s*bux & neverland

We have to get the motorhome driver off the clock. Well I still have to upload the files. Just do it from home. I'll just go to Starbucks and upload it from there.

Thus it began...

Heat, concrete, and a rash were most of my day. Not my rash, though don't think I wouldn't admit it if it were mine, someone I work with. And I was the lucky person chosen to handle the situation, to find him a clinic, to make sure he had paperwork, to make sure he was safe, to make sure he could work tomorrow. Inside the motorhome the air conditioner blasted and I never removed my apple sweater while in there. Outside on the giant concrete slab of our shoot, it was blazing hot and I was rarely outside for longer than a few minutes walking to and fro, walkie and phone in hand.

I wasn't even upset that I had to try to upload the files after we'd all been wrapped and most heading home because Matt wouldn't be home for a few more hours and even then the odds of my still being awake when he gets home at 11 with a 5:30am calltime were slim. I figured I'd not see him except hazily in between a goodnight and a goodmorning kiss. My being stuck at the valley's most hit-on able starbucks didn't really bother me. Nor did the testy man who admitted he'd had a bad day to the man he was being testy with. He apologized to me but the damage was done. You sir, are an ass. Your attempt to hit on that girl with the drums is pathetic, she's way too cute for you and definately too young. What bothered me was my bladder. I'd had a giant glass of iced green tea earlier and I had to go and we all know that when you have to go at a Starbucks, the person in the bathroom before you is obligated by law to be the slowest bathroom user this side of the Sierra Nevadas. I actually had enough time to rush back to the car to grab my reusable cup so I could grab some decaf heaven to drink on the long drive back home. Still no free bathroom. Doing the bathroom dance now. Ohmygoshohmygosh hurry UP! FINALLY! Ah, yocata... I rinse out my cup, wash my hands, head to the counter.

To the counter comes a bear of a barista. He's about 6'5 with a thick beard. Maybe about 23 or so. Lots of pins on his shirt. What can he get me. This, I point proudly to the p-touch tape on my cup that states my favorite coffee drink at S*bux. Whoa, did you get this cup at Pike Place? Yes, I had to make a pilgrimidge I declare, and this one is the original logo, the one where you can see her nips. Oh yes, I see, I gotta make a pilgrimidge myself, I'm trying to volunteer. Volunteer?

My bear friend tells me that no barista may call the store on Pike Place market their home store. Whoever is staffed there is a volunteer from a local area. He also told me that Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks only has one key for a Starbucks store and its the Pike Place one. I have an old magazine, I told him, where he tells us his favorite drink which is something fairly basic that neither of us can recall. A drip? A latte? I move on down to await my drink where two men attempt to make conversation. Well one tries with asking if my drink is the one on the counter and doesn't believe me when I insist it isn't, after all, I'm holding the lid of my coffee cup. Now I know how that guy out there felt when he made a scene. The other guy just looks at me like he knows me and is trying to place me, which makes me wonder if I know him so I try to place him. My coffee is up, a masterpiece truly, I may have to return to this store, if only to tell my bear friend that Schultz's favorite drink is a double shot non-fat latte, three quarters full.

I'm still in a good mood. My coffee is fantastic, life is great, and then I get on the 134. Red lights. Hmm... Should I? Well hello. Hi Alexa, what are you doing? Oh, just closing up at work, what are you doing? I'm on the 134 stuck in traffic with everyone else. Did you want to come on by? I was thinking about it, want me to pick you up?

Baja Fresh it is. Not that salsa, the medium one, yeah that's the ticket. Conversations of blogs, jobs, leaks, calltimes, fires, CDs, money, husbands, grown up stuff after all, we're only a few years away from thirty. How time has flown.

As I drive home thoughts of books and happy things flood my head, of Christmas, of the many events we have coming up, and JM Barrie and his wonderful stories of Peter Pan and Neverland and should I read some more of them.

The car in front of me is a minivan, there's a DVD playing overhead for the kids in the back, its Peter Pan. Hook is chasing little animated Peter around as Wendy and the lost boys cheer him on. I shed a little tear, its been a magical day in the land of grown ups.