It was 1998.
“I’m not… sure I… want to go to college. I mean, there’s nothing I really want to do-“
“You’re going to college.”
I keep wondering. Will I really live my whole life through without being a barista? Could life really be so short? If I am useful to the machine at all, which I doubt, if there is anything at all I can do, I think it is make and serve coffee. For one thing, I excel at rapid customer service, multi-tasking, and operating machines. I doubt an espresso maker is much trickier than an HPLC – and just think, there wouldn’t be any columns or mobile phase. Just lovely water and coffee grounds.
For another thing, I excel at friendly but not intimate discourse with complete strangers.