“Barista” Banned by Finicky Feds

 

The Standard Occupational Classification Policy Committee of the Bureau of Labor Statistics has nixed the word “Barista:”

“(part I) Docket No. 08-1081 requested adding “barista” as an illustrative example for 35-3022 Counter Attendants, Cafeteria, Food Concession, and Coffee Shop. The SOCPC did not accept this recommendation. Depending on the work performed, baristas can be classified in more than one occupation, including 35-2021 Food Preparation Workers, 35-3021 Combined Food Preparation and Serving Workers, Fast Food, and 35-3022 Counter Attendants, Cafeteria, Food Concession, and Coffee Shop. The SOCPC recommended classifying workers who perform duties combining preparation and serving of non-alcoholic beverages in 35-3021 Combined Food Preparation and Serving Workers, Including Fast Food, and modifying the definition to clarify their inclusion.”

That sounds suspiciously like the prose of confirmed tea drinkers.

In any case, the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) is merely used by government agencies that collect and publish occupational data at the Federal level.

The late William Safire noted the word’s arrival in the 11th edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary in 2003:

“Waitrons (nope; that overly nonsexist term never made it) will be happy to see barista, ‘a person who makes and serves coffee (as espresso) to the public.’”

The Urban Dictionary claims the term is derived from the Italian for “I was an Art History major.”

Frankly, we’re partial to the term “Java-Jockey” ourselves.

 

Image (“Neo-Nighthawks, after Edward Hopper”) by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Blogs With Bite

Blogs with Bite is an occasional omnivorous sampling of food blogs and sites we find particularly tasty. Follow the trail of bread crumbs back to earlier editions, starting here.

Here is a fresh serving of Blogs with Bite:

Well-Preserved – Eugenia Bone’s cooking blog on the Denver Post site. Is it crabapple jelly time already?

RogersMushrooms –  Over 3,000 photos of the fungi of Great Britain, Europe, and North America. Based on books and photographs by Roger Phillips. Includes pages on safety and The Mushroom Kitchen.

Food Safety News — Comprehensive “daily Web-based newspaper … reporting on issues surrounding food safety.” Presented by Marler Clark LLP, PS, a law firm “dedicated to representing victims of food poisoning.”

Beer Activist – “Drink Beer. Save the World.” Learn how from Chris O’Brien, author of Fermenting Revolution.

Porkopolis — “a collection of arts, literature, philosophy and other varied considerations of the pig.” Incomparable.

Vegetarian History — The on-line library of the International Vegetarian Union.  A wonderful PhD thesis on the movement in England plus PDF and text versions of cookbooks like The Food of the Future (1904),  The Allinson Vegetarian Cookery Book (1915), A Plea for Vegetarianism (1886), Fruits and farinacea the proper food of man (1845), The Progress Meatless Cookbook ( 1911), Modern Meatless Cookbook (1907), and The Golden Age Cook Book (1898).

Smart Choices

A good nutritious diet for Americans: Fudgsicles, Froot Loops and Kraft Bagel-fuls. How do we know? They have this little green checkmark on the label which means … which means … they could be even worse for you than they are. Somehow.

If you aren’t a careful reader you might think the little green check means the products are good nutrition. Not 44% sugar, like Froot Loops.

Who runs the program? A nonprofit lab in Colorado. Who pays for it ? ConAgra, Nestle, Kraft, Kellogg, Coca-Cola, Unilever and Wrigley — the country’s largest food processors.

Plaxico Penalty: Prison

Plaxico Burress caught the winning pass in Super Bowl XLII, but yesterday the former NFL star caught a prison sentence for short yardage, 2 years. He could have spent 36 years in a New York prison, but pleaded guilty to the get the shorter term. Prison time is compulsory for New York City gun crimes.

DC Car Free Day 22 September 2009

Break the car habit for one day.

Celebrate World Car Free Day on September 22nd. Commute on foot or by bike, bus or Metrorail. You can even go “Car-Lite” in a car pool.

Last year 5,445 residents of the Washington Metropolitan Area pledged to be car free for the day to improve air quality, save money, and reduce their carbon footprints. Take this year’s Car Free Pledge here. 

Car Free Celebrations are scheduled for Tuesday, September 22nd in DC (7th & F Streets NW, 11am – 3pm) and elsewhere.

 Learn more about Car Free Day Metro DC here.

 

Top image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Fear of Darwin

The film that opened the 2009 Toronto Film Festival is too controversial to show in the USA. No distributor will touch it. Why? It’s about Charles Darwin.

Based on Anna’s Box, a book by Darwin great-great-grandson Randal Keynes, the film Creation deals with Darwin’s crisis of faith after the death of his young daughter.

March of the Disgruntled in DC

They came from all across this great land, from Sun City to Leisure World, united only by … by … Dick Armey’s astroturf roots movement and their dissatisfaction with … something-or-other. 

Rebels without a common cause, they came to Washington because whatever irks them, it must be that guy’s fault, that Obama. He’s been in office practically forever.

So they brought their Winnebagos and walkers to Washington, all  two million, one million, 100,000, 60,000 of them.

That’s about the number expected for next week’s big DC demonstration and march, Mothers Against Bad Stuff. DC Drivers: expect delays — just like any other weekend in Washington.

 

 

Images by Mike Licht. Download a copy of the top one here and bottom one here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Shoe Thrower Set Loose

Iraqi reporter Muntazer al-Zaidi, correspondent for al- Baghdadiya television news service, was freed from a Baghdad prison yesterday, nine months after he interrupted a speech by the President of the United States by yelling “You lie!”  “It is the farewell kiss, you dog!” He also presented George W. Bush with two Florsheim Awards on behalf of Iraqi widows and orphans. President Bush was visibly moved.

After the release of the Iraqi shoe-thrower, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security elevated security threat levels to cordovan.

Bagel Day

Tuesday was Bagel Day at the software development center. I favored Bagels & Baguettes near Stanton Park. There was a line when I got there, around 8:30 AM. The shop is near Senate office buildings and the Heritage Foundation, and the TV is tuned to CNN to keep news-obsessed customers occupied.

By the time I got my two dozen hot bagels, the damnedest thing was on the television. An airplane had crashed right into the middle of a World Trade Center tower in New York, and the building was on fire. It was September 11, 2001.

 I went to the office break room and put out the bagels, cream cheese, and smoked salmon. I guess I was making coffee when the second plane hit the other tower. I figured people still had to eat.

The developers were plugged into the web, and learned as much – or as little — as anyone that morning. We knew a third plane hit the Pentagon and heard the false report that a fourth had hit the White House. There was a rumor that a plane had hit the Capitol, but we were two blocks away and would have heard that.

I scanned the radio, but the news stations were clueless. I heard some good eyewitness reporting from New York over Pacifica, which I hadn’t expected. I put it on the telephone intercom and went through the office, turning intercoms on for some, off for people who had already heard enough.

I called the boss, got the word to send folks home, and surfed up reports on school systems and Metro. The Red Line at Union Station was shut down until early afternoon. Phones at schools were busy; cell phone systems overloaded. I negotiated some car-pool rides for those suburban commuters game enough to try the roads, shut the center down, and walked home.

It was a quiet walk. There wasn’t a plane in the sky. All civilian aircraft were grounded. I kept the radio off and waited for the Wednesday paper.

 

Versions of this item were posted on September 11, 2008 and September 10, 2007.

The Honorable Joe Wilson of South Carolina

Addison Graves Wilson Sr., aka Joe Wilson, is the U.S. Congressman representing the 2nd District of South Carolina and the finest traditions of Southern Courtesy. As you may have heard, he interrupted a speech by the President of the United States during a Joint Session of Congress to call the Chief Executive a liar.

PolitiFact indicates that it was actually Mr. Wilson who uttered the untruth. Apparently the Congressman did not base his stridently erroneous opinion on the legislation in question, but put his faith in an anonymous chain email instead.

 

Any resemblance of Mr. Wilson’s likeness to Big Boy, a registered trademark of Big Boy Restaurants International LLC, is purely coincidental. Okay, we lie,  but we use it under the satire provisions of the Fair Use Doctrine.

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.