viz.

Image Credit: nomnomclub.com

The Starbucks Christmas cups have been out in full force for what seems like several weeks, although I’ve delayed writing about them until after Thanksgiving. If last year is any measure, I should be writing about these cups at exactly the right moment. Last year, at the Starbucks in and around UT’s campus, their coffees reverted to the boring white cups nearly a full week before Christmas. Whereas the area’s students had gotten in the mood for Christmas well in advance of Thanksgiving, at the exact moment they were turning in the last of their final papers, at the exact moment when responsible students might let their thoughts drift towards dreams of sugar plum ferries, Yuletide cheer vanished from the cups of their gingerbread lattes. This strange vanishing has made me suspicious of Starbucks’ holiday cups.

Image Credit: www.neontommy.com

My cynical conclusion is that these cups come out at a very calculated moment in order to someway enhance Black Friday sales. American holiday consumers have long been known to energize their excessive shopping experiences with massive amounts of caffeine. What better way to shop for an event that’s just about a month away than to do so ingesting holiday-themed caffeine with images of people sledding and partridges flying in the periphery? I do enjoy Starbucks’ Christmas cups, and so I hope that none of this sounds too condescending. Is it irreverent to comment that the cup’s artwork looks a little bit like a computer generated depiction of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker? To be honest, I’m not sure what other images one could use for such a project. A blogger over at neontommy.com has suggested that the Starbucks nutcracker looks a lot like Guy Fawkes, mascot of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Image Credit: www.neontommy.com

Speaking of Occupy Wall Street, all reports suggest that Occupy UT Austin will be gearing up after the holidays. Tents should be propping up on campus sometime around Martin Luther King Day. Whatever you think about the Occupy movement, I can’t help but point something out. All the cool kids on facebook and elsewhere have started referring to the Occupy movement as “OWS.” This acronym is five syllables. “Occupy Wall Street” is also five syllables. So, essentially, it takes the same amount of time to say “OWS” as it does to say “Occupy Wall Street.” What is it about acronyms in the twenty-first century? Does making “Occupy Wall Street” an acronym somehow enhance the movement’s credibility? Maybe, like Starbucks’ red Christmas cups, it’s the visual appearance that counts.

Okay, okay…folks started referring to “Occupy Wall Street” as “OWS” because the acronym is the movement’s Twitter hash tag. A friend sitting next to me just corrected my post. But, you know, it sure is ironic.