This is about more than a cup of coffee... The idea that people are patting this guy on the back for launching into a profanity-laced tirade at someone who by the nature of their job isn't allowed to fight back is completely pathetic. Has the internet truly made us so coarse? I don't care what this guy does over on his tentacle-porn forum posts but where I come from it is never appropriate to swear at someone in a service position and certainly not over something as piddly as this. Whatever happened after the fact with the shop owner is irrelevant to the utter, unrepentant prickishness of browbeating a barista because you can't have what you want. And shocker, this typical INTERNET MALE (has a moral right to everything he desires, lacks any perspective, has self-indulgent personal blog, references “hot” girlfriend – check, check, check and check!) wanted to go and do the EXACT THING that the Murky Coffee policy is there to prevent - he wanted to get an iced latte without paying for one... I will GIVE you the extra buck you cheap shmoe. And to think he posted the whole rant because he thought it made him look too cool for school. Shame on BoingBoing for indulging this kind of behavior. Adults resolve problems. They don't escalate them. NEW RULE: Whenever you confront one of life's curve balls (No iced espresso -- EGADS, MAN!) pretend you have your five-year-old daughter standing next to you. If you can't do it in front of her, you shouldn't do it.

Many moons ago I worked for the National Archives in downtown DC. Among other things I pulled boxes for the military records branch. Interesting stuff - you never know what you'd find. Often what you'll see at the Archives are series of 3x5 card file boxes that represent compressed versions of paper memos - retyped on a smaller format for better storage. While minding my own business in the stacks one day, pulling an order I noticed a card file with a very interesting alphabetical range indicated DEATH RAY to well, whatever. I had to check it out! I dug up the cards, which documented a whole series of letters from the War Department about a inventor with a death ray weapon that he wanted to pitch. I can only imagine the exchange related to this gentleman. Somewhere at home I have photocopies of the whole series of letters. Our history - WEIRDER THAN YOU THINK!