Closing down the coffee shop

After almost life time of patronizing coffee shops, I'm now only going occasionally. I'm putting my $2/day into the kitty for a special trip next fall, and I've learned to make a passably-possibly decent cup of coffee at home. About a year ago I had to switch to 100% decaf, and since that always tastes like water at the coffee shop, I started making it at home and using Half n Half. The trick is to make it a little stronger than regular--I'm using Folgers.

Now I'm also making a dark chocolate drink--2 scoops of Hersey's dark chocolate to one scoop of sweetner. I do miss talking to the folks I'd met over the years, but with age comes adjustments. So unless I observe something really strange going on, you probably won't see much happening here. Please visit my regular blog, Collecting my thoughts, which is still updated every day--or more.

I wasn't in the coffee shop, but . . .

. . . it happened in a parking lot. I was getting out of my car; one space away was a man on the passenger side of his car straightening his pant leg. He looked at me and said cheerily, "I change my socks 20 times a day; I guess I'm a little weird." Uh, you betcha, I thought, but I said, "If it works for you." So I just had to Google it. I found 6.5% of Americans change their socks more than once a day. But 20 times seems a bit OCD.

How mothers talk to children

Mom-babble. Four lively youngsters were jockying for space at the next table in the coffee shop, and of course, the smallest one lost. Here's what I overheard from Mom: "Tears do not mean happy. . ." "You need to clean up this mess. . ." "One of you made your brother upset, one of you needs to say you're sorry." Hello! Sometimes kids do this to get mom's attention, it works, and she talks them to death. Believe it or not, we took classes to learn to talky talky to children in the 1970s. I probably flunked, but lectured like my Mom did. If we weren't nice, she explained, and explained. Sometimes it made you wish for a spanking. Now everyone knows how to mom babble. Even dads.

Breakfast cookies

At the coffee shop today I met the woman who makes the "breakfast cookies" that are sold there. She told me they had butter, sugar, flour, eggs, raisin bran--and lots of raisins. Then she sat down to work on her Bible study work book. Sounds like a good combination for heart and soul! Probably pretty much the same as this recipe. Or this one, a little richer, with nuts and coconut.

Back at Lakeside coffee show

Met two lovely young ladies at the coffee shop this morning--Mara attends Muskingham College, and Mallory attends Kent State. We have such nice people taking care of us here at Lakeside in the summer. Chatted with some neighbors.

Sad Thanksgiving story

I greeted a coffee shop friend today with a casual remark about "How are you celebrating Thanksgiving?" But she wasn't feeling thankful. It turns out a trusted employee, a woman she’s known and been friends with for 25 years, was embezzling from her. Now they both have lawyers, and the woman has admitted to stealing about $100,000, but her employer suspects it’s much more. And as you may guess, losing the money hurts, but not as much as her feeling of grief and back stabbing over this woman whom she considered a friend. She said, “She smiled at me every day, clucked over my children, we did things together. What sort of psychopath does this?” A very sad holiday.

No Panera's this morning

High winds, sleet and snow from Sandy. I'm skipping the coffee shop this morning, but I'm guessing the bakers and clerks will be there.

"It's like a weirdly inverse chart, where the folks with secure government jobs, the ones with SUVs and more affluent addresses, get to stay home, bundle up and wait out the storm. And the folks working the minimum-wage jobs, who frequently rely on public transportation, have to find a way — any way — to make it to work." Washington Post