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Why doesn't Boston have a coffehouse where you can just lounge around for hours?
By adamg on Sun, 12/28/2008 - 8:36pm
Jess Mullen bemoans the area's lack of such a place:
... Isn't Boston one of the top five coffee centers in the United States? Not that there isn't good coffee here. I would even go so far as to say we have good cafes, but few that are set up such that you'd want to stay, and I'm thinking none that want you to stay for very long. ... Do I have YET ANOTHER reason to move to Paris?
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Comments
Just the kind of person who
Just the kind of person who puts a shop out of business. There are plenty of places like that in Boston - they're called home.
Not that I know of,
notwhitey is just the kind of notcustomer who puts notcoffee shops not out of business.
i for one can't get anything
i for one can't get anything done in my house because there are too many distractions. it's not like i don't buy plenty of coffee when i go there.
who's putting anyone out of business by being a consistent customer?
how about the Other Side Cafe
on Newbury just west of Mass. Ave?
i love the other side, but
i love the other side, but sometimes you just need a quiet space, and the other side is not the place for that.
They tend to be where people live
I can think of several good loungy places, but they are all in Davis Square, Ball Square, etc.
I don't think such people "put businesses out of business". It depends on your business model. The places I frequent offer free wifi and encourage loungers with board games and such ... and they do a bang up business in walk-in and take out traffic, too! Loungers tend to fill the slow times anyway ... and keep drinking the coffee as they work.
Outside Boston Proper
I can think of some in Central, Davis, Inman, Union, and Harvard Squares where people seem to camp out for hours.
I think one is looking at a minimum of $4 of coffee and scones per hour. That adds up. Most of the year, I'd go to cafes and buy a coffee to last long enough to charge my laptop battery, then go back outside to work until the battery needed another charge.
The etiquette isn't universal. For example, I'm sure there will always be bohemian hipsters with the latest PowerBooks, iPods, iPhones, and designer eyewear... who don't realize that camping out at a table all day also costs money.
Then there's mousy grad students and writers who are conscious of the protocol but don't have a lot of discretionary income. They sip their coffee very slowly, or get a pot of tea. An empty cup is indistinguishable from a non-empty one if it has a lid. (They secretly hope to meet other eligible cafe-going singles, and rarely get a lot of work done unless they are scouting characters and dialogue for their novels.)
Wheeeeeeeeeeeell...
...if it isn't too more of our resident mouthy hipsters, who think blogging is a job.
I'd have to say that yes, hanging around a place drinking coffee a cafe is really for douche grad students with otherpriced laptops or homeless people (spare some change for my orange creme frappucino, mistah?) - though I've always been more partial to espresso royale myself. Otherside cafe is a little too loud, its kinda like the green line with tables. Trident Bookstore cafe on newbury st has been my favorite since I was a teen, great coffee, fun people, I haven't been there longer than about an hour since I was 1) employed or 2) realized douchebags who sit around on their pricey mac queerbooks are more annoying than homeless people in the Dunkin Donuts.
Why would you want to lounge around all day, are you unemployed, do you think blogging is a career? Are you fat and think all the diaretics in coffee will make you thinner?
quite the contrary. i'm
quite the contrary. i'm employed, blog when i have the chance, which isn't often because i work too much, and would like to spend the day at a coffee shop so that i can get work done without being annoyed by my roommates.
how could you afford trident? i like it, but it's prohibitively expensive.
whoah, you have major
whoah, you have major issues.....
i, like most other people with full time professional careers, only work less than 75% of days. So, with those 2 days a week, they may wish to find a cafe to hang out in. It is a very non-scandalous activity, found in most civilized corners of the world
Oh My!
Another brave drive-by anonomyous life coach who just knows everything about everybody and thinks whining on the internet about every body else is a job!
Grad students with overpriced laptops? Well, I have to say that I used to do this with a high priced laptop ... one I bought from the ATSDR funded grant that I got myself. I probably saved enough on having heaters going at home to buy my coffee and scone to sip and nibble while my machine processed my latest statistical analysis run.
ZOMG
briefs:
- 3 points for "drive-by anonymous life coach"
- I sometimes take an extra laptop (typically a high end Macintosh) and just set it on the chair next to me to keep someone from sitting there, and to show off how much grad student money I have.
signed,
a regular poster and occasional unrepentant grouch who was too lazy to sign in since today is not a work day for me
ERC
Espresso Royale Cafe on Comm Ave (basically, at BU Central T stop).
Couches, games, books, amazing coffee and decent food.
It's exactly the kind of place that doesn't care if you lounge for hours...and still does an insane amount of foot traffic (even with 4+ Starbucks within walking distance).
erc is a pretty great place
erc is a pretty great place (although i don't really like their espresso), as is peet's in harvard square, if you can get a seat.
JP Licks in JP.
JP Licks in JP.
curious
Anyone remember Curious Liquids cafe. . . that was just the spot. Thanks for nothing, Fox 25.
That place rocked
I miss that place. We use to hang out there all the time when i was in college. Now its Starbucks or Dunkn' Doughnuts for options. Who really wants to sit in those places. I miss the couches and the good chats with random people of city.
Aw, man.
I miss sitting in the basement of Curious Liquids for an afternoon with my friends, taking all the stray Uno cards they had kicking around, making the World's Biggest Uno Deck and dealing in anyone passing by who wanted to play.
Fox25 wheedled to get the space simply because they wanted the State House as a backdrop. Screw them. It's not like their news shows are worth any amount of warm spit anyway.
OK, so it is Fox 25's fault
OK, so it is Fox 25's fault that they had a failed business?
The business didn't fail
Not every business closes because it 'fails'. In this case, I believe that either the landlord terminated the lease and rented it out to Fox25 instead, or else the building was sold.
Liberty Cafe
Best coffeehouse ever. RIP.