18 October 2017 – Well, if they can talk about their Brake-fast menu, I can talk about my coffee brake…

I am in the Tandem Bike Café, having splish-sploshed my way around town for assorted reasons, and in the mood to reward myself for not whining — even to myself — about the rain.

See? Very wet.

Not the driving but relatively brief downpour I wrote about earlier, but the steady, determined kind of rain that you know can keep going for … oh … a week or so. As indeed is predicted.

But I am learning to be a Vancouverite. I am wearing my new Sorel rainboots, picked up at the local MEC (Mountain Equipment Co-op), and a rainproof jacket, and wielding a spacious umbrella.

At the moment I am wielding a steaming latte instead, peering over its froth to both sides of this shop’s dual identity.

Left rear = bike repair & sales. Right rear = rest of the café seating.

Click-thunk, go the sound effects, as a steady stream of customers come through the door.

“Hi Nicole, my usual…” says one young man, adding he has plenty of time because he has just missed his bus.

Next a woman who keeps her eyes focused on the front window as she orders a lemon loaf. Then, obviously thinking, Well, that’s a bit rude, explains: “Sorry, I’m watching for the bus…”

I’m seated by that front window, next to the goodies display case, so I hear all the chat.

So does the gnome.

Summer he props open the front door; rainy season, he stands guard with the space heater.

The legs behind him belong to the customer picking up his coffee & cinnamon bun order. And lingering, because Nicole & Sonia behind the counter are reading him excerpts from a book of short stories. “This guy just dropped it off, free,” says one of them. “His mother wrote it and he’s handing out copies. And look — this story, we’re supposed to fill in the blanks.”

So the three of them bend their heads to the challenge.

The next click-thunk announces a bike-repair customer, plus malfunctioning bike. He veers left, not right. The consultation begins.

I’m just gathering my belongings — stash my phone where rain can’t reach it, zip my jacket to the top, retrieve the umbrella — when yet another customer starts debating the characteristics of this particular rainfall. I listen. Of course I do! Vancouverites discuss rain like the connoisseurs they are, and I need to learn this stuff.

“I know it’s going on all week,” he says. “That’s normal! It’s just normal Vancouver rain.”

I look out the window before I head off. This is what normal rain looks like, I tell myself.

Where’s Lemon-Loaf Lady? The next bus has just arrived.