I’m more of a tea person than coffee, but since I usually get my teas at a coffee shop it’s always fun hearing their lingo. It seems that more and more each coffee houses out there are trying to out due their competitors by creating their own language that we have to follow to get our order correct.
Over a year ago I stopped going to a coffee shop, which will remain nameless but has a mermaid as a logo. I was always ordering their “venti” tea, but asking for only one tea bag, since for some reason they add an extra tea bag to their largest size. They then told me to I had to ask for their “grande” size, but in a “venti” cup or they would have to charge me for the extra tea bag. And this was the manager of said shop telling me this. I was blown away and had refused to go them because of it. I even tweeted my surprise and never got a single response from them.
Most recently I was at said mermaid coffee shop, and I placed my order for an earl grey tea and asked that it be “filled to the top” with water. After receiving my tea, the clerk told me that next time I have to order it “with no room”. I thought to myself, seriously?! We are creating a new way to order a tea now? It isn’t bad enough that you have to ask for a specific size when ordering and that the small, medium and large just don’t exist to them. If it wasn’t for the gift certificate I had, I would not have gone to them.
What is the worst lingo you ever heard?
Literary academese is the worst lingo in my experience. I’ve done my best to avoid it most of the time, but at some point it just seeps into your writing unannounced.
*headdesk*