hello, and welcome to my grumpy morning ponderings

I've been trying to branch out when it comes to take-out coffee lately. This is for many reasons....

1. I'm sick of the folks at my local Starbucks asking me if I'm sure whenever I ask for something other than a tall cinnamon dolce latte. (In a way I can't blame them, since nine times out of 10, I do want the CDL. But, as one of my coworkers recently pointed out, there's such a massive turnover at this particular coffee shop and, really, every single service place in the city, that no one should be able to remember my drink order. This says something about me, not them, I know.)
2. No Logo.
3. The after-taste of a latte at Three Bananas Cafe, for example, is incomparable. Life-altering, perhaps. Pure coffee goodness.
4. Douglas Coupland makes me angry.

That last one threw you off, eh?

First, you're wondering how anyone could ever be angry at Douglas Coupland. (Who, by the way, has the best author website in the world. Honestly.)

But there are only a handful of "The Way I See It" messages to be found on the tall cups at Starbucks in Edmonton. One is from Madeleine Albright reminding me to stop hating women or being catty or something like that. One from Newt Gingrich about the battlefield of ideas, yadda yadda.

The one I get virtually every day is written by Douglas Coupland.

"I know a lot of morning people and I know a lot of night people but I have yet to meet a late afternoon person," it smirks self-indulgently, like Genius Douglas Coupland is the only person in the world who likes to sleep in. It mocks me when I have to get to work by 8 a.m. and I hate everything already, and then the King of Generation X is making fun of me because I'm bleary-eyed and angry at myself for not getting to the pool at 6:45 or some other ungodly hour I set my alarm for but couldn't muster the strength to meet.

I shake my fist at you, Douglas Coupland, you ironic genius of Canadiana. Shake. My. Fist.