10 Reasons Why I Don't Actively Promote Coffeeshops

1. I feel like a fish out of water the minute I walk in the door and realize I can't see because the lights are so dim. (Does drastically reducing your sight somehow enhance the taste experience?)

2. The signs are always written in chalk in some sort of flourishy cursive which looks folksy but is actually impossible to read. Cute, but I already need a dictionary.

3. I'm limited in my size options because I don't know how to pronounce the names they give their cups.

4. They ask if I want shots as if that's something perfectly normal (No thanks. I'm not that fond of needles...)

5. The only thing affordable on the menu is the regular coffee, which tastes like they brewed a teaspoon of water in an entire sack of grounds. I have yet to discover the correct poundage of sugar required to make this drinkable.

6. I'm either working the pitcher of half-and-half wrong or it's perpetually two drips from empty whenever I need it.

7. I can't justify spending half my hourly rate on a cup of tea I could make at home with 5 cents worth of ingredients.

8. I freeze when asked if I want to add anything to my drink because, first of all, I have no idea what they have in those four hundred bottles on the counter or how they might taste mixed with my order and secondly, I don't know how many squirts would actually enhance the general flavor experience. ( I have learned, however, that three squirts do not.)

9. The menu is always behind the counter so I have to awkwardly stand in front of all the incredibly friendly baristas as I take twenty minutes to decide that I'll have the same thing I had the last time I came.

10. I'm not nearly passionate enough about coffee to endure the above 9 reasons on any sort of regular basis or educate myself on  the basics of coffeeshop lingo.

This is my confession.

Till next time!

The Adam and Eve Syndrome

Today I ate a plum and stapled backlogged pages into my journal.

Why do you need to know this?

I have absolutely no idea.

The plum was delicious. The stapling was victorious.

Do any of you journal? If so, you may understand my pain.

I never, ever, ever want to look in my journal again and see that the last date was more than two weeks ago - after the most eventful two weeks of my life. 

Well, not quite.

You see, I read a book on journaling a few months ago and it turned my style upside-down.

The author's biggest challenge (to me, that is) was being "bare naked honest".

Sounds a little...revealing, don't you think?

I tried it.

Aside from the fact that it now takes me at least twice as long to record everything, every time I want to write anything I also must go into the back yard and remember where I buried it last. And recall the 20 digit passcode on the wrought iron security box once I dig 50 feet down to retrieve it.

  In the words of Shakespeare (loosely located) "you jest".

And I do.

There are too many wee pitchers around my house to fall into 50-foot holes.

But in all seriousness, though it has been difficult and awkward and downright frightening (and I will admit that I have chickened out on a regular basis), it's done me a lot of good and made my journal inestimably more interesting to read.

It's also encouraged me to be more honest with God.

I don't know what it is about the human mind that thinks we can hide things from God by not telling Him directly (perhaps this came from Adam and Eve? Because it worked so well for them...), but I've always shied away from voicing things aloud or even in prayer to Him because they're such deep secrets or such cherished hopes or such awful deeds.

News flash: Psalm 139:2 "You know when I sit and when I rise; You perceive my thoughts from afar."

I can't hide a blessed thing from Him anyway.

In light of this, I've been challenged to be candid with God. He knows it all already, but it's a trust thing. He doesn't want to know my secrets because He's omniscient, He wants to know my secrets because I trust Him enough to voice them to Him. And, since I'm not telling Him anything new, He's not going to be surprised or horrified or shocked by what I say. What matters to Him is that I trust Him enough to entrust whatever it is to Him.

The friend who I don't hesitate to trust - that's what God wants to be.

Until next time!