Coffee Making Curriculum

All of us over at Timmy Ho's have been handling the new 24 ounce XL size fairly well. It's not really that confusing, in theory. Even four-and-a-half-year-old habits aren't that hard to break so long as you have a multitude of visual reminders strategically placed in every nook and corner.

There really is a kind of order to our thinking, but thanks to the fact that our store is only partially through the process of upgrading to resized paraphernalia, and has always been a bit of a malfunctioning ghetto, we aren't currently able to express that ordered thinking in standard Tim Horton's lingo. We function just fine, but suppose we suddenly got a newbie with no prior Timmy's experience?

---

His name would be Franz (like one of those five babies from 2010. Not like the one from Fire Emblem). Suppose he's an eager-to-please high schooler with blond hair and big, wide blue eyes. It's his first day on the job.

Customer: I'll have a large double-double and a medium hot chocolate with one-and-a-half milks, please.

Me: Franz, please make us a large double-double.

Franz: Right away.

Me: Use the second largest cup.

Franz: And I put in two sugar and two cream.

Me: Yes, except you put in the wrong amount of sugar.

Franz: I hit the button for the second largest portion twice.

Me: I know, but the machine disagrees with your reasoning. To make a large with two sugar, you actually need to use the button for the one that looks like an extra-large portion twice. If you were making an extra-large, then you'd use two small and two medium shots of sugar, which are labelled as medium and large on the machine.

Franz: Oh. Then why do you call them small and medium?

Me: Because that's what they are. But not with the cream. For the cream, you use the second largest portion, unless you're using the machine for counter. Then you use the largest potion for for a large and two each of the second largest and second smallest, which you can call either small and medium or medium and large.

Franz: Um... ok. Start again, please. What do I use?

Me: I'll show you. Since we're standing at the drive-thru, for a large double-double, we use two of the apparently extra-large sugars, and two large creams.

Franz: Isn't the second largest cream for the large coffee?

Me: Yes.

Franz: Then why did you use the middle one and the largest one?

Me: Because I hit the wrong button first, so I offset the smaller size by using the largest.

Franz: Oh, this helps me be not confused.

Me: WELL I CONFUSED MYSELF AND MADE A MISTAKE, OK?

Franz: No need to yell, Carla.

Me: Sorry.

Franz: So here it is? One large double-double? Now it needs to be stirred.

Me: Good. And put a large lid on it.

Franz: It won't fit.

Me: That's because you need to put a lid that says "XL" on it.

Franz: Doesn't that mean "extra-large"?

Me: It used to, but now it means just large. The smaller ones that don't say anything are the true extra-larges.

Franz: Go figure.

Me: And now the medium hot chocolate with one-and-a-half milks.

Franz: That's the medium sized cup, right?

Me: Of course. What else would it be?

Franz: Is the milk as complicated as the cream?

Me: No. Just one medium milk, and then one extra-small milk. Unless you're using the counter machine. Then you don't use the machine.

Franz: How does that work?

Me: You just eye-ball it.

Franz: Ok. How's this?

Me: Too much.

Franz: This?

Me: Too little.

Franz: Now?

Me: Too much.

Franz: Arrrgh!!

Me: Just a smidgen less, really. Don't get upset.

Franz: I am so not getting the hang of this.

Me: But you're almost done! Just fill it with hot chocolate, now.

Franz: This hot chocolate looks funny.

Me: Oh yeah! I forgot to tell you that to get hot chocolate you need to dispense from the English Toffee machine.

Franz: What?!

Me: You get English Toffee if you dispense from the hot chocolate spout.

Franz: Who decided that?! You mean I have to make it again? *begins to sob*

Me: No, no, Franz! Don't cry! I'll do it for you. Here, just mark me a medium lid.

Franz: *sniffs* Fine.

Me: Um, that's a small.

Franz: *wails*

Customer: Oh, wait! I meant a medium coffee and a small hot chocolate!

---

"If you put sugar in my coffee, I will throw it in your face!" Nasty Lady at Tim's today

Baby Naming Girls

Here is the girl-baby naming data from Alberta 2010. As a general rule, the girl names seem to follow a pattern: 1) find perfectly good name 2) add something that sounds like "ee", "lee", "lynne", or possibly "ann". Take a look at the list if you dare. You will never want to see lyn or lee tagged onto the end of a name ever again.

In the end, girl names in general tend to be a mass of cloyingly sweet mix-n-match variations of a few names, overdone with vowel sounds. Naturally, with so many similar names they're mostly quite forgettable, but also generally a little less patently absurd than some boys names.

For example, there were fourteen babies named Rose in 2010. Then there were also four named Rosalie, two named Rosaleigh, one Rosalyn, one Rosa-Lynne, four Rosannas, two Rosannes, and one Roseanne. There was also one Rosia, two Rosies, one Roslyn, and one Rosslyn. In this case there was also one Rosaline, one Rosaleeta, one Rosalia and several variations on Rosemarie. This is a name that's traditionally adaptable, so it's not half bad, but it's pretty much the pattern with most girl names now.

How about another name? I still like this name in theory, but it's been so overdone I hardly want to hear it anymore:

3 Shay
1 Shaye
1 Shayanna
1 Shay-Linh
1 Shaye-Lynn
6 Shaylee
2 Shaylyn
1 Shaya
1 Shayelle
26 Shayla
1 Shaydance
2 Shayda
1 Shayla-May
1 Shayla-Rae
4 Shayna
1 Shayma
1 Shaynah
2 Shayne
1 Shazia
3 Shea
1 Shea-Kaya
1 Sheala
1 Shealyn
1 Shada
1 Shadae
1 Shadayia
1 Shaden
1 Shadlin
2 Shae
1 Shaela
1 Shaelin
5 Shaelyn
1 Shaelynn
2 Shaelynne
1 Shae-Lynne

It really does seem that people think that just adding a cute suffix-name to the end of something else makes it a perfectly respectable girl name. But unfortunately some names just aren't quite so conducive to the mixing. How about Scottlynn? Seantyanna? Maybe Drazzlyn? Elektra-Lee? Harllie-Lyn? How about Clementine-E? I don't know what's with this cultural "ee", "lee", and "lyn" fixation.

It's even worse when they add kre8tiv spelling on top of it all. For example, one little girl was named Heavenly. Except she's Heavon-Liegh instead. Jaydyn-Lyn? Someone liked the letter y. And after all those x-lyn names, we have exactly ONE plain Lyne and ONE Lynn. No Lynne at all, and one Lynnette (which is pretty much the only version I like).

On the less cloyingly sweet side, I'm surprised by how popular Addison is for a girl (there were 104, not counting kre8iv spellings). And also a bit disappointed. The more popular they are, the sooner they'll be "lynn and lee-ified" and then I'll get sick of them. Still, Addison so far has remained a favourite of mine (but only spelled "Addison").

Even less sweet, there were six babies named Agatha. I thought that name was far in the distant past.

I'm intrigued with the 16 named Ember. I've played with this one in my head for quite a while, as an alternative to Amber, and I've liked, but I didn't really expect it to "take off".

And yes, girls are named strange things, too. How about Feather? Finnaveer? Gooday? Icey? Imunique? Has that one seriously not been done? What the heck is Learnie? Two girls named Navy. Notoria? You WANT your kid to be Notoria? And Phallika? Oh, dear me... Serenirty (that's not my typo). We also have Serenedy and Serennity-Lynne. I'm not sure what to make of Landry, which made the boy's list, too. It's probably pronounced with a Lan like Can, but it looks so similar to Laundry that it just can't be worth it. Five baby girls were named Princess, and one Princes. I assume that was a typo on the parents' part. Psalm is interesting. And Real must be a protest against Cosmic Humanism and the New Age movement. I think Rea-Lee could be pronounced Rhea-Lee (either Raya-lee or Reeya-lee), but I wouldn't bet on it.

Rolica sounds like a fun baby. Maybe she's Stoic's sister. How's Maxophena for pretentious? Pemberley (Mr. Darcy, anyone?). One Scout (yay Harper Lee!)

There were two girls named Alberta. Maybe they're the twin sisters of Canada and Kanada. At least Alberta is a genuine person-name. After places, there were also two named Bethlehem (and one Ephrathah). Hmm... say what you will, I kinda like those.

Hagley, on the other hand, I think is just awful. Depending on how you pronounce it, it starts off with either "hag" or "hog", and if you pronounce it with a soft a, it rhymes with "ugly".

And we have another few couples that just couldn't make all the in-laws happy. Louisa-Nora-Ivette, anyone? Isabella-Coral-Tiana? Oh, yeah!

Forty-two were named Brianna exactly (my sister), and 3 were named Carla (and 4 Karla). Two were name Kiki, like my gerbil. Thankfully I didn't find any named Scamp, after my sister's gerbil.

And the single longest un-hyphenated name of either gender? Kamakaleiimalamalamaiaikanaau. I'd love to know what it means.

No baby Sibylla anywhere. :-( Not even a Sibylla-leigh!

“I don't care what you say about me. Just be sure to spell my name wrong.” Barbra Streisand

Baby Naming Boys

Here is the boy-baby naming data from Alberta 2010. You may be interested in some of the more... interesting... names.

Someone in Alberta just over a year ago named their baby boy.... Baby. Now, there are plenty of parents that call their baby "Baby". Hey, I even call people's babies "Baby", regardless of whether I know their names or not. But I have never heard of someone naming their baby "Baby". Maybe nine months just wasn't enough time for the parents to find a name they liked.

The parents of Elmer-Charles-Rylee must have had the opposite problem. They couldn't figure on a name they didn't like. I wonder how many middle names this little bopper has.

Moving on six babies were named "Corny", which is doubtlessly a diminutive of Cornelius, but STILL, people, please. Next you'll be naming him "Cheesy".

One baby was named Barabbas. Yes, after the murderer in the Bible, I assume. And somebody had the guts to use "Zerubabel". (And my relations think I have crazy biblical name tastes. At least I make an attempt to spell them correctly.)

We also welcomed into our midst a little Beowolf. No, not "Beowulf", but "Beowolf". So much for coming off as educated literature geek parents.

There's also a Ding, Bing, Bang, and Boomer born among us. The first three could quite possibly be ethnic names, but I still find it interesting. Actually, it's sometimes difficult to distinguish between perfectly respectable ethnic names that just sound goofy to an English speaker and names that are genuinely bizarro-weird. Yet I'm pretty sure that "Gixxer" falls into the latter category.

A lot of baby boys were given noun name. The most patriotic of these was Canada (and one Kanada). There was also a Dragon (and Dragan), and a wee little Leviathan. Maybe he was such a fat baby that his mother was convinced that's what he was as she delivered him. Also, Duramax and Dynamite. But besides Coven being a pagan name, isn't Wicca also primarily a female religion?

The two little babies named Coy were offset by the one named Courage. And how about Stoic? Lots of parents name their baby after a trait they hope the baby to show, but I guess these parents must really have been hoping for a quiet, easy baby. On the other hand, the parents of the 3 babies Tiger were probably hoping for something else. I'm not sure what the parents of Daedric were wanting, except more time to play Oblivion and Skyrim.

And then someone named their son Hades. WHAT THE? Sigh. There's Riddick, too, which isn't QUITE as bad as Hades, but leaves more room for teasing. Riddick-ulous! And Heartheaven? Mydnite? Despite naming your kid a sentimental noun like Midnight, it's still not unique enough that you have to do it with a kre8iv spelling?

There's less kre8iv spelling going on with the boys than with the girls, but there's still enough to make you shake your head. "Jheirred" for "Jared"? So what if Jared is popular? If you love it, use it, but I assure you that randomly altering the name to make it impossibly difficult to spell will not garner your baby any more respect from anyone. At least Xzavier and X-Zavier leave no question as to their pronunciation.

And dare I ask what was the purpose behind the 11 babies "Trystan" and "Trysten"? We do not need double entendres in baby names, thank you. I don't understand why the letter Y is so popular with parents right now.

On the slightly less aggravating side, someone used Strider (yay, Lord of the Rings!), plain V (V for Vendetta, anyone?), and Valen (Babylon 5, yes, yes?)

I like Augustus, but it may sound too pretentious in our culture. Still, I'm happy to see it used. I was intrigued by the 6 named Orion. I've been contemplating this name for quite a while, but I'm not sure I could ever use it.

For my personal favourites, there was unfortunately only one Ephraim (and one Efrem, but that barely counts). There 5 Enochs (and one Enock), 4 Gideons, and 2 Corins. And a full 25 named Griffin.

Fifty-six boys were named after my brother, Justin, and 5 after my dad, Arthur. Four were named Heinrich (plus a few others of various Heinrich/Hendrick composition).

I know I've used this before, but it's just so pertinent:

"Even the most obedient and adoring of Nazis might have had difficulty saluting his Fuehrer with a crisp 'Heil Schicklgrober!'" The Concise Biography of Hitler

Love Thy Neighbour

This film was played at an animation showcase my siblings and I recently attended. We fell in love with it, if only because of how thoroughly horrific the last few minutes are. It's a stop-motion short film that was made by Norman McLaren in 1969. You will go to jail if you can't guess the moral of the story.



“You must not kill your neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism.” Bertrand Russell

Cream Goes Boom

Given that I've worked at Tim Hortons for almost five years, now, I've survived so long remarkably unscathed. My arms are not crisscrossed with burn marks from the toaster. My hands have never been cut with breaking coffee pots. The piping hot tea water has never attacked me. And up until this morning, I've never been the one to detonate a creamer.

Today was my first shift with the new 24 oz XL cups. I'm working on getting my coworkers to call them the "Big Momma" size. Nanda, at least, seems open to it. "Big Momma, double double," she said, trying it on for size.

If you order a Big Momma triple triple, you have more cream in that sucker than you have coffee in an XS black. We have always gone through cream fast at Timmy's; needless to say this new cup size hasn't helped the issue. (It hasn't helped the drive-thru times issue, either. Did you know that we have to hit twelve separate buttons to make one XL triple triple?)

So yeah, my cream dispenser ran out of cream at 6:45 am. And I went to change it. One of the supervisors mentioned to me a few weeks ago that whenever she changes creamers, she changes them over the garbage just in case they break open. That way, rather than draining all over the floor, they drain into the garbage bin. It seemed a smart thing to do, so this morning I followed suit.

BUT I HARDLY TOUCHED THE FRAGILE PART.
Nevertheless, as I dropped the cream bag into its metal cradle, I heard a splurt noise. So I looked down. And shrieked. And then I jumped backward in an attempt to evade the surging dairy liquid, but my legs were already casualties. I kid you not. It's like white paint.

I didn't even have the brains to pull out the garbage bin to catch the outpouring cream-stream. You know, the whole reason I had been switching cream bags over the garbage in the first place? It was Soon who did that. As I jumped to... well there was no safety, but farther away from the flood, Soon heroically dived in, pulling out the bin, thereby mitigating any further damage.

Meanwhile, two male customers standing at the counter were confused and working out with each other what had just happened. "Look at her!" one of them laughed to the other.

"No, don't look at me!" I whimpered.

My two wonderful coworkers both began damage control, trying simultaneously to serve two lines of customers and mop up the lake on the floor. And to do so without slipping and smashing their bones. Even the Esso guy helped out, but not before handing me the key to the bathroom.

At least the bathroom was working. All last week, it was shut down because they had no running water. And I ask you, what would I have done if there were no water with which to rinse out my pants? I mean, there are the Timmy's sinks, but there's no way I'd rinse my pants there in front of the cameras. It'd be a crazy time trying to wring pants out again without taking them off.

So I went to the bathroom and made my pants even wetter, but less white. Meanwhile, I hear a new voice over the headset, taking orders. It turns out Debbie had arrived fifteen minutes early. Finding the back door open (bad!) she thought she'd sneak in undetected to demonstrate how easily someone could have stolen all our purses.

"Won't they be surprised?" she thought.

"But," she said to me later, "I was the one who was surprised!"

She graciously jumped into the fray despite being technically not on-shift yet just because she's awesome. And she changed all my creamers for me for the rest of the shift. That's one thing I like about the Esso. Nobody gets mad at anyone for making disastrous boo-boos. They just try to make you feel better. :-D

Eventually everything got mopped up, cleaned up, and I did eventually dry out, smelling not too strongly of curdled cream. But what with the Esso being just too small to fit the new XL cup sizes and everyone having Friday-brain and all, the chaos continued throughout the shift.

I enjoyed it all. Except for the bit about putting wet pants back on. That is not fun.

Ivanova: Ambassador. Do you really want to know what's going on down there right now?
Londo: Yes! Absolutely!
Ivanova: Boom. Boom boom boom. Boom Boom. BOOM! Have a nice day!
Londo: Aah! You can never get a straight answer from anyone around here!

Don't Think Too Hard

I was browsing through some philosophy essays I wrote during my first year of university. I think 2006-2008 was the epoch of my academic writing career. My style was both colourful and interesting without being too casual. Most of the time.

In a discussion about the pitfalls of over-thinking things, I wrote,

"There are so many variables that, in an extreme case, a person [who is trying to consider them all] might eventually find him or herself to be caught so deeply in thought that nothing would ever get accomplished, and the person would simply appear to become an atrophied blob of breathing, thinking flesh."

While I don't think he took any marks off for it, my professor scrawled in the margin, "Carla, I really didn't need this image!"

I probably wouldn't try to use that word-picture in formal writing nowadays.

"Pay no attention to what the critics say. Remember, a statue has never been set up in honor of a critic!" Jean Sibelius

Merlin: Alternative Script

This is how Merlin Series 4 should have gone:

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Arthur: I tried to use magic to heal my father. He died.

Merlin: It wasn't his fault. Gaius found an enchanted amulet on him that reverses the efforts of magic. The fact that he died so quickly means that the wizard was actually doing a good job. We think Morgana put the amulet on him.

Arthur: Oh. How did Morgana get the amulet on him?

Merlin: We're not sure, but we know for a fact that it doesn't belong to Uther and he wasn't wearing it before. Someone's a rat.

Arthur: Hmmmm.....

---

Gwen: Arthur, when Merlin came back from his disappearance in the woods, we found a thing in his neck.

Arthur: A what?

Gwen: A magic thing. It seems to be controlling him and turning him homicidal. Perhaps he should be locked up until Gaius can figure out what needs to be done about it.

Arthur: Ok.

Gaius: Now that the creature has been put to sleep, let's discuss this with Merlin.

Merlin: I can go back to Morgana's hut and kill the motherbeast.

Arthur: You know where Morgana's hut is?

Merlin: Yes. She didn't think to knock me out and drag me to the bog herself, she just told me to leave. I remember the route perfectly.

Arthur: Wonderful. I'll come along, too, and run her out of Camelot at the very least.

Gaius: Take a few more knights along just in case Merlin goes bonkers, and it sounds like a good plan.

Arthur: I think so, but I want to know one thing. How did anyone know where we were going to be in order to kidnap Merlin to begin with?

Merlin: I think we have a rat.

Arthur: Hmmmm...

---

Arthur: Agravaine, now that we've run Morgana out of Camelot, I've been thinking about this whole "rat" thing, and I think it's you.

Agravaine: What? I never!

Arthur: Well, have you any other ideas?

Agravaine: Gaius!

Arthur: Except that I'm pretty sure Gaius wouldn't betray Merlin. Or kill my dad. He's been our one faithful companion since before I was born. As much as I don't want to believe it's you, I'd hate to think it's Gaius even more.

Agravaine: But I would never betray your mother!

Arthur: I didn't even know you existed until you showed up after my dad went looney!

Agravaine: But I wouldn't ever hurt you!

Arthur: Because I have no solid proof, I'll buy your feeble defense for now. But be careful; I'm watching you.

Agravaine: I'll prove it was Gaius!

---

Merlin: Gwaine, could you please tell me if you know what this is?

Gwaine: It's iron ore. As far as I know, it's only found one place in Camelot. Where did you get it from?

Merlin: Agravaine's boots.

Gwaine: Why are you stealing dirt from Agravaine's boots?

Merlin: I have a hunch that he's framed Gaius and kidnapped him.

Gwaine: That's a pretty serious accusation, my friend.

Merlin: It is serious, but I have good reason to suppose that's the case. Since you've trusted me and supported me wonderfully with everything so far into our friendship, will you help me discover whether this is truly the case? I'd rather not get myself into trouble or damage an innocent man's reputation.

Gwaine: Of course, Merlin. You know I'd do anything for you.

---

Gwaine: Agravaine! It was you!

Agravaine: No! I followed you here!

Gwaine: ....and got here ahead of us? Right. Just to be safe, I won't kill you, but why don't you go sit in the corner while I help Gaius?

---

Arthur: Who kidnapped you, Gaius?

Gaius: Agravaine. He wanted to frame me.

Arthur: Are you sure?

Gaius: Yes.

Gwaine: I caught Agravaine trying to kill Gaius before we could rescue him.

Merlin: Plus, I may or may not have seen him visiting Morgana's hut in the wood when I was homicidal.

Arthur: And you didn't tell me?!

Merlin: Well, I was scared of how you would react.

Arthur: You ninny! Nincompoop! Thanks for the heads up!

Merlin: Sorry.

---

Gaius: No good deed goes unpunished, my lord. Morgana has lost all of her character complexity and is thoroughly bent on revenge. She's come back into Camelot, despite your warning. Somehow, she has an army.

Arthur: Fine, we'll have to kill her this time.

Merlin: Do you think we can hold her off?

Arthur: Her army, yes, no problem. I think a highly trained army in a castle built for sieges can withstand a few motley mercenaries. Now that our rat is gone, no one is leaking sensitive information to her, like the location of the siege tunnels. But Morgana herself has magic and may be hard to kill. It's too bad we don't have anything to personally counter her with.

Merlin: Well, um, *cough*

Arthur: What? What did you say, Merlin?

Merlin: I said, uh, if you did have some magic to counter her with, would you automatically assume that the magician is evil and has it in for you?

Arthur: Well, no.

Merlin: In that case, my king, I present to you, myself.

Arthur: Finally.

Merlin: What?

Arthur: You must really think I'm a blockhead if you believed you were actually fooling me these last three-and-a-half years. How blind do you think I am?

Merlin: Well, um....

Arthur: Can you handle Morgana if my knights fend off her slip-shod army?

Merlin: Yes.

Arthur: Good. In that case, I'm supposed be getting married today. Gwen!

Gwen: I love you, Arthur.

Arthur: I love you, Gwen.

---

Author's notes: The storyline could have been covered in half the time it actually takes, because certain incidents wouldn't have even happened had the characters (or writers) bothered to think things through.

I mean, I can understand them not wanting to kill Morgana, and according to tradition she does have to live longer than Arthur himself, but they way they neglect to deal with her is just ludicrous.

And Merlin had the nearly perfect segue to discussing his magic with Arthur. I mean, really, what else is he waiting for? The exact line, "Well, Merlin, I really wish one of the two of us had magic right now, preferably you"? Maybe, "Please, Merlin, now would be a wonderful time for you to tell me you've been keeping secrets from me... magical ones"?

Sigh.

"What are you waiting for? Another shade of green? This one isn't good enough for you?" my dad, when we don't notice the traffic light has turned green.