It was weird and hilarious.

It’s also worth mentioning that I had an Iced Grande two-pump white mocha light-ice latte. It was amazing.

Without argument, Starbucks has played a supporting role in my life. It is a place of warmth–literally and figuratively–warmed by coffee, friends, and love. The experience is nearly perfected, and is consistent across cities, countries, and continents. In those areas where Starbucks can improve they welcome ideas from customers and staff from around the world via mystarbucksidea.com.

The moment you walk into a Starbucks the contemporary music fills the air mixed with various conversations and the occasional sound of spray from the milk steamer. The cashiers are consistently welcoming and happy to take your order. Even when your drink has four modifiers the cashiers or expediters are happy to record and call-out your order.

This is the first step to your own hand-crafted beverage, made just the way you want. Behind the bar the magic happens as the barista mixes tea, syrup, espresso, milk, and/or spices to make exactly what you are waiting for. As the time passes you can find a seat, chat with a friend or fellow customer, or catch up on emails via your BlackBerry.

Is there a better moment then the one when the barista calls your drink to announce that it is ready at the bar? In the summer the cool feeling of a frappuccino or iced latte is refreshing; and in the winter, the warmth from a latte is overwhelmingly appreciated. A visit to the condiment station to dress up your drink a little more, or just cap it with a travel lid is the last step before you partake in the exact thing that you crave.

If you are enjoying your beverage “for here” the Starbucks experience continues, with comfortable seating and intimate table settings. You can sit alone and read the daily news, or sit comfortable as a group from 2 to 10. This is universally true, whether you’re in Ottawa, Kingston, Vancouver, Frankfurt, London, Karlsruhe, Munich, Prague, Madrid, or Zurich. Anywhere in the world you are welcome, and feel welcome.

The wonder of Starbucks doesn’t stop at the experience–just ask anyone who works there. Starbucks provides benefits to more of their employees, as well as higher wages when compared to others in the food service industry. The Corporation encourages employees to contribute to the long-term success of the company, and offers a stock purchasing program to provide extra incentive. I have heard people describe working at Starbucks as working with friends, even if you have gone into a store knowing nobody on staff.

And perhaps it is that work atmosphere that creates the welcoming atmosphere for customers. I have no doubt that every little thing contributes to the Starbucks experience which leads me to endorse Starbucks Corporation in its entirety.

There were two recurring items of work that I could remember: journal entries, and cursive writing. Journal entries definitely happened every day. We would all have time to write an entry, which always included a drawing for me. The topic was rarely set so I would often write about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles–a sort of fan fiction, if you will. But as much fun as writing TMNT fan fiction was, it was more fun to play games at the back of the class.

Being the bright, young man that I was, I had mastered a technique that would allow me to play with the toys more than anyone else in the class. My technique involved not doing the work assigned to me, but claiming that it was done. I was so smart that I would wait a believable amount of time before I would ask for permission to play, and Ms. White didn’t ask me for evidence that the daily quota was met.

The plan was not perfect as it were, because we were also called on at random every day to read entries from our journals to the class. If I was called on I would have nothing to read. (It, perhaps, hadn’t occurred to me that I could just read from an earlier entry, as I did occasionally write something.) To work around this, I would always ask to go to the washroom every day at journal reading time. I would spend the approximately length of time that journals were read in the washroom. When I came back from the washroom I would always stand in the hall and listen in until I confirmed that journal reading was over. It was perfect.

Okay, it wasn’t actually perfect because I eventually got caught. Remember that I also had cursive writing that I skipped out on? Well, one day Ms. White decided that she would check everyone’s cursive. It took a while to get through everyone and the whole time I was worried–staring at blank pages. It was probably the most agonizing time in my life up to that point. Inevitably I as called on to visit Ms. White’s desk with my notebook to show her my missing work. She was not pleased. I was sent to my desk and told to sit and do the work until it was done; meanwhile my classmates were all playing games, running around, having fun.

My work ethic changed after that and I started to apply myself a little bit more.

Two other things that were worth noting from these grades: my aptitude for maths was uncovered, and Emily Gale–my first crush. We had a maths challenge one day where we had to correctly answer a series of addition questions on the path to finding some treasure. I was one of only a couple of students to answer each question correctly, and for this I won one of those large plastic “diamonds” as my treasure. In retrospect I should have offered the treasure to Emily, but I suppose most 6 year olds don’t have much experience in the art of wooing.

“Asshole!”, I yelled (in my head).

This old guy had pressed 15, 16, and 17 on the elevator so that he would have enough time to get to his apartment and back to the elevator to press the button before the elevator would pass by the 14th floor. He was effectively holding the elevator for himself. In a building with 17 floors, 12 apartments per floor, and only two elevators he felt that the extra time he may have to wait to get the elevator in fair turn was more valuable than those who might also want to use the elevator.

A part of me wanted to ride the course and return to the 14th floor, holding the elevator for this guy (if he wasn’t already waiting for it) so that I could give him a lecture about sharing. He has effectively proven that he fits the “you get younger as you get older” stereotype. But rather than him having the innocence and/or lack of wisdom a child might have, he has no excuse.

I decided, instead, to press the following floor buttons: 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7. He wanted to make me wait for 3 floors, so he will wait for 6. I took the stairs down–happily.

Update: The guy died a few days following this incident.

We later found a bag of Cadbury Mini Eggs left in the kitchen for everyone to enjoy. Using a selection from this bag, and a selection from coworker’s Eggies, he put me to a blind taste test to see if I could pick the Mini Egg. Surely I did, without hesitation. It was as formidable a moment as the time I smelled the difference between a glass of Coca-Cola and a glass of Pepsi.

I sought out the truth from the Internet and found that I am not the only one who believes Cadbury Mini Eggs are better.