I'd like a Latte with a Shot of Wisdom, Please

At work the other day, I poured myself a cup of coffee, in the employee lounge. I put one of those cardboard things about the outside of the the cup to avoid burning my hand and went back to my office. I tried to sip some coffee and couldn't just yet. Too hot. So I set the cup on my desk. This was a cup from Starbucks and I discovered on the back of the cup yet one more place I could go to develop my intellectual horizons.

It seems Starbucks has started printing a series of insightful and erudite observations under the intriguing heading, "The Way I See It..." each one individually numbered. This one was "The Way I see It # 232." Below you will find the text of what I read.

You simply can't make someone
love you if they don't. You must
choose someone who already loves
you. If you choose someone who
does not love you, that is the sort
of love you apparently must want.

-- Israel Horowitz
Playwright/screenwriter, from
his new play, The Secret of
Mme. Bonnard's Bath

Or how about "The Way I See It #235," which makes a cool assessment of the collective wisdom of the American people.

In three decades of polling, I've
found that while individuals make
mistakes in judgment, America as a
whole rarely does. A collective
wisdom emerges from a poll or
vote that is far greater than the sum
of its parts.

--John Zogby
Pollster, president and CEO of
Zogby International

I fear that coffee at IHOP will never be quite as satisfying any longer. Something lost in the trade-off, I suppose. But I can live with this trade-off. I am getting something that will last infinitely longer than the dose of caffeine that I get from the coffee.