No good. Take it back.

BY JULIE SEYLER AND LOIS DESOCIO

Three out of seven mornings, I crave an unsweetened green ice tea, with extra ice from Starbucks. It’s acerbic and crisp. Usually, on my way to work, I am wearing my headset as I walk into Starbucks because Lois and I discuss every morning what we will post on the blog that day.

Like clockwork, in the middle of the conversation, we pause, because I have to order my tea. I always emphasize UN-sweetened, with EXTRA! ice to the barista behind the counter, because it’s the little touches that convert an acceptable drink to one that transcends even morning e-mails.

No good (as a sweater).

This morning (still in boot-mode), I got off the bus. It was raining, but before heading into my office, I walked in to Starbucks for that green tea. Lo and I were on the horn figuring out the schedule. I ordered, got my tea and hobbled across the street, and up the elevator to my office. I took my first sip of tea.

UGH! It was sweetened! A cloying, fake taste of sucrose. Impossible to ingest. I explained to Lo I had to hang up and go back to Starbucks to return my tea.

Her reaction, quoted below, in my opinion, offers an unedited window into how different we are.

Lo is a piece of white linen – pure, malleable and moves with ease through wind. I am the needle, although rigid, pointed, and not retractable, am needed to pull in and sew it up (blog included):

You mean you can’t suck it up just this one time?

Absolutely not. It’s disgusting and I paid for it and I am going to exchange it.

I would never do that. And with a boot on? I would have sucked it down even if I hated it.

I must. It is a travesty to the palate that defeats the purpose of the pleasure.

So, with a boot on, after settled in at your desk, you are going to go back to Starbucks just to exchange tea?

Yes.

I hate returning things. Even clothes and furniture. I kept a chair from Pier One that I found out was broken once I got it home in my kitchen for three years rather than lug it back. It still worked. And I spent $75 for a really ugly sweater years ago. Is definitely worthy of a return trip, but it’s still in my closet, five years later. I use it as a bathrobe.