Chez Dan's Cafe

Yupies, I have a love/hate relationship with them. I love the fact that a whole class of americans can be so f###ing stupid and yet still make a s###load of money. I hate every thing else about them, especially the fact that they can be so f###ing stupid and still make a s###load of money. I mention this because life at the Coffee house has been pits for the last month or so. I am sick of lattes, dogs, 1.1 kids, Armani suits, Land Rovers, suger free almond syrup, and a whole host of other yupie stuff. However sometimes a person (or yupie, I am not too sure that they qualify as human beings) will come into the coffee house and ask to most inane question, and if only they were not a customer you would repeat what they said and then ask "Who says dumb S### like that?". I will share some of these pearls of wisdom with you,

*Can you guys make Lattes?

*Customer: What do you call the large size? Us: Large.

*Customer: Which size is the medium? Us: The one in between the small and the Large.

*Well my drink is so complicated because I'm from Seattle.

*Customer: What kind of lattes do you make? Us: ...um...what do you mean? Regular ones I guess.

*I want a drink that doesn't taste like coffee.

*Customer: Can I get a grande? Us: What size is that? Customer: Uh ... like a medium. Us: So you want a medium skim milk latte? Customer: Yes ... thats what I said; medium, grande ,skim milk, non-fat, skinny, vanilla latte. Us: So you also want vanilla? Customer: Have you been listining?

*Customer: My drink is really uncommon and hard to make. Its a mocha without whip cream.

*Customer: I don't get Foam on my drink. Barista: Ok, but I didn't know that because you didn't tell me that. Customer: Don't get snotty with me.

*Us: Good morning ... good morning ... good morning? Customer: Uh, ventii latte.

*Customer (on cell phone): Blah, blah, blah. Us (standing waiting like idiots, while a line behind the hell bitch builds up. After a while we ask the person behind her what he/she would like.)The Hell bitch on the cell phone : I was next.

*Can I get a Chia?

*Customer: Do you guys have wireless? Us: Not yet. Customer: But I have my laptop. Us: OK, but we still don't have wireless.

*I'm really late for work, so can you make my drink fast?

*Customer: Do you have change for a hundred? Us: well, its five in the morning and your the first customer.

"It is the Light that the darkness shall never overcome."

This would be funny if it was not so malicious. It is from today's New York Times,

"Pope Benedict well-known stands include the assertion that Catholicism is "true" and other religions are "deficient";

So this is why Benedict will make a bad pope, because he actually believes this stuff? He has spent his whole life in the service of a religion that church which he thinks is better than all the rest! How dare he! Can you imagine? How hypocritical, to actually practice and believe what one teaches!

I would like to point out again that quote is straight out of the Times, I did not embellish it one bit. Our new pope can take solace in the fact that the last beatitude is (more or less) Blessed are you when they (the NY Times, Cokie Roberts, Hans Kung, Fr. McBrian, et al.) mock, scorn, and utter every falsehood about you: rejoice and be glad.

Gideon et spec

A Great Daily Update

This is a link to Richard John Neuhaus' daily reports from Rome. As with everything he writes, it is well worth reading. http://www.firstthings.com/romediary/romediary.htm

The ATF and the Right Wing

Today I am going to apply for an internship at my local Free Market Policy Think Tank. The Institute is the epicenter of all things far right in the land of Coors. (If you don't know the Coors family is a good old boy conservative family, and there money is behind most of the think tanks across the country, the best known being the Cato Institute.) Well the one I hope to work for has an annual Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms Party. Which means all the fellows go out to the plains and smoke cigars, drink, and play with shot guns all day. Here are the pictures from last year. http://i2i.org/ATF2004.aspx

Descartes and the Music of the Spheres

Why is there not a Muzak station that only plays Credence Clearwater Revival? This is one of the more profound questions I have been thinking about. That and the epistemological axioms of Descartes that he takes for granted in the Rules, but never defends adequately. I shouldn't worry too much about Descartes though ... or the Credence.

Buy This Book

"It's a chilly March morning in the mountain of southern California when I wake up in the guest hacienda at Thomas Aquinas College. I switch off the eletric blanket - embarrassed to have needed it in what I expected to be a tropical clime. Impatiently, I flip throught the radio stations on the digital alarm clock, unable to find a news broadcast. the room has no television either, so CNN is out. I am not waiting to hear about anything in particular - the terrorist attacks of september are beginning to feel distant and I don't have much money in the stock market - just trying to quell this felling of isolation that has come over me suddenly.

"I saw a newspapper yesterday, but that was in New York, before I flew non-stop to Los Angeles, before I drove three hours - the last in pitch darkness - throught the Los Padres National Forest to rual Santa Paula. It was before my cell phone lost its signal, before the twelve-lane highways turned to two, before a student wearing a tweed jacket and carrying an old-fashioned lantern (did I dream that part?) came to meet me at the gate of the college. It was before I arrived in this strange room, with the brown shag carpeting and the crucifix over the bed and the cross on the dresser with canles on either side.

"As I think to plug in my computer and reconnect with the outside world, David Shaneyfelt, a tall man comfortably dressed in kakis and a short sleeved polo shirt, comes to the door. ... "How did you sleep?" he asks, adding immediately, "You know Mother Teresa stayes in that bed."

That is the introduction to TAC given in God and the Quad. The author, I am sure most of you rember when she was on campus, is a fellow at The Ethics and Public Policy Center, so I got an e-mail about the book being published and I whent out a picked it up. It is well worth the read, especially for those whom wish to go and get PhD's. In fact the chapter on TAC is the least interesting. I mean I know all about the school, the social life, the lone jew on campus, and the drinking at the pit. What is most interesting is that we are not alone. There are over a score of relgious colleges that are growing faster than they can hire faculty. That means there could be jobs for us. Further that means we are not alone. We are not the only people standing up to the culture and trying to save what came before. Although we where told many times we are. In other words, there is more reason to hope than we ever knew.

No Title Needed

Hurwitz just wrote to me, and at the end of his letter he wrote, "My condolences on the death of your religious leader. I hope that his successor is as wise and holy of a leader as John Paul II was". Amen.

At the End of an Age

Its Easter Friday, which means its one of those days where you don't have to think of an excuse for why you ordered a ruben sandwich at the dinner. This one however is a little somber. We are now facing the great unknown, and as someone who has spent his whole life so far with one pope, I am wondering what will happen to all of us. It almost seems like he is our last symbol of an uniqueness and distinct Catholic identity. Will we still be the same after this? Of course not! But will we be changed for the better? I guess we should try praying.