In Istanbul, the coffee isn't finished when you drink it. That's when the reading begins. You tip the small cup over its saucer, wait for the dark sediment to slide and dry into ridges and blots, and hand it across the table to someone who claims to see what's coming....
Some cities have a skyline. Melbourne has a coffee order, and it will quietly judge you by yours. Ask for a flat white in the wrong tone, in the wrong laneway, and you will feel the room recalibrate its opinion of you before the milk has even been steamed. This is not...
By mid-afternoon, your judgement is quietly worse, and you will blame absolutely everything except the dozens of small choices you already made before lunch. The traffic. The meeting that ran long. The colleague who breathes through their mouth. Anything but the slow...