Having been a barista for some time now, I think I have been exposed to most of the annoying quirks people request for in their (stupid) coffees. Here is a list and I will explain WHY they are annoying for us baristakind to make. So next time your coffee doesn’t come out “the way you had it last time”, then at least you will understand why.

EXTRA HOT – This is one of the most common most stupid requests ever. Milk is tastiest around 65-70ºC, any more and it tastes like BURNT SHIT, any less and you’re just an idiot (because it’s still in the food danger zone, but you asked for it). So believe it or not, it is actually HARD to make it taste like BURNT SHIT! That’s right, it’s HARD to BURN the milk. Sure, you think we just leave the milk in the wand for a few seconds more, it gets hotter. It also destroys the texture of the milk, and then, when the milk starts to boil at 80ºC, it starts to SPIT out of the jug, all over us. Get it? I have to burn MYSELF just to burn the milk for you. When you want to sit down and drink it, that is fine, because I can just heat the cup to the point where I can’t even hold it myself without burning myself too, then you’ll be under the impression that it’s “extra hot”. But when you order a takeaway, unfortunately I cannot heat a paper cup the same way I can heat a glass or ceramic. SO GET IT? IT’S GOING TO BE NORMAL TEMPERATURE in a takeaway cup. So I really don’t care if you think I’m not a good barista because I don’t want to make it extra hot for you – I actually just don’t want to burn myself. Besides, at those temperatures, you can’t even taste anything, so it’s your loss either way.

EXTRA FROTH – I know, you can like froth. It’s airy, smooth, melts on your tongue. Wow. You want more of it. HOWEVER, unfortunately, it does not work like that. Get it. It does not work like that. Just because you want more froth, does not mean I can make more of it and still get your nice creamy smooth texture. You might think that it just means I suck more air into the milk. Sure I do, that’s how it’s done. But what a pity. It’ll be such low quality froth that you’ll choke on it instead. So it is actually HARD to make heaps of froth (and maintain good texture).

LATTE WITH NO FROTH – Dudes, just get a flat white. Because, I am just going to make you a flat white, no matter how much you want to kick and scream that it tastes different. The point of a latte is the perfect 7mm of light, luscious froth on top, with just perfect milk on top a good shot.

DECAF – Ah, the taste of coffee without the caffeine. It’s like eating a sugarless Mars Bar. Just drink water if you need to quench your thirst. Or suck on a Kopiko.

SOY – Don’t complain about waiting if you want soy. You do realise, that in ten orders, your soy order is just one. So guess what, I’m going to do the other ones first, before I do your soy!!

AND if you order any of these in combination with each other, then please, just leave and go somewhere else. Sorry if I am not good enough, but I don’t care

Please be considerate next time you order coffee. If you want a good coffee from me, please note that I like to make ordinary cappuccino’s and ordinary latte’s, and actually take some pride in pouring them perfectly. I probably shouldn’t tell you that I make cappuccino’s with latte froth, because I am a fan of latte art!!! (Hint, it’s latte art, not cappuccino art)

Haven’t written on this thing in a while, but that doesn’t mean my brain hasn’t been thinking!!

I just looked at a post about my todo list for these holidays. So far I have 80% crossed off one of the things in that list. I have realised that I’m not going to actually do some of them. Such as:

- Fold the Last Waltz, and perfect it quite badly. <– need to do
- Read Brukner & Khan cover to cover <-yeah should do
- Read a book. Full stop. <– need to get moving on this as well HAHA
- Install Windows 7 and restore the settings and data <– have done this mostly
- Buy a MBP <–probably not gonna get a laptop again, for another year!!!
- Get Crystal Glaze protection <– I'm gonna wax my car on my own, instead of get it professionally
- Buy a Wii <– gonna wait for the Wii2

There are some other ones I need to do:
- Write some Christmas cards
- Vacuum my room
- Format parent's computer
- Get a tv tuner card???
- Ride the bike

I guess that's all I can think of for now.

In other news, I passed semester 4!! And I did okay as well!! I really thought I was in for it, I really thought I'd only get P's this semester. Instead, somehow I fluked it through with some honours!!! (Which can mean anything above 65 LOL) I yeah, honestly thought i was doomed for 55% for Neuro, but yay!!! Let out this massive "YEEEEAH!!" at about 6:40pm today, and my dad was like "what" (in cantonese LOL) and I was like WOOOOOOOOOT YEAH. And then I told him and he was like, "oh, that's only ______. That's crap." Then I explained to him that I thought I did really really shit this semester. SO yeAH. I do realise that I don't normally write on this blog like a teeniebopper. But I was excited. It's results season!!! Celebration.

Hmm.

The time has come for the babies of ‘89.

I am turning twenty tomorrow, just one syllable. It is but a number… And in all those years on Earth, I haven’t discovered the meaning of ‘but’ in the previous sentence.

I think I’ve had a pretty big week in the life of my mind; I’ve said some things that I can’t take back, but may have not been phrased or as well thought out as I’d have liked. It has caused me to wonder.

In the next ten years I’ll find out where I’m going with my life. I want to learn to make the right decisions; I want to see if I can belie my right palm and separate my head and heart; I want to find purpose to this life instead of accumulating knowledge. I want to challenge myself, step out of my comfort zones and learn to trust my gut rather than past successes. I want to find the right balance of things that will make me happy to the core, because I know if I do this, I’ll know that I can do things right at last.

I want to grow up quickly so that this can happen. At the same time I must be patient and trust that everything will fall into place eventually if I do it slowly.

It is still an exciting age to be alive, and the only edge being lost is the ‘teen’ syllable.

Yeah so obviously to fill in my spare time I need to do stuff, and that would involve making a list to make sure I achieve something.

I must:
- Fold the Last Waltz, and perfect it quite badly.
- Read Brukner & Khan cover to cover
- Read a book. Full stop.
- Install Windows 7 and restore the settings and data
- Buy a MBP
- Get Crystal Glaze protection
- Buy a Wii

Hopefully when I come back to this list at end of the holidays I’ll have achieved much of this!!

Provided I don’t have such a wild day.

It rained a lot last night and this morning, causing random pools of water in various gutters.

Driving down Springvale Rd there was a bad car behind me, just going too fast for the weather. It came close behind me, ready to overtake. I had space before the car in front, so I could watch them quite safely in the rear view mirror. I saw the signal come on, I looked forward again, the car just in front to my left at that moment just shaved a puddle and threw water to the middle lane which I was in.

The bad car behind me signaled left, went into that puddle at about 80km/h, and just as it passed me and went through the puddle, I was exactly adjacent to them.

I braced myself, turned my head, scrunched my eyes (using orbicularis oculi) tapped the brake slightly, gripped the steering wheel tighter with my right hand, and slammed the heel of my left hand into the horn.

Then all was fine in the next moment, but really it sucked. I got pounded by water but didn’t get wet… the car is a funny unit.

A few hours ago I woke from the longest sleep I’ve had in at least a year. Hit the mattress at 10pm, and woke at 6:40am, and lay around till about 8:45. I don’t get to do that any more, there was a stage during the year I had to be moving for seven days in a week for about two months. That was really tiring.

What caused me to need to sleep for so long was the enormous day I had two days ago, followed by a restless night attempting to sleep in thirty degree heat, backed up by being hammered at a work trial.

So here is the start of Wednesday.

I woke nice and early after finishing exams the day before, thinking the Eastern freeway would be a gentle crawl through Alexandra Pde. But wonderfully, with a passenger in the car I remebered the envious T2 lane, and zipped all the way through to arrive half an hour early. Messed around for half an hour in the adjacent park, had a play with the sundial. That was an interesting gadget.

Moved on to the interview at a relatively exclusive chocolate cafe chain. The Lygon St store was ethereal. Formerly one of those neat little townhouses converted into a cafe, it had almost a ghastly aura to it. I don’t know how to describe it, but it was really very nice. The interview went okay, I got stuck on the questions where I was asked what my referees would say about me if they were to be dialled.

Then decided to visit the places that I haven’t been to in the best part of half a year. Devoured some Brunetti’s. Yum. Had a bit of a peek around Smith St, found some stuff that doesn’t fit terribly well. Victoria St was the next stop for lunch, found the restaurant that I haven’t been to for a while, and had my old-time favourite meal. It wasn’t as good as it used to be, but nice to have nonetheless.

Drove to Doncaster to escape the heat. When I got into the carpark there, I found a spot, but I also had a phone call. A phonecall for a trial. Wooooo! Indeed major excitement right at that moment. While on the phone I had cars horning me because I’d pulled over right next to a vacant parking spot. BUT I had a job trial right then and there.

All this was somehow shared with someone slightly special. What I want to say to this is that endless days are the most special thing ever … but making them count means more.

When my mum got back from work at night, we went out for dinner. I really wasn’t hungry, indeed I was very full after the day’s massive calorie/kilojoule consumpution. Luckily I wasn’t bloated, or I would have wasted my parents money in going out for dinner in the first place. Dinner was nice.

tbc if i can be bothered.

nancy says (21:10):
*like falling in love
*with someone new
*the thrill of the chase
*and then discovering their little love quirks
*and being wooed and everything feeling new and amazing and surprising and mysterious
*and feeling invincible cos your serotonin levels are like sky high
*and staying up all night and waking up at the crack of dawn
*and your immune system is like triple strength
*because of some other chemical

Emirates Melbourne Cup 03/11/2009.

Saturday was Derby day and on the news that night, my dad and I saw Shocking tear up the field from behind with a lot of toe to win by a few body-lengths. Immediately after the race I heard the commentators talking about how Shocking was to be a Melbourne Cup runner, and that it would be two kilograms lighter than it was in the Derby run. I remarked to my dad that he should buy this horse, as he seems to always buy the horses that run the race from the front of the pack.

So now to the big race. The race itself was rather uneventful, Wawringa (sp?) led basically the whole race and poor Damien Oliver went from winner one year, to finishing last the next. It’s like you waste a minute of your life watching the horses complete the first 2800m, so at the last bend the moves were being made. With 300m to go i heard the caller utter “Shocking after Crime Scene in the lead…” and I got out of my chair to get a closer look at the TV screen. I found number 21 and it was making fast ground on Crime Scene, just a neck away from its nose. The horse had come from about halfway to two-thirds of the way to the back, and mounted its attack laterally against a strong headwind to break to the lead. I was then shouting at my dad that his horse was right there, and going to win the cup. With 50m to go, Shocking had put itself a neck in front… then the horses passed the finish line and Shocking won by one length. I was so excited!! and my dad was still confused as to whether he’d won!! But it was probably because I was shouting and being all excited… He did hear the race caller utter that tell-tale line.

So it’s been several uneventful years in Melbourne Cup betting for us, so it’s nice to get a small win, albeit minor as he bought the early favourite (Viewed) and another horse starting with Z as well.

The past two days have been relatively interesting for me, especially in the life of the mind.

Yesterday, driving home along the long straight road that is Wellington Rd, 80km/h. Suddenly the light turned orange and I was about 50m from it. It was between me and the light, but this time, lethargic as I was, I decided to brake and stop at it. Travelling 80km/h, the first time I hit the brakes, obviously I looked in the rear view mirror. There was no one behind me. As I was maybe 10m from the lights, I looked again, and this time I saw the flashing lights of an ambulance in the fading sunset in the overcast sky. The world doesn’t look too bright at that hour when you’re wearing sunglasses for the glare, but everything else is shady, particularly through the windows of your tinted car. So here I was, 10m from the lights that were about to turn red, and an ambulance behind me. I thought about the heart attack the ambulance was trying to rescue, the person who might die if I stopped here and prevented the ambulance from passing. There were no option to either side of me; cars were lined up on either side. I thought about being caught on a red light camera, being a fast, straight road. But I thought if it decided to photograph me, that it would photograph the ambulance too. Then the person reviewing the photos would realise I did it for the ambulance.
As I came to a complete stop, the lights were red. With the ambulance bearing down behind me, I decided to look right, and then left, as you do. There were no oncoming cars, it was a minor intersection, or it was just quiet at that time of day. So I drove through, and pulled over to the left lanes and kind of hit the brakes as I crossed the road, unsure of whether I had done the right thing. I saw the ambulance whizz past and before I knew it, it was jostling for the bus lane at the next intersection to zip through there. I then thought about the scenario had I not driven through and let the ambulance through, how it would be stuck in limbo land being held up by ‘laws’. I drove home confused, but I could have saved a life.

This morning was another strange story. I worked opening shift for the first time in months. I was anxious: I’d slept late the night before, I was running late and very tired this morning, I didn’t have time to eat a proper breakfast, I had more than myself to look after, I completed many tasks at once in the 45 minutes between waking and leaving for work. In the car on the way to work I wondered if I’d remember everything to do first thing in the morning. As I drove around the side of the streets I saw my other workmate taking the walk to the store room. I was going to be there before her, so I was relieved. I took my time parking the car, and raced over to the store to get the ball rolling.
As I turned the corner around a walkway where our store was blindsided till you turned the corner, I noticed that one of the objects we use to block the entrance was placed at a funny angle. I put this down to laziness by the person from the day before. Or perhaps even a curious customer, overnight. As I shuffled this out of the way, I walked into the store and the first thing I vividly noticed was that the small white bin was missing. I didn’t think much of it, as I only work once a week. I thought someone might have broken it, or the boss must have taken it home. When big things that I use all the time are missing like this, I take notice.
I hurriedly turned on the various machines, not wanting to make a wrong move in the morning. No one really bothers to ‘train’ you properly here, so you have to pick things up here and there when working. So I did things the best I could, unfortunately I stuffed them both up, but yes. I continued with the small cakes and as my colleague finished with the large cakes, she began serving the early customers. To do so, we need money to give people change. She opened the cupboard where the safe is, and she said, “M, look at this..” I turned around from the fridge where I was adjusting the small cakes and had a look.
There were two things that went through my head. The first was, ‘It was bound to happen sooner or later, so whatever..’ and the other was ‘Great how are we going to give customers change.’ So I uttered, “Fuck,” as I was stunned, shocked, disbelieved. I just continued with what I was doing.
Moments later, my colleague suggested to call security. I immediately thought to myself that, yes, that would be the right thing to do, because Center Management needs to know that their overnight security is inadequate. Right, so I had no idea where to find the number, so my colleague rummaged around the various folders looking for it. Finally she found it, after I tried calling the main Center Management number to no avail. I punched it into the phone, all ten digits – as I was doing so I thought how stupid it was that the number for SECURITY was so long. After a long twenty or thirty seconds, someone probably woke up and picked up the phone. I think they said they were security, and I said, “I’m calling from A Place, and we have been burgled overnight.” He said he’d be here. I felt like such a fool that I just thought to continue on with doing what I was, and not thought to call someone about it. The most I thought to do was call my boss, but I thought my colleague would handle that sooner rather than later, as I’m not a regular staff member.
Probably five to ten minutes later, a man turned up in the uniform and we showed him. The first question he asked was what we’ve touched. And we looked at each other and thought, great. We’ve touched everything. But I quickly pointed out that the cupboard in question was touched only by my colleague, who was still wearing gloves from organising the cakes. Not too bad.
After another twenty seconds of doing nothing, he suggested that we call the Police, 000. So I pulled my phone out of my pocket and quickly decided against using it, and used the store phone instead. Very bad phone, but I didn’t really care. I was connected almost instantaneously, and I heard the familiar ‘What do you need Police Fire Ambulance… … …’ over the din of the shopping center coming alive slowly. I had to guess what questions they were asking me because it was hard to hear, but I said we’d been burgled overnight, and they needed the address, to which I tried to ask my colleague what address/store number we were at. The security guy from Center Management took over, giving me a disdainful, “Here let me do it …” All I thought was that he should have called the police himself!! As if some lowly idiot like me call in!! So after having called the police, my colleague called my boss and they were to come as soon as humanly possible.
We began wearing gloves to do everything, it had to be business as usual. A little tricky to handle things sometimes, with decreased tactile sensation.
A little bit later on I asked my colleague whether she knew anything about the little white bin we have. She walked along and looked to see that it wasn’t there. So I hypothesised that the person had cracked open the insecure cupboard, crowbarred the pissweak safe out, shoved it in the bin, and left causing minimal damage.
I was outside the front of the store as my boss came. I was putting price tags in front of the cakes. For some reason I turned around, and I saw him walking in. I shook my head at him, and he shook his head back.
Another half hour elapsed and I went to the store room. As I returned I saw that the police had arrived shortly before me. They were getting a bit of a story from my colleague, and my bosses.
There were details taken, the cupboard was dusted for fingerprints, photos were taken. It was uncovered in the coming hours that two other cafes in our vicinity had been ‘hacked’, and this was somewhat ‘relieving’ news to my boss that it wasn’t an attack that was targeted solely at us.
The strange day continued, as I spent nine hours on my legs.

(The previous word I typed was my 1500th word in this entry. Quite and effort considering I’ve been doing my 1500 word essay for three weeks already.)

I have come to think back to these instantaneous, split-second reactions/thoughts that have come to my head in the past days. I must first remark that it is amazing how many things we can think of all at once – we can even think ahead to the consequences of our actions within a breath. However, I have not been thinking correctly lately, I seem to have a strange ‘common sense’… It appears to be these sudden reactions that define who we are as a person; what we think first is how our mind is bent. But I guess it is these real-life experiences that we learn from which prepare us for the unknowns which will happen in the future.

If you are a manual driver who regularly burns out at intersections or skidpans, drifts and whatever, this is wayyy too amateurish for you.

Today, I finally booked myself in for a skilled driver’s course – free, of course. The morning was a few hours of ‘theory’ or just statistics to highlight the reality of young drivers being bad. I guess the main message from this was that us P-Platers often forget that you can actually go to court and be in jail for causing a crash.

The afternoon was a great little adrenaline rush. Starting with a slalom between witches hats that I quite enormously failed at all speeds. It was kinda cool to finally get to do one, although I had harboured no yearning to do it prior to this. In my group, a guy, R, with an SS Commodore gave a great continuous swerve to show us almost how its done. That was mild fun.

Next was a hairpin turn. No adjectives needed. Probably 10m in diametre. My first run in was supposed to be at 45km/h, but i cranked it to 50km/h for fear of losing too much speed through the turn. Got through it unscathed at this speed. The next two runs were gentle at 30km/h and 35km/h, I easily turned those with one hand on the steering. After those mid-warmups, I got to hit the accelerator again and was meant to do it at 60km/h. Got to the dodgy three-quarter point and my back wheels started losing traction. So this is what it’s all about!! Thought about hitting the break momentarily, kinda did that, but accelerated through the last twenty percent. That was heaps fun!!

The swerve exercise was monstrous. Sudden calls of LEFT and RIGHT around a cone setup led us to swerve the car to avoid a figurative petrol tanker. Very hard to do with little distance and reaction time, let me tell you. Pretty much impossible to get out of the way. Even the swerve-stop was hard. My favourite swerve was with about two seconds to respond, and I shunted RIGHT then LEFT then back RIGHT again to do a complete swerve. That was thrilling, so agreed the two passengers, but of course not instructor. That was a good one too, but very much frightening.

Lastly was a true emergency stop at mostly 45km/h, then 60km/h. I am very impressed at my car’s emergency brakes, to say the least. From 60km/h, it stops me within 12m (on a dry road, on a sunny day). Was just wary of not slamming my brakes too much here, and could feel the ABS going on R’s car as well, which was a pretty cool feeling. Also smelt the rubber through the open window of my other group member’s car. Nifty.

Low-doses of adrenline pumping for a couple of hours? Great fun. Now I see why people love playing with their cars so much. But only on proper tracks that don’t have anything built up nearby. Much to dangerous in your everyday street. A little bit of the inner hoon unleashed within me today!!

Tomorrow is the birthday of one I have not seen much at all in the past two years, let alone been aware of the existence of. A small sadness but such is the busy life of those popular and working. Umm not much more to say.