News and notes from around the interweb:
- An UberX driver chronicles her New Years Eve. No one puked in her car, but she was propositioned with pizza..
- Flat whites come to Starbucks January 6! I always order these at the Andaz 5th Avenue, and at a few other places in New York. It’s a coffee choice I picked up in Australia in the late 80s — microfoam poured over double espresso. Coffee is important.
- The Forward Cabin posts this three year old prank call that I hadn’t ever heard: recordings of Arnold Schwarzenegger prank calling the American Airlines automated voice system and then a reservations agent.
- Russia’s economic crisis leads to an airline bailout
- Confessions of a former TSA agent
- Contra this advice from
George BushDana Carvey, you’re going to want to use paper towels rather than hand dryers in airport bathrooms.
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The arrival of the flat white is the most important news of the year. As an expat Australian, the flat white is among the things I miss most about living in New York.
The problem is that Starbucks can’t really make coffee. This is one of the reasons that Starbucks has failed to take hold in Australia, despite several attempts to break in. Australia’s coffee is so far superior to American coffee (and, I would argue, pretty much any other) that Starbucks was simply unable to compete on quality OR price in a country where a bad coffee is exceedingly rare.
So – long live the flat white. Let’s just hope that some kind Australians are able to teach some of the locals here in NYC how to actually make it.
So domestic Russian flights are essentially half off for visiting tourists?
Australia may have come up with the term “flat white”, but not the drink. It is exactly like the “café con leche” I used to get in Spain.
Anyone who has lived in AUS/NZ/Europe and North America, knows that a flat white is basically the same as a US “cappuccino” (but usually with a double espresso), since cappuccinos aren’t made like they are here in most of the rest of the world, never mind Italy.
Who do these women keep saying you have to touch the towel dispenser? The sensor ones have been around for almost 15 years and most places have them by now.