What a typical afternoon spent working in a café looks like

Daniel Benneworth-Gray, detailing a typical working-in-a-café schedule:

14:15

Still going. No distractions. The uniform inauthenticity of this place is emphasised by the corporate art adorning the walls: canvas-printed stock images of beautiful Italian folk, drinking what appears to be far superior coffee in a proper café, somewhere sun-drenched and rustic. There are scooters, cobbles. Fresh fruit tumbles gaily from a punnet. It’s a Mediterranean coffee-drinking ideal so far removed from the one I’m actually experiencing, it’s as if I’m actively being mocked for my custom. When I do occasionally peer up from my screen, the immediate response of “well this is all slightly awful, I bet I should have some strong opinions about their tax arrangements” is enough to push my gaze back down again.

14:25

My unnamed buddies have left. I’m suddenly conscious that I look like a complete twerp, making dramatic swooshes on my screen.

If you have ever spent some time trying to do some work in a café, you will nod in agreement at every sentence of this piece.