The bike ride is quick and effortless from the Wicker Park/UK Village proper. Having been to 'the pig' several times, I knew what would be in store: A floor to ceiling selection of loose tea neatly arranged in glass jars, siphons of selective Indonesian provinces. Culture just bottled in wait for the selection. Sky high chalk board menu(s) with an exhausting selection of panini, hot/cold beverages, ice cream, baked goods, cold sandwiches etc. A few of the food offerings have taken on Literary monikers such as: 'Catcher in the Rye' for the Reuben and the goat cheese and cherry salad is a Midsummer Night's Dream. Ahhh, college coffee shops…

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It gets more and more difficult to construct fantastic worlds around shops as they begin to blend into a continuum of experience that is so stirred, miscible, and in the end, pure. I cannot pluck so easily a place like The Sun Shoppe out of its context and describe it in such a way that will be useful for others. It may be the inherent focus of this project, these coffeeshop texts, that begins to crush the subject into just a catalogue of objects and sensations, unrelated to any sort of real experience, or it may be, in this case, the ennui associated with describing a hometown establishment.

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