The Least of All Evils

Ok. Well, I decided to change the layout/skin/template/whatever-you-call-it on the blog, as you can see. I will re-iterate: BLOGGER, GET NEW TEMPLATES. This one was about the least offensive of the others, unless I wanted it basically to look like a Word document with a box around the header. No thanks.


Also---just because I have to write it down somewhere---I am drinking the WORST cup of coffee of my life, such as it is, today. It tastes like volcanic dirt. I only wish I were actually IN Hawaii, somewhere near a volcano, which might lessen the pain of drinking this crap. Some random person (who is new and from another department is using our office space until their office is finished being renovated---how nice) used our coffee maker and "surprised" us by brewing up a pot of this delightful, high-octane sludge this morning before anyone else got in. Super! Thanks! Why don't I just walk my fat, lazy ass down to the little coffee shop on the ground floor of the building attached to my building? Well, I'll tell you:

a) Their coffee sucks ass. It's new name will be "ass-coffee."

b) I went in there last week to get a quick, healthy food item to eat for breakfast (yeah, good luck finding this within 24 miles of a college campus, but anyway) because I re-joined Weight Watchers last Monday. I will post more about this later. Suffice it to say, for now, that it's going well. Anyhoo. So the only thing I could find in there remotely healthy was yogurt. Fine. Whatever. Good ol' Dannon light 6 oz. cup of blueberry yogurt.

So I get over to the counter and order a medium ass-coffee, as is my custom nearly every morning, and I put the yogurt on the counter too. She rings me up. The total is $5.07. Now, I know a medium coffee is $1.75. And I also know that they charge tax if you pay cash (crazy, I know). So, math GENIUS that I am, I figure it out and and say, incredulous, "Wait. Was that yogurt like $3.00?" She goes, somewhat sympathetically and sheepishly, "Yeah, it's $2.99." I was struck into complete idiot mode at that point and could only utter, "Wow...o...k." Then there is the little matter of the sales tax. So, after all was said and done, that yogurt cost me $3.20. Yeah. I remained. The guy behind me in line says, "Holy shit! Did you just pay $3.00 for that yogurt?!? You can get like 8 of them for that at Acme (which is a local chain supermarket)." Again, still stunned into utter stupidity, I could only nod in agreement. I picked up my yogurt and my coffee cup and filled up and left.

Hind-sight is always 20/20, as my dad says---I'd like to interrupt at this point to mention that I just spilled some of the volcanic dirt coffee down my chin and on my jacket. I think it is my subconscious brain trying to get rid of the stuff before I can commit all of it to my innards.

Thank you. To continue: I looked at my receipt later that day and it said:

medium coffee 1.75
Dannon parfait 2.99

Parfait? What parfait? Who had a parfait? Not I! I had a cup of freakin' yogurt, not a yogurt, whipped cream, granola, and fruit concoction. Then, it dawned on me. The cashier saw the word "Dannon" on the product I bought and spied the word "Dannon" on her register's keypad and thought, "DING! DANNON! This is it!" But really, there probably is a another button on the keypad that has "yogurt" written on it and she just didn't realize it.

My suspicions were confirmed earlier this week when I went in there and saw that they had actually placed labels with prices for the shelved refrigerator items. "Dannon yogurt: $1.69." Which is also criminally overpriced for a cup of yogurt, but still, it 'aint $3.00.

So that is why I am steering clear of the coffee shop if I can. And why I just choked down 12 oz. of volcanic dirt. Oy.

Tuesday Night Knitting Club

Last night was my monthly "First Tuesday of the Month Knitting Group." I missed March's because I was just so utterly overwhelmed with the move. We met at the usual Starbucks on Rte. 100 in Exton. We had a small group there; smaller than usual. But it was a great time. Mandy, the "coffee master" was there and gave us another coffee tasting. I absolutely love when Mandy is there and treats us to a coffee tasting! We received these little coffee booklets called "passports." And we get stamps to put in them based on the coffees we try out from around the world. It's just so neat.

And I finally had one of my socks ready for the gusset lesson! I hope that I can get knitting on my other sock to get it to the same point. I don't want to move too far ahead on one sock then forget what to do for the other! Which, seeing that it's ME we're talking about here, is entirely plausible!

I can't believe it's April already! I really need to get crackin' on the baby items for my sister. August 23 (her due date) will be here before I even realize it! I'm just so happy that I finally have a somewhat valid reason to knit this:




And I still can't find my hair comb! It will be 4 weeks on Saturday! Yes, your assumption is correct: I, in fact, have NOT combed my hair in nearly a month...it looks it too. D'oh!

Coffee, Pastries, Knitting and Kicking Santorum Out of Office--- What Could Be Better?!

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....