Saturday, December 22, 2012

Presents for the Kids


After shopping for Christmas presents at Mass Ave Toys,
 I stopped in at the Starbucks across the street from the store for
some hot coffee, well,  really, for one of my favorite foo-foo coffee drinks,
The place was busy with customers, shoppers and residents from
the surrounding neighborhood.


The place was warm and dark, one of the numerous businesses 
that inhabit the restored storefronts in the area. I think the neighborhood's 
success is due in great part to the fact that the brick, mortar and wood
are to human scale, where people don't feel as anonymous as they
might in the bigger, slick constructions just a few blocks away.


I liked the light fixtures in the coffee shop, with their light cord 
wound on old wooden pulleys.


Yesterday's rainstorm brought a cold front, accompanied 
by the season's first snowfall. People and their cars all trod carefully
on the frozen walks and streets, many finding shelter in the numerous
restaurants and pubs in the neighborhood. The Old Point Tavern,
at the corner of Massachusetts Avenue and Alabama Street,
is a standby, the second-oldest pub in Indy.
The line of red lights at the left mark Mass Ave Toys, 
while sculptor Julian Opie's electronic dancing woman 
marks the corner.


1 comment:

dive said...

I'm now off to Saturday Breakfast Club and you've appropriately whetted my appetite, Speedway, for which my tastebuds thank you.

Love the street scene. Very inviting.

Starbies coffee is too sweet for me (we Euros like bitter). They're in deep shit over here right now. They've been tax dodging on a breathtaking scale for years and it got public a few months back. People whose public services have been cut have recognised that this is due in part to corporate tax avoidance and those groups worst hit have been taking over Starbucks' shops and using them as creches and support centres. Starbies' management are so weasely they've now offered to pay token amounts of tax but it has only resulted in more resentment and they're permanently damaged here now. Other coffee houses are packed to bursting while Starbucks' stores are like ghost towns.
Serves the smeggers right.