One way John Locke fucks your shit up

...let me count the ways.

DO THE D A N C E

Your coffee is better than my coffee (REDUX)

On April 25th, a team of suited-up somebodies tore the plastic wrap off of Rice's newest structural question mark. The Brochstein Pavilion is a huge glass box full of chairs and plasma TV's (sort of like the Situation Room) nestled between the RMC-- Rice's tiny little collection of shops and eateries-- and Fondren Library. I suppose the idea behind this huge glass box was to provide students a place to work and eat at the same time; something more formal than the RMC but less formal than the Library. But like any good idea that Rice's administration has ever squatted out of its brain-thorax, the Pavilion has conjured a huge and stupid mess of problems and bitchy, clever blog posts all over the Internets.

Problems? Enter Dirk's Coffee. It's not really Dirk's Coffee, though. Dirk was an Avant-Garde douchebag who sold all of his coffee to THE MAN a couple of years ago in order to fund his blossoming crank lab. Actually Dirk's Coffee is a rebranding of Dietrich's Coffee, which itself is a brand owned by Starbucks Coffee. Regardless of who actually owns the coffee, there is a circular kiosk that sells coffee inside the Pavilion which is, essentially, owned and operated by Starbucks. This would perhaps be the coolest and most indie thing ever, if...

• Starbucks was still indie, which it hasn't been since last Tuesday.
• Starbucks was still cool, which... eh. Whatever. I listen to Arcade Fire.
  
• They actually sold the good products that you like about Starbucks, like the Green Tea Frappuccino. But they don't, because they're branded as Dietrich's/Dirk's.
• WE DIDN'T ALREADY HAVE A COFFEEHOUSE.

Ladies and gentlemen, that's right! Rice already operates a full-time, student-run coffeehouse in the RMC. It's aptly called Rice Coffeehouse because it is the coffeehouse at Rice. While this concept of Rice Coffeehouse selling coffee to Rice students sounds pretty straightforward, apparently someone in the Administration's chain of command figured that this complex concept just didn't add up. So now we have two coffeehouses: Rice Coffeehouse and Dirk's Coffee. They operate within about 50 yards of one other.

I'm not going to point any fingers... no, fuck that, I am going to point some fingers. I guess the first finger is a sweeping one that slices through the entire student body, including myself. Why the fuck didn't we make a bigger ruckus when this was first reported? I know my reaction was something along the lines of "That's so stupid that it'll never happen." But I guess it's been proven time and time again that trusting administrative offices to conform to the rules of logic is sort of like leaving your kids with a babysitter named Josef Fritzl.

The next finger is for President Leebron. Don't get me started on how he "didn't have anything to do with the decision." He's the fucking president of the university. His office knows (or should damn well know) about every business that operates on this campus. While he may not have been sitting in a black robe waving his pale hands over a crystal ball trying to figure out how to cut more student jobs from the campus, the fact that the plan made it from start to finish without his intervention speaks to his priorities: Satan > University > Alumni Donations > His Wife Ping > Students > His Children.

Campus media, I'm going to half-raise a finger at you. There should have been a massive Save Coffeehouse campaign spearheaded via the Thresher and the Rice Standard. It seems that rather than taking a proactive stance on the issue, both publications sat back and waited for the stories to make themselves. Rather than affecting the issue, they cashed in on it, so to speak.

So what else is wrong with bringing Dirk's Starbucks Coffee to the big glass box? Oh, oh! I know! Let me enumerate the ways...

• Dirk's brings nothing new to the table. No 24-hour food solution, no hot meals, no student jobs, and basically nothing that students wanted to fill that Pavilion.
• It's not a Waffle House.
• Rice Coffeehouse has no way whatsoever to compete with Dirk's. In less than a year's time, corporate backing from Seattle will prove Dirk to be the winner in the coming price war between the two establishments. And besides, do you think Leebron + Co. are going to piss money into Coffeehouse or Dirk's?
  
• Popular opinion suggest that it's not that good.
• Did I mention that closing CH kills dozens of student jobs in favor of three full-time Dirk's employees that don't even go to Rice?
• The other non-Rice operated establishments on campus-- 13th Street Bakery and the Rice Bookstore (O&O by Barnes and Noble)-- are rackets that specialize in high prices and shit-poor service. I guess the University Copy Center is alright but, fuck, I'm sure I could find a complaint if I had a need for it.

If you're at all interested in supporting the effort to push Dirk out and move CH (or some other student-run business) into the Pavilion, see the link below.

I Refuse to Buy Coffee from the Brochstein Pavilion (Facebook)