When you work freelance you can either work from home or work from somewhere else. Somewhere else almost always means a coffee shop with free wi-fi. I suppose there are some people who can wake up in the morning, take a shower, pour a cup of coffee, walk to their desk and start writing. I am not one of those people. I need to get out of the house to get my brain working, to wake up, to feel like I am part of the big wide world that my writing is supposed to connect to. For that reason, I am always searching for the perfect internet café...
Location, location, location. Close to home is best and if you can't find one close to home, then you need good parking nearby. It's a tricky balance when you're a morning person like I am and you decide to travel to a different neighborhood. There's an irrational and inexact clock in your brain that limits the travel time. If I am too long in the car, then I am a commuter. If I'm going to be a commuter, I may as well have health insurance, etc. So all of the cafes I frequent are within whatever range my unconscious has prescribed as the terrain of Blogland . I cannot work in Commuterville.
The second most important element is a high quality wi-fi connection. If you are constantly checking your email to check in on projects, research, fact-check, then you will go crazy with a slow hook-up or one that kicks out on you in the middle of your work. I don't normally ask the proprietors what sort they have, but I think the best set-up is when they have a cable hook-up and an expensive wi-fi router. That way if there are a whole mess of Bloglanders in the place, you still have a connection that works out okay.
The third most important ingredient is coffee . Some places serve some rank and bitter brew, which makes it hard to reach optimum levels of caffeination (Caffeine Nation!) without getting either a sour mouth, a sour stomach, or a sour outlook on your day.
The fourth most important ingredient is a clean, spacious, discreet bathroom set-up with an industrial flushing mechanism and a well-thought out air freshening system. Sorry to be graphic but I'm not the only person in America who comes to my morning cup with a swollen colon, and whether it takes you two cups or three, coffee is a successful diuretic . If you either can't get into the bathroom, or face massive embarrassment as a result of your visit, you will not return to the café, because you will be traumatized.
There are a few other factors that ought to be considered when choosing your home office away from home. Their importance varies.
I generally write with headphones on. It's the best way to focus in a public space. You create your own little cockpit. Any place that plays their own music too loud, unless their taste is impeccable, can create a very frustrating undercurrent of noise that after about an hour will drive you as crazy as the South Dakota wind.
Some places you go into will have one electrical outlet in the whole joint and all the other Bloglanders will compete greedily for the seat closest to it. The more brash ones will challenge you to a game of cord twister even if you get there first. My computer will go about three hours on its battery time, which is usually plenty for one session, but if you decide to stretch it out, or you're coming in without having charged, it's nice to be in a place where you can pull up a chair and plug in.
The clientele can also be important. You don't want it to be too too. Too much of anything is bad. Blogland is best when it's sort of cold, misanthropic, and convenient. Too homey means you might get a passel of middle-aged women discussing something personal in that frenzied hen-gaggle kind of way that makes it hard not to listen but also drives you to distraction. Too corporate means you get the guy next to you on his cell phone delivering command decisions to his henchman in Dallas. That can make you murderous. Too indy means the place is packed with Bloglanders wearing horn rims and sporting powerful laptops with bumper stickers on the covers that say Digitalia and stuff like that. There is nothing inherently distracting about this crowd unless you begin to feel like you're actually one of them, and then the cycle of self-hate that sets in can throw you off your game. Too trendy means there's too many cute babes coming through. This can be used as a motivational tool and keep you focused, but it can also wind you up with a sore neck. Good clientele, like good referees, should go unnoticed.
My Top Six:
Café Jumping Bean , 18th and Laflin-The Bean, as it is affectionately known, used to be the hub of all indy/artsy/revolutionary activity in Pilsen. It was opened when Pilsen was still the barrio and it is right across the street from the APO building, a beautiful old structure that has housed art and insurrection since the 70s. The best part about the Bean is the coffee, which tastes great. Eliazar Delgado, the proprietor, is hard-working, attentive, and detail oriented. The service is great, the food is good, cheap and fast, and the space is light and lively. Old timers complain that the Bean has been corrupted... by Bloglanders. This is true. Gone are the days when the Pilsen activistas hunch over chess boards with rollies tucked behind their ears and argue about la revolucion. Now it's mostly peopled with local professionals on their way to and from work, UIC kids, and Bloglanders who live in Pilsen. The bathroom never stinks, which considering how small it is and how much traffic it gets, is a small miracle. The internet connection is fast. It gets tangled from time to time but if you tell Eliazar he will have Luis fix it. The working crew on weekday mornings-Luis bussing, Susanna waitressing, and Francisco preparing, with Eliazar generalling-is efficient, endearing, and friendly. Se habla espanol.
SIP Café, Grand between Ogden/Racine-I am in SIP for the first time now. I don't love the coffee but this place is Café Blogland. It's full of Bloglanders. The space is wonderful. Warm, full of light, like a nice urban yuppie brownstone. It is a nice urban yuppie brownstone. You get a free refill with your for here cup. The internet connection is great. There are electrical outlets everywhere. The chairs and tables are sturdy, clean, well-spaced. Jazz is pouring from the speakers. There's an outdoor interior courtyard for smoking. Parking is a bit dodgy but this place is a winner. It makes you want to kick everyone else out and take over. It especially makes you want to kick out the bearded Bloglander who goes to the toilet with his IBook tucked under his arm. That is a pet peeve of mine by the way.
Swim Café, Chicago close to Noble St.-Swim Café is small and cute. The food is good. The layout is a little weird because there are like three benches and no one wants to sit in the middle. The coffee here is also good. Their main issue is the internet connection, which is slow. Swim café runs the risk of falling into the too trendy category, the area is a hotbed for indy all stars these days.
Café Ballou, Western at Augusta-Café Ballou has a kind of Midwestern bed and breakfast feel, almost like a farmhouse living room. It's a little precious. The place is wonderful though. The food is good. The counter help is a cool central European girl. The internet and bathroom work great. The coffee is so-so. The owner is a forty something woman named Christine who is incredibly friendly and around a lot. There is not a whole lot of seating that is far enough from the door that you won't freeze this time of year and there are only three outlet station areas. You may run into a gaggle of middle-aged women talking about something personal, or an office of non-profiteers on lunch break talking about something serious. Parking is easy on Ashland.
Café Efebos, Blue Island at 18th-Efebos is Pilsen's other hotspot. It's totally different from the Bean. It is the place that caters to the "Artists in Aztlan " crowd. The place is great looking inside although it does not get enough natural light. The drip coffee sucks, so always get an espresso drink. Some people love the food, especially the bionicos for breakfast, but I'm not that into it. The owner, Cesar, is a great guy and the place has by far and away the best coffee shop art I have ever seen. They change the show every two months or so and it's always good, often showcasing local talent like Roy Villalobos. The internet connection and bathroom are good. Solid infrastructure. It's also two blocks from my house.
Mercury Café, Chicago near Ashland-The Mercury is sort of a hippie style coffee shop run by a girl named Alex and staffed by her friends. It's a cavernous loft space with a wood floor, tin roofs, and exposed heating ducts. It feels like a work in progress. The coffee here is good. The place can be drafty in the cold weather and it has only a couple of outlets. It's got a huge store window to look out of, which makes it pleasant, like being in a fish bowl. The sandwiches are good and so is the coffee. They have all sorts of weird groups that convene but in the mornings it is very quiet and mostly full of regulars. You will have to wait a few minutes if there are more than two people in line. Meter parking out front and a Laundromat nextdoor, in case you want to kill two birds with one stone, and like a thousand quarters.
Café Research and Scouting has been provided by Scott O'Brien of Cyt O Gallery .
The second most important element is a high quality wi-fi connection. If you are constantly checking your email to check in on projects, research, fact-check, then you will go crazy with a slow hook-up or one that kicks out on you in the middle of your work. I don't normally ask the proprietors what sort they have, but I think the best set-up is when they have a cable hook-up and an expensive wi-fi router. That way if there are a whole mess of Bloglanders in the place, you still have a connection that works out okay.
The third most important ingredient is coffee . Some places serve some rank and bitter brew, which makes it hard to reach optimum levels of caffeination (Caffeine Nation!) without getting either a sour mouth, a sour stomach, or a sour outlook on your day.
The fourth most important ingredient is a clean, spacious, discreet bathroom set-up with an industrial flushing mechanism and a well-thought out air freshening system. Sorry to be graphic but I'm not the only person in America who comes to my morning cup with a swollen colon, and whether it takes you two cups or three, coffee is a successful diuretic . If you either can't get into the bathroom, or face massive embarrassment as a result of your visit, you will not return to the café, because you will be traumatized.
There are a few other factors that ought to be considered when choosing your home office away from home. Their importance varies.
I generally write with headphones on. It's the best way to focus in a public space. You create your own little cockpit. Any place that plays their own music too loud, unless their taste is impeccable, can create a very frustrating undercurrent of noise that after about an hour will drive you as crazy as the South Dakota wind.
Some places you go into will have one electrical outlet in the whole joint and all the other Bloglanders will compete greedily for the seat closest to it. The more brash ones will challenge you to a game of cord twister even if you get there first. My computer will go about three hours on its battery time, which is usually plenty for one session, but if you decide to stretch it out, or you're coming in without having charged, it's nice to be in a place where you can pull up a chair and plug in.
The clientele can also be important. You don't want it to be too too. Too much of anything is bad. Blogland is best when it's sort of cold, misanthropic, and convenient. Too homey means you might get a passel of middle-aged women discussing something personal in that frenzied hen-gaggle kind of way that makes it hard not to listen but also drives you to distraction. Too corporate means you get the guy next to you on his cell phone delivering command decisions to his henchman in Dallas. That can make you murderous. Too indy means the place is packed with Bloglanders wearing horn rims and sporting powerful laptops with bumper stickers on the covers that say Digitalia and stuff like that. There is nothing inherently distracting about this crowd unless you begin to feel like you're actually one of them, and then the cycle of self-hate that sets in can throw you off your game. Too trendy means there's too many cute babes coming through. This can be used as a motivational tool and keep you focused, but it can also wind you up with a sore neck. Good clientele, like good referees, should go unnoticed.
My Top Six:
Café Jumping Bean , 18th and Laflin-The Bean, as it is affectionately known, used to be the hub of all indy/artsy/revolutionary activity in Pilsen. It was opened when Pilsen was still the barrio and it is right across the street from the APO building, a beautiful old structure that has housed art and insurrection since the 70s. The best part about the Bean is the coffee, which tastes great. Eliazar Delgado, the proprietor, is hard-working, attentive, and detail oriented. The service is great, the food is good, cheap and fast, and the space is light and lively. Old timers complain that the Bean has been corrupted... by Bloglanders. This is true. Gone are the days when the Pilsen activistas hunch over chess boards with rollies tucked behind their ears and argue about la revolucion. Now it's mostly peopled with local professionals on their way to and from work, UIC kids, and Bloglanders who live in Pilsen. The bathroom never stinks, which considering how small it is and how much traffic it gets, is a small miracle. The internet connection is fast. It gets tangled from time to time but if you tell Eliazar he will have Luis fix it. The working crew on weekday mornings-Luis bussing, Susanna waitressing, and Francisco preparing, with Eliazar generalling-is efficient, endearing, and friendly. Se habla espanol.
SIP Café, Grand between Ogden/Racine-I am in SIP for the first time now. I don't love the coffee but this place is Café Blogland. It's full of Bloglanders. The space is wonderful. Warm, full of light, like a nice urban yuppie brownstone. It is a nice urban yuppie brownstone. You get a free refill with your for here cup. The internet connection is great. There are electrical outlets everywhere. The chairs and tables are sturdy, clean, well-spaced. Jazz is pouring from the speakers. There's an outdoor interior courtyard for smoking. Parking is a bit dodgy but this place is a winner. It makes you want to kick everyone else out and take over. It especially makes you want to kick out the bearded Bloglander who goes to the toilet with his IBook tucked under his arm. That is a pet peeve of mine by the way.
Swim Café, Chicago close to Noble St.-Swim Café is small and cute. The food is good. The layout is a little weird because there are like three benches and no one wants to sit in the middle. The coffee here is also good. Their main issue is the internet connection, which is slow. Swim café runs the risk of falling into the too trendy category, the area is a hotbed for indy all stars these days.
Café Ballou, Western at Augusta-Café Ballou has a kind of Midwestern bed and breakfast feel, almost like a farmhouse living room. It's a little precious. The place is wonderful though. The food is good. The counter help is a cool central European girl. The internet and bathroom work great. The coffee is so-so. The owner is a forty something woman named Christine who is incredibly friendly and around a lot. There is not a whole lot of seating that is far enough from the door that you won't freeze this time of year and there are only three outlet station areas. You may run into a gaggle of middle-aged women talking about something personal, or an office of non-profiteers on lunch break talking about something serious. Parking is easy on Ashland.
Café Efebos, Blue Island at 18th-Efebos is Pilsen's other hotspot. It's totally different from the Bean. It is the place that caters to the "Artists in Aztlan " crowd. The place is great looking inside although it does not get enough natural light. The drip coffee sucks, so always get an espresso drink. Some people love the food, especially the bionicos for breakfast, but I'm not that into it. The owner, Cesar, is a great guy and the place has by far and away the best coffee shop art I have ever seen. They change the show every two months or so and it's always good, often showcasing local talent like Roy Villalobos. The internet connection and bathroom are good. Solid infrastructure. It's also two blocks from my house.
Mercury Café, Chicago near Ashland-The Mercury is sort of a hippie style coffee shop run by a girl named Alex and staffed by her friends. It's a cavernous loft space with a wood floor, tin roofs, and exposed heating ducts. It feels like a work in progress. The coffee here is good. The place can be drafty in the cold weather and it has only a couple of outlets. It's got a huge store window to look out of, which makes it pleasant, like being in a fish bowl. The sandwiches are good and so is the coffee. They have all sorts of weird groups that convene but in the mornings it is very quiet and mostly full of regulars. You will have to wait a few minutes if there are more than two people in line. Meter parking out front and a Laundromat nextdoor, in case you want to kill two birds with one stone, and like a thousand quarters.
Café Research and Scouting has been provided by Scott O'Brien of Cyt O Gallery .
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