Starbucks Will Never Have Good Coffee, Which Is Fine; And Other Facts
Welcome to What We Learned This Week, a digest of the most curiously important facts from the past few days. This week: Making the world's most okay-est coffee is fine, why working out needs to hurt so much and why print should make a comeback.
Starbucks Doesn't Need To Make A Good Cup Of Coffee
There are two beverages, I think, that everyone has strong opinions on: coffee and beer. It's probably no accident that one is a stimulant and one is a depressant, and are largely seen as essential, very normal mood-altering things. It's also probably no accident that both micro-brewing and third wave coffee — movements meant to "improve" the quality of the product — surfaced within a decade of each other. The two are so fixed within consumption patterns that it was only a matter of time until someone came around to try and "elevate" things.
With that, we have Cale Weissman's excellent read on Starbucks introducing the blonde espresso. Weissman, himself a self-professed coffee snob, points out that the interpretation of this new beverage as an effort for Starbucks to finally expand into the realm of fellow third-wave shops like Stumptown, Blue Bottle or any of the thousands of other local roasters dotting the nation, is a clumsy one.
Instead, Weissman argues, the fault is with us, assuming that Starbucks actually wants to join the likes of Philz and Sightglass. Starbucks is perfectly fine with the quality of their product. Their low-budget adaptations of high-end coffee staples have made them wildly successful. The Starbuck's blond espresso is the McDonald's Angus Third Pounder, a convincing-enough facsimile to persuade your average customer that they too have discerning taste. Which is absolutely fine. Imagine how tedious life would be if every cup of coffee needed to be good.
[Eater]
Working Out Is Maybe Too Hard These Days
This week in the Baffler, Barbara Ehrenreich makes two important observations on working out. The first is how many of us distance ourselves from our bodies once we step inside the gym. We are a complete person when we walk in, and then the second we step on a treadmill suddenly we are a brain furiously trying to control an uncooperative body. Because of this disconnect, fitness quickly switches from trying to improve one's health to a Sisyphean task of gaining perfect control over one's body — that at some point one will be fit enough that the body and brain no longer shout at each other.
From this surfaces Ehrenreich's second point: Exercise has only gotten more intense. It's not enough anymore to get in a good run once in awhile. We must push ourselves. It's hard to feel adequate when just across the room are a bunch of hard-bodies being shouted at to "empty the tank." Perhaps this is some sort of third-wave exercise — where a combination of science and snobbery has invented a high-end method of working out.
As someone who has been fairly sucked into most of this by way of bicycle racing, let me assure you: you will never gain perfect control of your body. We're designed to adapt to a near-infinite amount of stress. "It never gets easier, you only get faster," is what the first America Tour de France winner Greg LeMond once famously said. Some see LeMond's bon mot as motivation to work harder, but I think it can also be interpreted under a more cautionary light. Do not believe the fitness swindlers when they offer visions of a more perfect you. You'll do nothing but chase it. The only compromise is to convince yourself you love the chase.
Maybe Staring At The News All Day Online Is Not Good?
There is a lot that is obvious about Farhad Manjoo's latest column in the New York Times. For two months, Manjoo sat down every morning and read three daily newspapers and a weekly news magazine. "For Two Months, I Got My News From Print Newspapers. Here's What I Learned" reads his headline. Well, obviously.
What he concludes is fairly obvious. If you consume news in more moderate, concentrated and considered doses — as the medium of print demands — you will find more time to devote your thoughts elsewhere, and thus, perhaps find some modicum of peace. It's a notion that is plainly obvious to just about everyone, but, maybe like eating or exercise, probably bears repeating.
The only obvious omissions seem to be the notion that just a few decades ago this is how people consumed news, and also this is the core draw of print. Print is finite. You pick it up, you read it, you finish it, and you're done. There's nothing left to consume. You're caught up!
It sounds crazy but the fact that print periodicals come out, well, periodically is a good thing! The creators of those things are, believe it or not, considering the frequency of publication when it comes to assembling an issue. Print periodicals aren't snapshots of what happened between a start and an end date, but through story selection, editing and design, they attempt to provide a comprehensive representation of that day, week, month and so on. You might say that you're offering all the news that is fit to print.
I know this sounds obvious, but it's sometimes easy to forget after having our faces plugged into the firehose for so long.
