Looks Like I Won't Be Needing These Anymore!

I spent a weekend in Portland, Oregon last December. It will be exactly a year ago, next week. It was singularly one of the best experiences of my life, spending time in a city that happily embraces food, books, donuts, coffee, and strippers.

It's like my Mecca. Ever since, I've wanted to go back there. This morning I was looking up train tickets, since it's just a short jaunt and takes about as much time by train as it does by car. Of course, the real point of going to Portland is to go to Stumptown Coffee, which has several locations, but only one that served me a cup of a magical elixir that comes from San Salvador, or someplace faraway like that, and that had the word "Kilimanjaro" in it.

So I go to Stumptown's website. My goal is to find that store's phone number so I can punch it into my iPhone. Say it's a Thursday afternoon and I get a hankering for some Stumptown. I extract my phone, punch the button that looks like a coffee cup, and say, "Hey, do you guys have any of that 'Kilimanjaro' in stock? You do? I'll be right there." Click, train ticket, click, hotel room, toot-toot, walk, buy, sniff, cry a little while hugging the bag.

Instead, what do I find? They sell the stuff. On the Internet. This doesn't mean that I never have to go back to Portland, it just means I don't have to go back there right this minute.