Unless you're ready for a lifetime of incredible lattes, don't even sip that first one. Do yourself a favor and keep drinking Starbucks or whatever the burnt-tasting hell it is they serve at the grocery store café, because once you have a good latte... (I'm talkin' 'bout a real latte, made on a clean machine, with organic whole milk and perfectly crafted espresso beans.) Once you've had a mixture of flavors so smooth and enticing, you'll drive across town for it...
OK. Did you ever read Flowers for Algernon? Yeah. So you get it. You can't just go back to being sexually repressed and mentally challenged and whatnot, not after having an amazing latte like that.
(What the hell am I talking about? Check it: http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/algernon/summary.html)
My sister owns a café, and I worked for her the first summer they were open. I learned how to taste coffee. I discovered the complex flavors that go into a hot cup of Get Your Ass Up in the Morning. I learned the craft; the science of the bean; the art of the pour. Then, when summer was over, I got another job.
I started drinking the coffee at work.
I stopped drinking the coffee at work.
I've had lattes at other cafes, of course. I had one of those mint-and-chocolate concoctions at the airport over Christmas because I was tired. We had a long, uncomfortable flight ahead of us and...you know what? I don't have to explain myself to you. I wanted some coffee. I knew it would taste like shit, alright? I knew. So I had them pour a bunch of sugary crap on it so I wouldn't have to taste it.
I did. Have mercy on me, I tasted it. Evil like that cuts through peppermint syrup like a hot blade through butter.
I choked down half of the offensive brew and tossed the rest in the garbage. I felt like a traitor. I had lowered myself for the thrill that coffee's facsimile offers and never quite delivers. (Not to mention the guilt of throwing away "perfectly good" food. Does a luxury beverage count? Are there starving kids in Africa who would sacrifice a day's wages for a shitty paper cup full of airport coffee beverage?) What I had put in my mouth was the pleather of caffeinated beverages. I drank a mask-wearing villain, posing as espresso and milk. (Holy Baby Jesus, I don't even want to think about what they used for "milk." I can't handle skim, for sweet fuck's sake, and there's no way this stuff would be considered real by even McDonald's standards.) I needed a shower.
And then there was the time we registered for a Keurig...
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