Grounds for Improvement

I admit it - I'm one of those Starbuck's people. I really enjoy spending part of a late afternoon/early evening lounging about with a good book and drinking obnoxiously strong coffee. The Starbuck's that I frequent is the first one that opened in West Palm (several years ago) and has been around long enough to have developed a true 'broken-in' feel as well as a large contingent of familiar faces, one or two of which, you are likely to spot on any given visit. I have friends that I only see or talk to when we happen to meet at Starbuck's (which is often) and there's a small group of us who have been known to take over all the comfy chairs, my favorite being the over-stuffed purple (favorite color) velvet club chair, and working 5 or 6 crossword puzzles on a rotational basis with a lot of cross talk and fervent fanfare when a particularly difficult clue is solved.

My time, there, spent socializing with like minded friends or alone, absorbed in a world of words is always time well spent but not confined to Starbuck's out of choice. The people I've met through my caffeine addiction do not strike me as the trendy types and I, for sure, am not, however, we congregate in a trendy locale due merely to lack of options. Were there multiple locations for us to enjoy caffeinated concoctions power-brewed to culturally diverse and eclectic music while immersed in a womb of a chair, I'm sure we'd make the rounds and eventually settle into the agreed upon favorite. Unfortunately, for now, we have only one option so we make the best of it and, besides, I truly enjoy the coffee. I order coffee, for use at home, from several places but I always have 3 or 4 bags of various Starbuck's selections because they have become my preferred daily dose, as it were, but, given the opportunity, I would readily experiment with a new establishment for the sake of change and giving the 'new guy' an opportunity since everyone has to start somewhere and because of who I am; I'm more for intimate and creative and less for structured and corporate, anyway.

The pictures that I've included are what, originally, got me to thinking of these things and my intention was to share the photos - not ramble endlessly about my incredibly exciting existence in a level that Dante missed.

Click here for the rest of the photos.