It was during the latter part of the 90s that Starbucks became the ubiquitous household name we know today. In my block alone, there are three (that’s right, three) of them.
So it was that I decided to work on my latest social marketing campaign from the comfort of one down at the corner, near the little Vietnamese mom and pop store. Imagine my surprise then, when after ordering a venti, it came with a little note… in the form of a napkin.
On it was scrawled the number of the (admittedly cute) barista who took my order.
Now here I site, trying to concentrate on the world of social media while she hovers just a few meters away. So my brain went on overdrive.
1) She’s in the immediate post-break up phase and she’s the type to get on the prowl, and more aggressive than ever. Cruel people (like my aunties and my bro) would use the word “desperate” to describe this behavior. I call it enraged hormones hell-bent on destruction and revenge. If true, then I could go over and say “Hey, our apartment was awesome last weekend… more so now, since no one’s home. Wanna check it out?”
2) She grew up in Jersey, went here to La Jolla for college, and while Garfinkel is sorting things out, she’s working there.
3) We both happened to be at a “peak” and humans, unconsciously, behave like every other mammal. Meaning we were both upped in hormone levels. That week before the time of the month for her, and….errrr… I dunno what it is for me. Or maybe it was because I was more liberal spraying Noir because I just found a sealed bottle in my cabinet that, if I remember correctly, I bought in 2006, carried over from our previous apartment before. Good vintage?
4) That writing was there the whole time and it being folded that way was just coincidence, and worse, it was probably written by the pimpled gay guy in Counter 4.
5) It wasn’t her number but her friend’s. Who either falls into #1 to 3, but most likely the first, or is butt ugly, making for something like that Paris Hilton flick that bombed. Oh, wait, all her flicks bombed. The comedy. Oh wait, it wasn’t even funny. Forget it.
6) Maybe instead of “heartthrob,” l looked more like “zoned out druggie” given I was working the whole day befoe I got there and that was a number for a dealer.
7) Equally nefarious, given my growing goatee, she probably thought I was the “contact” who needs the other “contact” and she was merely following orders from her handler. And she had her fingers crossed that I wasn’t working for the NSA, and my name was not “Smith” but something like “Akhmed (The Dead Terrorist.)”
Maybe not for a “dealer” per se, but to a pharmacist who can get me the blue pill. Shit that means I look old.