Tryst

Now that I have my new laptop, I need a good coffee shop into which to take it.

The obvious option is Tryst, the local independent hipster hangout that is barely a block from where I live, but... I've never really managed the disaffected hipster gaze thing and Tryst manages to irritate me every time I go in there. (This from a person who is generally pretty amiable.)

Yes, the coffee is good, but the service is deliberately terrible. This is probably to be expected when the website advertises its open positions by saying the the job is more about hanging out with friends than it is about actually working.

As a former waitress I should be sympathetic towards my fellow workers because I know what they're going through, but it turns out that as a former waitress I'm actually very put off by poor service because I know exactly what giving good service requires. (When it is good, I tip very, very good; but when it is bad I tip horrid.)

Hello Cupcake would be ideal, but I don't think it has wireless. It's also problematic because we aren't supposed to bring our own laptops into my workplace, so I would have to walk two miles back to the apartment, get the laptop, and then head two miles south to Hello Cupcake.

There's a Starbucks next to my apartment, of course (isn't there a Starbucks next to everyone's apartment?), but it's Starbucks.

Which means I should probably suck it up and get used to Tryst, even though today (for example) I got up to use the restroom (taking the Acer with me, of course) and came back to find that my seat had been given to another patron and, after I sat down at a different, empty seat, got lectured by the waitstaff for "making it look like I had left without paying." Um... if I haven't paid yet, why did you turn the table? Next time I'll leave a note: "I am in the bathroom. Please do not remove my plate of food. Also, I do intend to pay and maybe even tip if this seat is still waiting for me when I get back."

Or I could just practice my disaffected hipster gaze.