Thursday, October 18, 2007

One more addition to the blogosphere

Tim Harford, well-known for his Financial Times columns and author of the Undercover Economist, blogs now at the FT website. His Undercover Economist is arguably the nicest intuitive introduction to economic thinking (even though Harford believes in a silliness called market failure). Actually, I just gave away a copy of his book to an economics-unsavvy friend.

Harford became also famous in the coffee-drinking scene when he discovered the "secret drink" at Starbucks, namely the short cappuccino. Short? The menu at Starbucks gives us usually large, grande, and venti as choice, but go and try ordering a short cappuccino. No hesitation will occur; the employees all know it and will serve it. The funny thing is that it's actually the best drink at Starbucks as the ratio between espresso and milk is very nice. A grande cappuccino gives you less espresso per milk. The Starbucks-connoisseur will yell though that this can be rebalanced by making the order a triple shot. Okay. It's analogous though to drowning pasta in sauce. (Note to myself: Rant less on blog; less culture critique on blog.) I tested this across Starbucks in Germany, the USA, Singapore, the Philippines, and Hong Kong. It works.

Check out Harford's blog. (HT: MR.)

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