12:18 PM King Farm Safeway, Rockville, MD August 6
Standing in line at a Starbucks is pretty near the most American thing you can do besides trying to follow your kid's little league baseball game you're missing on your 2-way over the din of the evening metro commute. You heartless so-and-so. And it really was only recently, within the last 6 months, that a co-worker at my old job made me even think of approaching the Church of Coffee let alone adopt a favorite drink (Grean Tea frappaccino - what, guys drink that). So on this day with very little coaxing, I acted on the Pavlovian response and found myself ordering and then watching as the two employees diligently worked on not only my order but also the previous two.

As the instrumental version of theme song to "Greatest American Hero" played over the loudspeakers, I kind of zoned out as I'm prone to do in these situations. It's a little embarrassing to have to watch people work for you, especially if you understand commodities or have ever worked in food service. It would be one thing if the money freshly debited from my account were going directly to them but as it is, the whole thing is kind of foggy and when I have to pretend that neither of us knows what's going on its easier to convince myself that their happy ambivalence is more a product of their New Employee Training and not a genuine human response to coffee making.

About half-way through some good foam-sculpting action, I hear an irritated, shrill voice to my right say, "Is this the new thing here? Is this the new thing, not to wait on the Customer?"

So I turn and I see the voice - it's coming from an aging Grandmother woman, like the old lady in those greeting cards. She's standing at the register, clearly watching the employees bustling about in what is seriously a floor space the size of a closet. A normal person with even a modicum of human decency could sum up the situation in the following words: "They are busy and I will wait patiently."

I kind of lean over, smile and say innocently, like I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt that she really doesn't understand how to queue, "Oh, you know what it is... I think there's only two of them, so yeah...".

She replies, more to the employees than to me, with condescension thicker than caramel drizzle, "There's ALWAYS two of them. And they never wait on anyone."

The foam began to bubble over and I decided to press on, given the obvious and now comical aspect of the situation.

"So, okay," I say. "I guess you can give them a break."

Three Summers at Denny's, two years at Wild Waters and that freshman-year month at Arbie's where my manager's name was "Frog". Sticking up for the blue-collars, that's me.

Things got real, just then, and she turned to me. Random giggles from onlookers and I noticed one of the girls working on my green tea was smiling quietly to herself.

"Don't tell ME what to do," the old-coot said, then for affect, she upped her voice to a nice volume so you would think I was physically assaulting her, "DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO."

I motioned to the employees like, "Hello?" and she advanced on my position. I did one of those slight backsteps and looked to my left and right, like to find a quick exit, but I was blocked in between counter-top and Akeelah and the Bee.

"Sir, SIR...!" I'm right here, you finger-wagging harpy-queen.

"...I make it a point to examine the credentials of anyone who would tell me what to do, and you, sir, can DROP DEAD."

Well, I make it a point to steel myself in an argument for any possibly damaging rhetoric and I'm not really sure what the hell you just said but it sure as shit sounds funny. How can I be mad at you? YOU'RE SO CUTE! Come on, knit me a Colostomy Bag? What do you say?

That was pretty much it, but I did laugh, and so did the people around me, and before I walked away I said, "You're just a ball of Sunshine, aren't you?!" With my credentials now sufficiently examined, I went off to have my head examined, because I had to have day-dreamed that.