The Search for the Perfect Coffee Shop

Even if San Francisco had been a total hole in the wall city, I could have loved it for the coffee shops alone. I spent endless hours in Philz and Revolution Cafe, drinking so much sweetened caffeine that my hands began to buzz and I lost feeling in my feet. The atmosphere in these places is beautiful - places to sit, low-key people hanging out, live music sometimes - really they were neighborhood hang outs. But the truly wonderful thing about them was the free wi-fi. I'd lug my computer the few short blocks from my house on the days that I'd work from home, and find myself in good company. I never worried that I was taking up space, or being gauche (because really, is anything gauche in SF?), and so there'd I'd be for hours, working, writing long emails, and of course, drinking really great coffee. It was like out of a fantasy of mine, a kind of early 90s Seattle vision that I had created which I was sure had to be defunct if it had ever even existed in the first place. One of my greatest concerns in returning to New York was that I wouldn't be able to find a simple coffee place with free wi-fi where I could just sit and work for hours.

It turns out my fears were justified. I have a feeling that the vast majority of my exploration will be motivated by the search for the East Coast equivalent of coffee heaven.

It's not that New York is lacking in coffee shops - in comparison to SF, of course, but not in general. It's that the Upper West Side is a waste land. I went online to a site called http://ilovefreewifi.com/manhattan/ which shows a map of Manhattan and little flags where all the coffee shops are. My neighborhood is pathetically blank. I also visited http://www.wififreespot.com/ny.html and http://cupofnyc.com/ which, though lacking the aggressive visual aid, were no more promising. I ended up on yelp.com which gave me some more detail but I was still faced with the sad truth.

So I sucked it up and hopped the 1.

I ventured to West 125th street and then strolled down Amsterdam in the blinding heat to a place called Max Cafe. I walked in and was pretty intimidated at first, since it was definitely a restaurant. But I glanced over and saw people with laptops and iced coffee, and I figured they couldn't all be wrong. So, I sat down and joined them.

It was really nice. Free wi-fi, decent coffee, and I sat there for three hours on only one drink. They also have beer and wine and food, which is definitely cool. It feels a little formal, but I got over it. And, I mean, it's not cheap, which sucks, but then again, I'm in Manhattan. Short of jumping onto the 7 and heading out towards Queens, I'm not sure how much less expensive it will get. Of course, now that the parks have wi-fi, I could always just brew my own and head East for thirty minutes before my old computer dies on me.

But that would kind of defeat my purpose.