Blue Bottle: Cure for the Blues
Woke up feeling crappy: dehydrated, sleep-deprived, and with a voice 4 octaves lower than usual. (Thanks to Leah P. for bringing me a glass of water last night; I might have no voice at all otherwise.) Kristin helped set my day on a brighter path by meeting me at 5th & Market, from whence we walked to the relatively new Blue Bottle Cafe on Mint.
If you haven't been to Blue Bottle yet, and you like coffee, get thee there asap. This was one of the best lattes I've ever had, and I drink decaf—so you can imagine what the real stuff's like.
It's fascinating to sit and watch the employees do their thing. The place looks like a chemistry lab, with beakers and pipettes and all kinds of other contraptions for filtering coffee. It's also instructive to watch the barista do his or her thing behind the espresso machine: how precisely the grounds are measured, how carefully the edges of the doodad that holds the grounds are wiped (yeah, I know my coffee paraphernalia, eh?), etc.
It was a perfect way to start a gray morning.