WASHINGTON, D.C. The U.S. Department of Labor today released projections that America will run short of baristas by the year 2010, a crisis that Washington insiders say creates an opportunity for a breakthrough on immigration reform.
Chao: “I had to wait twenty minutes for a no-foam vanilla latte this morning.”
“Lattes and cappucinos are a bi-partisan issue,” said Charles Nathanson of the Project for a New America, a Bethesda, Maryland think-tank. “You’ll see folks reaching across the aisle on this one, asking people who would normally be their adversaries to pass the cinnamon shaker.”
Cinnamon shaker: If this falls into enemy hands, it could be disastrous.
Baristas are highly-trained food service employees capable of preparing espresso-based drinks while exuding an attitude of monumental indifference to the finer points of customer service. In Europe baristas are treated as local dignitaries, and have the power to perform marriages and notarize official documents.
“Mister–you’re going to have to wait. I’m having an existential crisis here.”
The crisis is worsened by policies that require customers to order drinks in what linguists refer to as “Starbucks Esperanto”, with nonce terms such as “venti” and “grande” used to refer to small and medium-sized drinks. “We spend good money putting immigrants through English-as-a-Second Language classes,” says adult education specialist Myra Florin of Amarillo, Texas. “Then they have to unlearn what we teach them in order to make a Frappacino.”
The term “venti” is especially troublesome, because in some Latin dialects it means either “slow” or “parrot”. “I was trying to get my venti latte this morning,” complained Elaine Chao, Secretary of Labor, “and the barista kept going slower and pointing to the pet store next door.”
Copyright 2007, Con Chapman
