Saturday, July 08, 2006

Service before my wake-up juice

I usually arrive to work in a half-dead state--uncoordinated, unable to think.
It takes a strong jolt of caffeine to get me going, and another couple of jolts to bring me up to a productive state where I can think and talk clearly, and in which my hands do what I want them to do.

From time to time though, the shop is busy from the moment I arrive and I have no time to suck down the caffeine. I burn my hands on the steam wand; I slur my words; Customers' orders sound like they're being ordered in an obscure dialect of Portugese or perhaps that African "click" language. It's ugly. (Not the click language--me.)

People have been arriving and ordering just as I'm arriving to work, a half hour before we're supposed to open. I suppose I could just tell them to wait until we're open, but they might just leave with their feelings hurt. We're trying to up business--every order is important in keeping us in the black. So I just tell them yes in my slurry speech, and burn my hands for their viewing pleasure.

2 comments:

Fr. Matthew said...

Does this include the afternoons when you just give the customer the drink you want to make rather than what they ordered.

Panimatka Philo said...

That can only be attributed to Barista Surliness--related to angst but with less anger.

You will drink what I tell you to!