The Old Coot has a “bug” up his sleeve.
By Merlin Lessler
I’m sitting here in a Starbucks with a container of
coffee in front of me, watching a cashier wait on customers. She’s been writing
about half of the orders on cups and putting them in a queue for the barista
(which I call a mixologist). She takes care of the simple coffee orders in a
routine way that may someday be done by a robot: listen to the order – turn to
the back counter – grab the proper size cup – fill it with blonde, pike or dark
roast coffee – install a top – slip the cup into a thin, cardboard sleeve –
swivel back around and hand the container to the customer. I watch her do this
again and again, always exactly the same.
It’s the sleeves that bother me. I don’t know why, they
just do. Whenever I’m handed a container with a sleeve, I wonder why they don’t
use better cups. My sleeves end up stuck in my car’s cupholder or the one on my
bicycle. It’s no small thing, the proliferation of these sleeves across the land.
It is estimated that Starbucks goes through 8 to 10 million every day – close
to 4 BILLION a year.
I’m not a whacko environmental extremist, just a regular
environmental aware person. I take care of my trash, recycle and pick up stray
litter on occasion, though I do take a frowned on “Sunday drive” every week. I
like to survey my world and learn where the roads go. It’s an inborn, genetic
trait to know your territory, going back to the days of the cavemen when it was
important to know where the wooly mammoths roamed and the sabretooth tigers
lurked.
It’s not that the sleeves are that much of an
environmental hazard anyway – they are biodegradable, but still, they irk me. I
guess it’s an old coot thing. Right now, the one on my cup has slipped down and
is resting on the table, like an extra-large shirt collar surrounding the neck
of a skinny necked guy like me. Every time I take a sip, I have to slide it up
on the cup. Maybe my issue is increased by the picture of the Starbuck’s woman
on the sleeve, wearing a crown and staring at me with a smug, disapproving look
on her face. It makes me feel uncomfortable. It’s the same look my 3rd
grade teacher gave me when I handed in a test paper, an ink stained and eraser shredded
work of art.
I should bring a glove with me when I go to a “sleeve”
place. One of those cheap, cotton things they sell in the hardware store by the
bundle. Then, I could ask for a sleeveless,
tall (that means small in English) dark roast.
But I won’t. If I did, I’d look like even more of a geek, and I can’t
risk it. Maybe Starbucks could put a pile of these cheap gloves by the cash
register so customers could use them, and then toss them into a wash bin by the
door on the way out. Most customers stay in the store until they finish their
beverage and take up space for time on end. I know! I’m right there watching
them.
Comments? Complaints? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com
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