What's out my window

As you might have guessed (and if you haven't, catch up will you?) I'm an somewhat dapper English pseudo gentleman now living in Canada. Therefore, looking up from working like a crazy man on new PR strategies and looking out the window holds a thousand hidden little treasures to me, things I'd never see in England, new sights and sounds, and experiences totally alien to what i used to know.

I'll give you an example. Where i live, in the dark, rank heart of suburbia (kidding, it's not that bad) you get joggers. Not just one or two occasional ones, upwards of twenty or thirty hardcore all weather Lycra health nuts will whizz past me on any given day during my travels. You don't really get joggers in England, people tend to take the sight of neon Lycra as target practice. Never walk your dog in England, it's always the dog walker who finds the body, who is usually the jogger.

Most of the joggers i see are ladies. That's not to say you don't get male joggers, but maybe they don't have unisex jogging routes yet. I don't know, i subscribe to Robert M. Hutchin's idea on exercise:

"Whenever i feel like exercising, i lie down and the feeling passes."

So there you go. Jam sponge all round. Coming back to reality, many lady joggers have enormous great contraptions that appear to be dragging them about. These are called, rather curiously, chariots. Chariots are basically a massive circus big top tent on wheels, which for some reason you require if you wish to take your kids out in Calgary. It's the done thing. If you want to go out with your kids, make it look like your being dragged around by a runaway Glastonbury tent. Everyone in Calgary has kids. If you're married and you're of the fairer sex, you have two kids. That, or you're working on it. Something in the water says "PROCREATE!" to all women, but once they've squeezed two out it slams the brakes on and says "CEASE! BUY A CHARIOT AND SOME DAYGLO LEGGINGS!" and so the cycle begins. First it's yoga pants and lulu lemon gear, then its two kids and a chariot.

Another thing you quickly get used to in Canada is snow. English people out there: Canada is not a frozen wasteland full of Eskimos and polar bears. Well, Winnipeg is, but the rest is pretty civilized. During the summer, the temperature reaches untold heights of boiling loveliness, and being up in the mountains, it's dry as can be so it's never that sticky hot that makes you feel like you poured jam in your pants. But in winter... Oh the winters. Temperatures fall drastically, and with them comes snow. Not just a sugary sprinkling, a full on foot at least. Snow over here is serious business, but the attitude towards it is... somewhat unorthodox. Only really major roads and arteries get ploughed, everything else is left. If you crash, it's your own fault, dumb ass. Canadians are refreshingly laissez faire about snow, its a fact over here. The trains run, people get to work, and nowhere is shut. It's crazy. In England, a light dusting shuts the entire country. If someone where to try and invade and overthrow the English government, all they'd need do is wait for either a light dusting of snow or a bank holiday.

Anywho, out my window right now are two joggers, one with a chariot, and a lot of snow. I made that last about six hundred words. Bully for me. What's out yours?

Catch y'all later, and if you're on Twitter follow me at http://twitter.com/VCspaceman

Increase the peace. Don't yell at dogs, they might be smarter than you.

Starbucks, I both hate and love you

Starbucks. From Hell's heart i stab at thee.

Starbucks, to me at least, represents everything I both am and wish i wasn't. Essentially, Starbucks seems to be this horrible sticky fondue of young/hip/urban/professional/yupee/stereotype people who all want to get together, "chillax" and drink rubbish coffee with pretentious names. I seem to end up in there a lot.

Once upon a time a read a line in a book that said "always make it easy for people to give you money". I don't want to sound like the heartless capitalist pig that I am, but Starbucks to me is the epitome of this maxim. Everything under one roof. You can get Wifi in there, so you can do your business and twitter or whatever while you drink crap coffee. You can buy a paper. You can buy festive gifts and other trash to lavish on people you supposedly care about but not enough that you'd actually go out and hunt for a gift in stores, you got them a mug with Starbucks emblazoned on it so they can get discount refills on their morning commute. You can buy yourself some music with your coffee, and get that same annoying faux-jazz rubbish in your house. But get this, not content with rubbish faux-jazz, Starbucks has now strong armed a bunch of people you've actually heard of into having their music only available from Starbucks. What's that Sonic Youth, you got a bunch of money and free Mocha Frappa-Crappa-Venti-Corporato-Wannabe-achinos for life for doing a Starbucks compilation? And all you had to trade in was your counter culture authenticity and any vestige of self respect and dignity? WHAT A DEAL!

That said, i find Starbucks a very relaxing place. Everything in there is designed to take the edge off, from the faux-jazz to the reassuring brand names and catch phrases, every little bite size chunk is designed to let you know that hey, you're in a Starbucks, but it's alright. Bombs may fall, buildings collapse and global woes continue unabated, but that's okay because you can get soy milk for an extra dollar.

I'm on the Internet a lot, and i find being able to have a hot drink while i check my daily mail (hello mum) quite nice. I have my coffee black with two brown sugars, and i can ask for that without resorting to silly words that don't really mean what they say (Grande, I'm looking at you. Since when did 'Big' or 'Large' mean 'Medium'? Guess i was sick that day)

But most of all, i like the fact that i have never been frowned at by a coffee maker in there. Seriously, I'm never in trouble, I'm never there at a bad time, and I've never had a bad word said to me. I don't give a fudge if that's happened to you, it's never happened to me and that's what matters. You're all jealous of them, because they've taken a simple concept like filling your mug with brown dishwater and made it a global success. They're like McDonald's. I bet you don't like their food massively, but you know who they are and you've been there before.

Money makes the world go round. Coffee makes the wheels turn faster