to-speak. These are some really super-nice, super-talented ladies! We were all having a grand old time discussing yarn stashes, needles, projects, and where the hell does mohair come from. Then, an employee of Starbucks approached our group. (We later learned that her name was Mandy.) I immediately thought, "Oh, crap. She's coming to put the smack-down on us. We're being too loud and/or not drinking enough of their coffee to keep us welcome here." Instead, we were pleasantly surprised by an offer to participate in a "coffee tasting" with free samples of coffees and pastries! Katie said, "Who would say 'no' to this?!" I agree!
So Mandy brought out 3 different coffees: House Blend, Yukon, and their 2006 Christmas coffee with three different types of pastry, which I think were a blueberry crumb cake, oatmeal cookies, and a cinnamon pound cake. Mandy explained exactly what the difference is between coffee brewed via French press and coffee brewed with percolator or a drip coffee maker. All the coffee she served us was brewed using a French press. She showed us the proper way to take in the aroma of coffee, and how to sip/slurp it through our front teeth to get the best reaction with our tongues. It's much like wine-tasting, except you don't spit it out. :-P
We also learned from Mandy that she was part of a special "coffee masters" program at Starbucks. She will be learning all about coffee: how it's grown; how soil, elevation, and harvesting processes will vary the flavors of coffee; how aging the beans changes the texture of the coffee, etc. She will eventually earn a "black apron" and be an expert on coffee. She already seemed very knowledgeable to me! And she was oh-so right about how the coffees we tasted had different bodies, flavors, undertones, and smoothness.
What a great experience! So we are planning to go do our little knitting group every first Tuesday of the month. Mandy said that she had more to teach us and more for us to taste! So Marsha is going to do her best to coordinate our knitting group meeting with Mandy's work schedule! SWEEEEEEEEEET.
Say what you will about Starbucks as a corporation. But they make DAMN GOOD coffee!
AND
As if the day couldn't get any better, Pennsylvanians finally got their heads out of their asses and collectively said "go to hell" to Rick Santorum. How he managed to get elected in the first place and then to get re-elected six years ago will forever remain a mystery to me. This man is not only a misogynist but a complete idiot. A swell combination. To wit:
"As the hobbits are going up Mount Doom, the Eye of Mordor is being drawn somewhere else," Santorum said. "It's being drawn to Iraq and it's not being drawn to the U.S. You know what? I want to keep it on Iraq. I don't want the Eye to come back here to the United States.
--Santorum, 10/06, as quoted by the Bucks County Courier Times
OK. a) what the fuck is he talking about? and b) ...um...what the fuck is he talking about?
Oh, what? Not convinced? Here you go:
"And if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution."
-- Senator Rick Santorum, Republican from Pennsylvania, 2003
I guess he never took a class in Logic, Philosophy, History, Sociology, Political Science, or -- oh yeah -- the frelling United States CONSTITUTION. Why am I not surprised?
Anyway, it's all moot, and water under the proverbial bridge, and such and such, seeing that he's gone now, thankfully --- hopefully back to Leesburg, Virginia, where he really lives....
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