DON'T TOUCH STATION FOOD. EVER.

Ok, so I rarely go on long train journeys. This is because I am evil and like to ruin the environment by zooming around in an air borne vehicle, watching the plants and small creatures of the world slowly waste away, as CO2 and all sorts of nasty chemicals billow out from the exhaust pipes of the plane (wait, do planes even have exhaust pipes?!)

I jest. I just dislike the idea of being trapped in a metal box, bumping along the ground until I get to wherever it is because being in a metal box hurtling through the air is SO MUCH MORE EXCITING. I love that weird ‘holiday’ feeling you get, even when you’re really not going on holiday anywhere and you’re about to have a mini-heart attack because you can’t remember whether you’ve locked the door/remembered to pack your socks.  I also like the whole ritualistic safety procedure thing the flight attendants do. I always stare attentively because I am overly afraid of the plane crashing and feel hugely sorry for them because only nice people and those terrified of plane tragedies seem to be listening.

Another thing which makes me prefer air travel is the fact that the food is just less crappy. And even when it is a crappy, sloppy mess you can totally pretend that it’s free and when it’s served to you by a reasonably attractive and friendly flight attendant with a huge smile it somehow makes it a less miserable meal. Cool.

With trains you have the weird buffet cart/canteen/café/death pit thing which I have never ventured into but by the sounds of it, is probably a carriage at the end of the train with plastic tables and chairs, smelling of stale coffee grinds and time-hardened cardboard sandwiches circa 1996.  This leaves the resourceful traveller with very few other options – one of them being buying food at the actual station itself.

This would be fine if the food here wasn’t also so abysmal and expensive that it makes you want to put your head in your hands, weep and wonder what you’ve done in your past life to deserve this mistreatment. There are the same old chains everywhere which I wouldn’t even care about if the stuff they served was semi-edible. I found myself in the unfortunate position of being desperately hungry and stuck in Euston Station (something I seriously do not recommend).

Having no choice but to go to some horrendously lame sandwich chain, I bought myself a regular latte which was the size of those weird tubes you put urine samples in and a mini-baguette the colour of NEON with some unidentifiable mulch in it. I think it was supposed to be a crazy breakfast bonanza but the more I looked at it, the more I wanted to cry. It was the first time I’d ever eaten something I couldn’t identify – I could see egg, cheese (cheese, who on earth has cheese for breakfast, are you CRAZY!?) and the rest was UFM (unidentifiable food-ish matter). Even the identifiable bits were bad. The egg tasted like it had been whipped up from powder and water, World War II style and the cheese was plastic and limp, like it had been in a terrible and violent bar brawl and lost.

I think my latte was ok but I was so worked up and craving the sweet rush of caffeine I think I was beyond caring. Next time I am doing what the smart guy sitting opposite me was doing – loading up with a bag of goodies from M & S because I swear, if I have to eat food from that place or a similar hell hole again I will go crazy and start chewing on other passengers like one of those zombies in 28 days later.

I’ve just realised I’ve reviewed a sandwich joint in a train station. Being on a long train journey has made me sink to an all time low. I’ll be doing the buffet cart next. 

Starbucks, I love you but…

Make mine a soya skinny venti hazelnut coffee frapp with cream and an extra shot, please

Like many others, I am in the unfortunate position of being stuck in a bizarre love/hate relationship with Starbucks so I figured it was time to take a deep breath, air our differences and embark on some much needed relationship counselling to sort out our problems.

Ok, so let’s start with the good:

You have brought me so much joy. We hang out together loads, you’re reliable, consistent and you play weird but calming ethnic-y-meets-jazz-meets-blues type music while I’m reading stuff for tutorials. You’re always there with a comforting latte when I’m having a bad day or a double espresso when I am on the verge of an examstressrevisionoverload mental breakdown. You have been tolerant of my incredible neediness and whinging. I have been tolerant of the fact that you are seriously expensive to be in a relationship with and a bit on/off with the quality of your coffee.

You have given me that amazing piece of plastic that is my Starbucks card which entitles me to more of your love and you spoil me ENDLESSLY with free shots, syrup, soya, cream and wifi. In short, you treat me like a total princess and I am pretty sure that if you were a real person, things would be working out GREAT between us (most of the time anyway).

However I am now going to have to focus on the bad because there are some things you do which really get on my (coffee) beans and we need to talk before our relationship goes awry, mister.

1. Why do you have to put those massive jars of waffles and cookies in front of the counter!? You know I have serious hand-eye co-ordination problems and it’s already quite hard for me to swipe my card (which you constantly encourage me to use by giving me rewards) without dislocating my shoulder because of the funny angle at which you place your machines.

Adding extra obstacles in the form of huge-ass glass jars is NOT helping the situation. Also, I end up feeling like an incompetent fool when the kindly barista behind the counter has no choice but to swipe for me. You don’t make this easy for them either –whenever they have to reach around the assault course that is the counter to help me swipe, it reminds me of an octopus tentacle cautiously wending its way around plants on the seabed, afraid of disturbing the little creatures living in the sea foliage. WHY?!

2. Your food is atrocious. Other than your delectable blueberry cheesecake which is like heaven on earth times a gazillion squared, your food is laughably bad. Well, I’d be laughing if I didn’t spend virtually ALL MY FREE TIME round at your place eating your lame food because I’m too lazy to get it elsewhere. I swear your menu has hardly changed since we first started out other than the occasional, uninspired seasonal add on. Don’t get me wrong, I love cheese and marmite and I love the fact that you have all the desperately boring/standard stuff but seriously, get creative with food and innovate otherwise I’m going to have a filthy, passionate affair with Pret and THEN you’ll be sorry.

3. STOP TRYING SO HARD. Seriously, you’re really cool and I really dig the fact that you’re taking advantage of your global dominance and making an effort to be helpful and stuff but come on now. Stop trying to shove the ‘Fairtrade/Charity/Aren’t I good?’ thing in my face. Yes, it’s nice and great that you have a CSR programme and that you do a lot for charity. It’s also fantastic that you’re all Fairtrade now, but making out you’re saving the world, bean by bean? Shut your face and just give me my latte.

4. You’re so samey. I know you’re a chain and you want to be comfortingly samey same-same everywhere you are but I think it would be cool if you let your customers/baristas have a small say when it comes to interior décor. 

Here’s a suggestion: Instead of using the same blandgraphicminimalistshape crap a bunch of randoms from a creative design team have crafted to hypnotise people into buying more of your crazy coffee beans, how about using some local artwork? I’m not suggesting that you fill your coffee houses with awkward, badly proportioned oil paintings of nekkid ladies and Tabby the cat done by the local WI but there are a LOT of super cool, up and coming artists around in major cities and it wouldn’t hurt to maybe showcase some of their work, would it? Plus if you’re so into the whole ‘using my superpowers for good’ thing (which by the way, I find totally hot) surely you could give it a try? Just sayin’

5. Toffee Nut Latte is for life, not just for Christmas. Only you, Starbs, could be enough of a tease to create one of the most tear-inducingly yummy drinks in the whole entire world and then totally screw me over by making it only available during the seasonal period. I’d be totally cool with that normally but when you let the people across the pond have TNL ALL YEAR ROUND, it’s just not fair. I love slowly licking those little toffee sprinkles off the foamy cream top. Sometimes, it’s the highlight of my day, you hear me?!

On the other hand, you probably can’t deal with the fact that I:

1.       Make picky, headache inducing orders which don’t make sense (soy with cream, skinny with cream…hey I just like cream, ok?!)

2.       Have to order things extra hot and demand that things are stirred for me (I’m a delicate flower and stirring is complicated and dangerous)

3.       Get all angst ridden when you run out of soy (lactose intolerance, blame my ancestry)

4.       Am clumsy and often scald myself/spill stuff everywhere/generally break your shops because I have problems with coffee-in-hand walking/life in general (I’m so sorry, will you still love me? Please?)

I know I’m moany and complain a lot, and you’re not perfect either but we’ve had a pretty good run, stayed totally loyal to one another (that time at Pret was a one off and I swear it was totally physical and meant nothing to me).

I’m pretty sure there are at least a few more years left in our relationship. That’s if you consider my suggestions and start getting your act together. Plus I love you enough to give you a cutesy ole nickname and that’s a sign of HEFTY COMMITMENT, Starbs.