Starbucks squatter. Laptop hobo. One-mocha moocher.
Whatever you care to call him, you know the type: He treats the local coffee shop like his personal, rent-free office. He might bring a printer and shredder, and a smelly tuna sandwich from home. He leeches the wireless signal and nurses a single purchased beverage, shared with his secretary/wife.
He’s OK by us, though, because he has advanced the deadbeat arts to a semi-professional level.
Leave it to the snobs at Seattle-based Starbucks to pull his plug. Lately, some stores – mostly in the New York City market – have reportedly covered up their electrical outlets to keep campers from charging their devices.
Word of this ruthless crackdown has spread to the South Sound, where Tacoma-based Forza Coffee Company has struck a blow against tyranny. And the competition.
“We welcome folks to come in and use our uncovered outlets, free wi-fi, restrooms, water, or any other creature comfort we offer,” Forza marketing director Shaun Nestor said in an email to reporters.
The Proboscis would expect no less from a company that was born in T-Town. It has the city in its DNA.
The city where anyone can ride back and forth downtown on Link light rail all day without paying a cent. Where the homeless can settle in for a long winter’s nap at the main library.
The city proudly located on the non-toll side of the Narrows. Where residents almost picked up muskets defending their birthright not to pay for downtown parking.
Tacoma: land of the freeloaders, home of the brazen.
Settle it out of court, fellas: Lakewood Police Chief Bret Farrar and his chief deputy, Mike Zaro, have been the subject of a couple recent claims from current and former officers.
The latest was “filed” Thursday morning – scrawled on a Starbucks napkin, slipped under Farrar’s door at police HQ.
“Please consider this my claim against Chief Farrar, Assistant Chief Zaro and the City of Lakewood,” the demand states. “I have been mistreated because I am bald. It might also be because I have red hair. I demand $2.2 million or a similar amount on a Starbucks card. If you do not respond within 60 days I will be forced to give up and go away.”
Contacted Thursday, the chief said he wouldn’t comment on pending litigation.
From our mailbag, part 1: How ironic that the new Sprague Avenue exit on eastbound Highway 16 is labeled “1A” – the first of the first, the front of the line, like a top-brand wristwatch, handbag or condiment.
For his part, Robert in Tacoma says there’s been too much foofaraw made about the perils of the L-shaped offramp.
“I have driven the ramp in question, and the signs are clear and unmistakable,” he writes to The Schnoz. “My solution? Remove the concrete barriers and let Darwin sort out the ones who miss the turn.”
That’s fine, Robert, unless you’re the poor schlub in the Nalley Valley who has Thelma and Louise crash through your roof.
Mailbag, part 2: Last week we shared the real job description for the Tacoma Public Schools superintendent. It aims to scare off pretenders with warnings such as “may be exposed to public controversy.”
The list of conditions was so long and daunting, writes reader Publicola57, it “reminds me of the litany of quickly spoken possible undesirable side effects of various anti-depression and/or erectile dysfunction medicines advertised on TV.”
You’ve seen the ads: Winsome actors stroll along a beach or skip through a meadow while a pleasant narrator says their drug might make you get vertigo, spontaneously combust or turn into a werewolf.
What’s next, a commercial showing Tacoma Super-jefe Art Jarvis soaking in an outdoor bathtub, Cialis-style?
Speaking of those ads: Call us juvenile, but the script from an E.D. commercial was the first thing that sprang to mind when we heard downtown’s Hylebos Bridge was coming down for nine days of work after 10 years locked in an upright position.
Ten years? Shouldn’t someone have called a bridge doctor nine years, 364 days and 20 hours ago?
We won’t mention what came to mind when we first saw the Murray Morgan Bridge sheathed in plastic.
Got news for The Nose? Write to TheNose@thenewstribune.com
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