Pullin' a Late One

It's ten after twelve.

A.M.

And I really should go home...but I drank a double latte around 7pm and I know that if I lay myself down right now my head will go abuzz till at least 3am. I'm sparing myself the misfiring wires and tossing and turning. People have a hard time believing that I only drink coffee two or three times a week here. I think I need to be a bit more selective about when I choose to drink it, though.

We close at 6pm and I'm usually able to start breaking things down around 5pm so that, come six, all I have to do is clean the brewers, bleach the boards, sweep, mop and count the drawer. Tonight, though, Helen came in around 4:30 to show me how to get online and pay the monthly Meals and Rooms tax and also how to pay the payroll tax. It wasn't until 6:30 that we finished with that. I still had a customer in the living room taking an exam on-line for a class and I realized that I hadn't eaten anything all day.

I bought smoked salmon today on my Costco run so that I could offer it as a bagel sandwich and I went ahead this afternoon and erased a big portion of my chalk board so that I could re-write the sandwich into the menu.

Whaddya think ~ smoked salmon, cream cheese, red onion and organic greens on a toasted bagel? Kind of typical but a good stand by.

So I erased the board right before I got slammed with a thousand lunch orders, which led me right into my meeting with Helen, which led me right past closing and there it was... 11pm... and I'm covered in chalk and jacked on caffeine and standing on the counters trying to be just the tiniest bit artistic in my penmanship... hands kind of shaking. And can I just say how very much I hate the sound of chalk on a chalk board? About as much as the sound of styrofoam. About as much as the sound of a napkin being rubbed together. (About as much as the sound of a hand on the fabric of the ceiling of a car??) Isms.

But the board is written, the dishes are done, the sandwich was tested and approved and I'm about five minutes away from a serious caffeine crash. G'night.

Chai Lattes and Star Charts

For the past year or so, Ella has been somewhat obsessessed with glow-in-the-dark sticker stars. Little by little they show up in new places throughout the house... newly noticed at night as we navigate our way through the dark. They now line the trim of windows and doors. There's a long strip of constellation along the top step in the upstairs hallway letting us, as well as houseguests, know where that drop off point is... should we come wandering into the hallway at night with something less than our full senses. Now there's a little halfcircle around the belly of the sink in the bathroom. Occasionally, in the middle of the night, when I wake up to take a wiz, I find a bit of the cosmos.... one speck of a star, usually.... clinging to my shoulderblade or maybe my hipbone. Sometimes when I lift the covers at night I'll find one or two or three giving off wee bits of light from within.

Last night I was at the shop, music blaring and buckets of bleach water everywhere, hogging out the backroom ...finally. I've entered that room sooo many times in an attempt to start that project but each time I end up walking around in circles like a dog trying to make itself a bed in the dirt... and then I find myself abandoning ship directly afterward.

I haven't had coffee for a little over a week and have been generally avoiding caffeine. I seem to have enough external stimulants right now to keep me on my toes. Caffeine, at this point, might just make me manic. I'd likely end up in the fetal position rocking back and forth... mind spinning.

But last night I made myself a chai latte when I arrived and drank the whole thing. I have a friend, and a regular customer at the bar, who comes in two, sometimes three, sometimes more than three times a day. He doesn't drink coffee and he doesn't eat wheat... which basically leaves him the choice of an italian soda or tea. He's a chai drinker. That, or Earl Grey. Most days, he comes in, downs two full pint glasses of iced chai, no ice. And then repeats that same routine every time he shows back up..... tallying him, easily, anywhere between 4-8 pints of chai per day. Each one loaded with maple syrup.

I had one pint glass at 8pm, cleaned the fuck out of this god-awful room, came home nauseaus with a bleach headache, crawled into bed at 1:30 and realized that there was absolutely no chance of sleep whatsoever... even with all that hard labor after all that caffeine. I'm now wondering how this friend's heart doesn't explode on him every day.

It was 1:30 in the morning and I was lying there thinking about picking up a check from the bank the following morning. I was thinking about my business account... about placing orders, about bills that would be popping up at the end of the month. Rent. Utilitites. Costco runs. I was thinking about the drawer's total every night and depositing that into the bank. Taxes. Thinking about whether or not all these figures will be leaving me upside down or right side up when it's all said and done. Thinking what a disastrous history I have when it comes to keeping track of dollars. I could feel my insides tightening and the little balls inbetween my shoulders blades screaming "stop stop stop".

I was able to see from the window last night that the sky was full of cloud cover but I knew that there was a meteor shower happening up there where I couldn't see. I also knew it'd be a long time before sleep would come and I could lay there in a panick about money or I could take myself outside and let the elements settle my nerves.

I followed Ella's star charts in the dark, dressing myself in warm layers and gathering our biggest fleece blanket, a pillow and my wool cape. I spread myself out on the hill in front of the house and listenened to the winds move through the trees in the valley. There were pockets in the sky where the clouds were stretched thin and little blinks of stars would shine through and then extinguish.... barely visible to begin with.... just a canvas of dim, random light.

I laid there for two hours....long enough for the winds to blow the clouds from the northwest to the southeast and, as soon as the canopy directly above my head was finally free and clear of cloud cover, a long, white streak jumped from the night sky and left a long, sweet trail as it fell.

I'd have been perfectly content with the little blinks of stars shining randomly through the pockets of clouds. There was a sweetness to just knowing that there were meteors falling up there, out of sight. It was just one more quiet, invisible mystery among many. But by the time the sky did clear, my nerves were settled, my bleach headache faded and the meteor shower that followed was like big bonus to the night.

When I followed Ella's treasure map of glow-in-the-dark sticker stars back to bed at 3:30 am I felt like thinks might be alright. Like maybe I might be able to balance the books. Like maybe I might be able to sleep.

Mocha madness

Behind the counter at the shop I have a three-bay sink. The far left sink, per health department requirement, is constantly full of hot water and one capful of bleach. After dishes are soaped and rinsed they sit in the bleach water for a few minutes until they reach the drain board to dry. We keep test strips in the drawer so that the health inspector can check the ph of the water should he grace us one day with a surprise visit.

Today was a busy day. We had a strong lunch crowd, ran out of chicken curry salad and never pulled a second hummus to thaw for the Veggie Delite. I had a chronic condition from 11am – 4pm of just completely spacing people’s bagels in the toaster, burning them, or just forgetting the order existed at all. I spilled one woman’s latte on the counter, gave full test coffee to those who asked for decaf, had to repeat every order else it move from one ear to the other without even having the luxury of entering the brain in the first place.

I learned today that I should not drink caffeine while working. And if I do, I should stick with the mellow octane like Yerba Mate or Chai latte.

The past two days I’ve had the great company of a hometown friend sitting at my counter keeping me company, meeting the locals and keeping Ella entertained. I promised him, before he came, that I’d make him one of my meanest café mochas. Tom explained yesterday that at his favorite coffee shop in Easton, Maryland they make what they call a Euro Mocha…. which mixes powered cocoa instead of chocolate syrup with the espresso shot. It makes for a mocha that’s not quite as sweet….I see the appeal.

So today we decided to have ourselves a little experimental mocha party. And Meg wasn’t very smart about her caffeine intake at the party…. Meg went a little overboard...hence all the fuck-ups (sorry Mom… I’ve been trying not to swear but the day really was full of fuck-ups).

So long about 5pm, as I’m wrapping up the baked goods, losing my mind, measuring out tomorrow morning’s beans, and finishing up the dirty dishes, I decide to drain the lukewarm bleach water and refill it with hot water. A few customers come in and I make their maple lattes and shots of espresso and answer the thousandth question for Ella (“No, you cannot have the fifty dollar teddy bear down at the book store. No, you cannot have another hot chocolate. I don’t care if your birthday is tomorrow. Right now is today. No, you cannot walk to the park all by yourself.”) …. And in the heat of all of that I totally space the bleachy, hot, health code sink that has filled up and proceeded to overflow onto the counter and flood the turntable cupboard and floor.

No more caffeine at work.
No more caffeine at work.
No more caffeine at work.

Today's Playlist

Gillian Welch ~ Hell Among the Yearlings

Music from the Tea Lands ~ Putumayo

Just Listen to It

(one of Jim's famous annual complilations... a fine addition to the shop's playlist!)

Bob Marley's last show ever ~ Pittsburg 3 River Stadium

G-Love ~ Hustle

Greg Brown ~ Dream Cafe

and for BJ ... Ray Lamontagne:)

the phenomenal Ruthie Foster

Feist

Ali Farka