Here's the TL;DR-- we are trying to find a buyer for the shop and I'd like to work in some kind of data science.
So this has been in the works for a while, like almost a year. We didn't want to go full public at first because selling your business while operating it can introduce dynamics into what has so far been a pretty straightforward operation. At this point we've exhausted our personal networks though and need a hand finding people who would like to take the proverbial Papa November reins. If you or someone you know could be considered an Interested Party please let us know and we will put you in touch with our broker.
Make no mistake, I really enjoy working here and interacting with all of you. But the fact remains that the point of work (to me) is to learn things and I've learnt pretty much all I'm going to about running this type of business by now. Also, honestly it makes more sense to put this out there now while we're still relevant than later. I think this is what's called "leveraging our brand".
If someone offered me a job right now I could theoretically put the shop on ice while we figure out the sale, but I think both Najla and I would prefer to have some closure before moving on. Having said that, pretty much everything is negotiable at this point.
In the longer term I'd like to work with meaningful data-- ideally with fisheries, logistics, healthcare, or something that satisfies my need to feel like I'm contributing to the greater good of humanity. In the shorter term I'd be happy doing something that would give me the skills I'd need to tackle some of the Harder Problems.
Some of you know I've been taking CS and related classes at CCSF, so I'm not completely new to tech-- actually I've been at the periphery for a while. I probably couldn't whiteboard a doubly linked list but I could probably tell you why you'd need one. I also don't think I'd ever be in a job where I'd have to write one from scratch.
Maybe more importantly, if anyone has thoughts on what I could be doing in the meantime to make myself more hireable I would be jazzed to hear them. I plan to investigate bootcamps when it's reasonable to do so-- does anyone have experience with Galvanize for example? I'd be extra interested to hear from people who have hired candidates from their program. There are tons of other courses out there, do you like any?
posted 2017-06-29 16:11:10 by px
Fortunately for you we have a Nest Cam which will give insight into our busyness. You can also grab a still image or the most recent daily GIF if you're interested.
Very rarely, AKA hardly ever. Our availability is very limited and logistics become complicated very quickly. We wrote a little blurb about events, and you're welcome to ask us about specifics either in person or via email.
Nope, we looked into it and honestly it doesn't make sense for our business. This is unlikely to change.
Yes! Just ask us for a QR code when you come to the shop.
No, too serious.
Oh, probably something on KFJC. That's what we listen to most of the time at the shop.
Totally! Please DO NOT send mail to 215 15th Street-- that's what Google thinks our address is for whatever reason, and it's not. We're happy to provide an actual mailing address, just use our form or your mouth parts to ask us what it is.
My friend, we have got you covered.
We use Stumptown coffee and Clover organic dairy items. Our baked items come from Neighbor Bakehouse. We also like Califia (unsweetened) almond milk. Our to-go cups (and lids, and straws) are all compostable from World Centric. A variety of other odds and ends we get from Rainbow Grocery.
tl;dr NO. The website's purpose is to get you the information you're seeking without having to click a bunch of times and suffer through music and/or interminable animations. Secondary purposes are to load quickly, look ok or pretty good on mobile devices, and be entertaining and/or funny. Having said that if you do in fact have suggestions for CSS improvements, HTML clarity, accessibility, or similar please let us know.
posted 2017-05-27 10:53:58 by px
So we're thinking about stuff we can add to or remove from the website, any suggestions? Maybe you have Qs you'd like to FA? Permanent/better/more obvious links to our Dropcam? Better/different RSS feeds? Hit us up down below or via one of the usual means if so.
posted 2016-05-09 21:48:14 by px
A quick one! We will be closed tomorrow, which is the The third Monday in February holiday here in California. Here's wishing everyone a happy TTMIF!
posted 2016-02-14 23:01:30 by px
Looks like our Dropcam is back online! A little background, video feed, grab a still. Whee!
posted 2016-01-10 22:36:32 by px
So we have figured out our plan for the end of the year holiday season, and it is detailed below. All days not listed will be normal hours for us.
Regular service will resume on 2016-01-04. There is a possibility that we will be open partial days listed as closed above, but I wouldn't hold your breath if I were you. We'll do our best to keep you abreast via Twitter or this website if anything changes.
In other news our Dropcam is (hopefully) temporarily offline. We are hoping to reinstall it soon, feel like giving us a hand?
posted 2015-11-23 19:49:59 by px
Well! Our Dropcam Nest Cam has been a hit, it seems like at least a few people have found it useful which was kind of the whole point. We have been fiddling around with it and have discovered that it's easy to grab stills from the video feed! So if you would like to see how long the line is, or if your car is still parked/unmolested on 15th Street, or whether we're even open you might want to bookmark that link up there. Note also that you can specify the width of the image in the URL-- we're still looking for the sweet spot in terms of filesize and resolution so if you have thoughts on the matter please share. Having a single URL also means it's easy to make GIFs, so we made a couple examples: 2015-06-19(5 minute intervals, 36MB!) and 2015-06-24(4 minute intervals, 78MB!). Note that the image quality degrades somewhat sharply in the second one in the afternoon, we're not sure if that's because we exceeded some limit or if the interval was too short or what. The first batch of images all came through fine but the second gave errors every few downloads. I looked at the developer's TOS for Nest Cam but could tell if we were violating it, or even if I was looking at the right document. Maybe you can tell? In any case, the stills trick works for any Drop Nest Cam you know the UUID for-- maybe you would like to look at meerkats? Or a fish market?
Oh also we will be closed Friday 03 July 2015 in observation of American Independence Day. Our hours will be normal otherwise the weeks of 29 June and 06 July.
Our Raspberry Pi project now has a name! Bess is coming along but it's been pretty slow going. No sensors are in place yet but they are in the works. In the meantime there's a Twitter account and a progress page.
posted 2015-06-27 16:41:51 by px
OK so we have a few things to report. Firstly our friends at Coupar Consulting agreed to host our Dropcam, so if you would like to preview the line, have a look at parking, or just see what we're up to you can now do so in the comfort of your own home/office/coworkspace/etc. We have a shortened URL too if you're into those.
On a related note we'd just like to mention that we selected the location intentionally so that you could see how many people are in line but not be able to identify those people individually. It is absolutely not our intention to compromise anyone's privacy and if you are uncomfortable with having the Dropcam in its present location please let us know and we will reposition it or remove it entirely.
On a completely unrelated note our Raspberry Pi project is coming along slowly, and we are hoping to have the first of the sensors up and running soon. The Pi itself is working great and you are still welcome to come by and get a login some time. If you would like to request one using our handy form below please specify your preferred username. You can also specify a temporary password to use otherwise we'll just make something up and you can change it at your leisure using passwd. You'll have to do it (and anything else) during shop hours and while connected to our wireless network though, at least for now.
posted 2015-05-17 21:17:28 by px
So we've mentioned this a few times already but we're finally getting around to installing a Raspberry Pi in the shop. The plan is to do some data logging so at some point there will be sensors-- possibilities include temp (ambient and/or espresso machine), wind speed, flowmeter, orientation, humidity, and so forth. We will probably install one or more of the following for the Pi to control as well: LEDs, piezo or audio thingies, motors, solenoids, &c. We don't have anything specific planned but we welcome your thoughts and suggestions.
So here's the thing-- we thought it would be fun to issue accounts to people that would like them. If you think you might be one of those people let us know (via form below or twitter/instagram or email or in person or whatever) and we'll create one for you. You'll have access to the same sensor data that we do, and you'll be able to do all of the usual things you can do over SSH. The catch is that at least at first you will need to be physically present at the shop to use your account over our WiFi. You'll be able to schedule tasks (via cron/anacron/whatever) and stuff if you would like, and we'll probably have a computer on hand for you to use if you don't feel like lugging one down from your office or whatever.
We're going to start with stock Raspbian install, and add Adafruit's Occidentalis via Pi Finder to start. The Pi will boot when it gets power (usually around 0700h every weekday) and will shut down automatically around 1530h which is when we're usually almost done cleaning up. The shutdown script will eventually do stuff like back the SD card up, warn users of impending process killing, and so forth but for now it just shuts down. We will probably also install Postgres, Dropbox, and a few other things.
This stuff should go without saying but we're going to say it anyway-- please keep in mind that this is a fun experimental project and as such you shouldn't use it for anything super important, or even semi-important. On a related note please be mindful of the limited resources available on a (vanilla model B) Pi, so mining dogecoin or rendering video is probably not going to work out all that well for anyone.
Please let us know if there are things you would like us to install (bonus if it's available via apt), if you have feelings on sensors or other hardware, or if you have thoughts on the project in general. We are also agonizing over hostnames-- tradition at our place has been to use names of kings and queens (eg Tubby, Cobra, Pepin, Midas etc) so if you can think of anything appropriate send it on over.
posted 2015-04-12 14:22:01 by px
Happy new year everyone! We're going to pretend we're just early for the upcoming wood goat new year and not late for the, uh, 2015 Greg new year.
In any case it's been a little while since we put one of these up so here's what's been happening on the shores of Lake Takahashi:
We will be open for President's day! We're expecting it to be kind of slow though, so Najla will be taking the morning off. What that means to you is that we will be opening late (plan on 0830, but possibly a little earlier) and there will be no treats that day. Please plan your morning treat acquisition accordingly.
posted 2015-02-12 21:26:42 by px
Well we figured out what our hours are going to be for the rest of 2014 and they are this:
With normal hours resuming Monday 05 Jan. If it's busy we may stay open a bit later on the 29th and 30th but we are expecting pretty slow days those days. If you have strong feelings on the matter let us know on twitter or via the form below. Please also note that it'll be just Paul working those days so there will not be any baked items and service may be slower than usual.
posted 2014-12-22 23:08:39 by px
We are closed for US Thanksgiving today, we were also closed yesterday but those of you who came by or follow us on Twitter already knew that. We will also be closed tomorrow, then back to normal on Monday 01 Dec. We will post end-of-December-hours here too, when we figure out what they are going to be.
posted 2014-11-27 12:00:31 by px
This is probably a surprise to no one but we will be taking the day off tomorrow for US Labor day. Sorry for the short notice but it sounded like very few people will be around in the neighborhood.
In other, colder news we finally have installed a freezer! That means that affogatos, ice cream sandwiches, and other chilly treats are likely to appear with some regularity! Keep an eye on twitter, instagram, and this space for more developments!
posted 2014-08-31 23:47:23 by px
So! After a little consideration we decided to make it easy on ourselves and have our two year anniversary at Dear Mom which is close to our (and maybe your) daytime operating location and is also our commissary. We really enjoyed the Hot dogs and silkscreening and general tomfoolery from last year but it was all kind of a frantic mess honestly. So please come by on Friday 2014-06-13 between the hours of 1800 and 2000 for some ice cream cake and libations on us. Sadly it looks like we were too slow to get glassware, new stickers, t-shirts, buttons, or any other doodads done in time for this partay so we will have to save those for a different auspicious occasion. Soon though, we promise.
posted 2014-06-10 21:12:10 by px
Just a quick note to mention that we will be closed Memorial Day! It falls on Monday 26 May this year, for the record.
Oh, also please note that our second anniversary falls on 12 June 2014! We will be having some kind of thingy on Friday 13 June to celebrate. We're still figuring out what exactly we'll be doing but it will be fun for sure! Suggestions are welcome as are ideas and art for the next run of t-shirt/tote bag/scrub tops!
posted 2014-05-15 23:08:08 by px
Some of you have noticed that we are displaying art by Çiğdem Michalski this week. We thought it would be fun to do a mini (micro?) art show and she will be rotating new illustrations in daily. It will run through 28 March. For more information there is a website (Facebook) and you can contact/follow her on Twitter. It's going to be fun! Come by and check it out!
posted 2014-03-18 22:14:36 by px
So we get asked to do events sometimes. Events can be really fun, we did one for a design company that was intimate and interesting-- turned out really well. We would be happy to discuss your event! Please be aware of the following though:
posted 2014-02-20 19:39:04 by px
So this will be silly nonsense to a lot of people, and if you think you might be one of those people you can probably skip this update. In any case.
We started accepting Dogecoin for payment yesterday! We have had a total of two transactions so far which have been paid in Ɖ, both of which were from the same guy. Thanks Jack! This is partly because people ask about alternate (eg. non-cash) payment options, and partly because it's just kind of fun and experimental. Plus we don't anticipate a lot of Dogecoin sales.
Here is a hastily assembled list of Dogecoin links, if you are curious:
We have been using Dogecoin Wallet (available on Google Play) for transactions and managing our wallet, it works great on our Nexus 7 and apparently other Android devices but we don't know how one would go about conducting a sale in iOS. Any thoughts on the matter are welcome.
If you just feel like sending Dogecoin our way for whatever reason, you can use our wallet address: DP2G 3TkF JB2f u74M Y8Td ggJo GubW cDeg FS
We also have a QR code you can scan if that would be more convenient.
The QR code link above has been updated, please use that instead of the old one.
posted 2014-02-07 12:25:07 by px
So the end of 2013 is upon us, and we have (finally) figured out what our hours will be for the last two weeks of December:
With normal hours starting up again starting on 02 Jan. Please note that on the short days it'll just be Paul in the trailer (Najla will be out of town) so there won't be any baked items and there is the possibility that waits will be longer than usual. It's just as likely that most people will be out of town though so maybe there won't be any waiting at all? We'll see how it goes. You can always find breaking news on Twitter and sometimes even on Instagram
In an exciting turn of events we will be losing our parking spot on pier 70! And we need to be out by 26 Dec! We're looking at it as an opportunity to upgrade though, and are looking for a new spot to park the trailer at night and on the weekends. If you have ideas or leads we would love to hear from you! Loosely in order of importance/desirability we're looking for a spot which is/has:
Only the first item is really important, the rest would just be nice to have. We should also mention that we can't afford to pay all that much, we can get more specific if you hit us up.
posted 2013-12-22 19:08:52 by px
So we've been talking about this for a while but it finally happened! We now have internet from Monkey Brains! There is some fine tuning that needs to happen but hopefully this week you'll be able to use our WiFi while you wait for your beverage. Or after you receive it. Or before you order, or whatever. We should probably mention that we will not be getting tables and chairs any time soon, you are welcome to borrow a milk crate if we have any. We are excited to start some silly projects possibly involving Arduinos, Raspberry Pis, and assorted sensors.
We have (half-jokingly) also been talking about accepting Bitcoin, and it sounds like that might actually happen. We would love to hear from anyone with experience or thoughts on payment processors and the like.
Thanksgiving falls on the 28th this year, and we will be closed that Thursday and Friday.
Oh, also! Crab season is upon us! There are still kittens available to be adopted to the right home! We have heard all possible Movember jokes!
posted 2013-11-17 14:07:14 by px
So we have always been proponents of reusable cups and if you have come by with any regularity you have probably seen us try to foist ceramic pig mugs on people in lieu of paper cups. In any case we are exploring two possibilities at the moment.
Cuppow makes sippy lids that fit on to ordinary mason jars. The upside is that mason jars are standardized, easy to find, inexpensive, and recyclable. The downsides are that they break if you bonk them too hard and they get hot on the outside if you put hot stuff in them. We're looking into sleeves and so forth but if you have ideas we're all ears. We could actually sell both the mason jars and the Cuppow lids pretty inexpensively, which would be cool.
The other option we're considering is KeepCup, which we like because they come in cool color combinations and don't break when you drop them. They cost more per unit but they are definitely more stylish.
There is major construction happening across the street! We hear that Design Within Reach will be opening on or near 01 November so if you are into that kind of stuff stay tuned!
We have been making progress on our cash register hacking! Maybe at some point this info will be useful to someone.
posted 2013-10-27 17:18:21 by px
Hi Everyone! We were closed for Labor Day! Sorry if you tried to come by and weren't warned beforehand.
posted 2013-09-02 19:03:07 by px
OK so the feral mom cat who deposited her kittens in our compost came back and dropped eight more kittens in our backyard a couple weeks ago. They are super cute as you have no doubt seen for yourselves already, but we will be fostering these guys. If you or someone you know is in the market for kitten action we can probably facilitate. We are using the hashtag #adoptablechublet2 on Instagram, and maybe Twitter? Not really sure how that all works to be honest.
We are getting new stickers printed! They won't be ready for another couple weeks though, boo. And they're not the super shiny Pris stickers we've been promising/working on for what seems like forever, double boo. Those ones are coming though, promise.
All of the t-shirts and tote bags are sold! We are still sitting on a few for some of you though, if one of them is yours come on by and say hi.
posted 2013-08-14 20:07:15 by px
The more astute among you may have noticed that our website is sporting a new typeface courtesy of Adobe® Edge Web Fonts! We're acutely aware that the overall design/CSS/everything is getting a little hella wooly and we're hoping to touch it up soon but we couldn't resist plugging Typekit a little, they're pretty all right. Plus it was super easy to implement, literally like a five minute job.
So we have adopted out sixty percent of the litter of kittens, only forty percent remain. Who could possibly say no to a mere forty percent of a litter of kittens? A lot of people, apparently. In any case if you or anyone you know is looking for two black kittens— one boy and one girl— send them our way. They have been eating raw their whole lives and are super healthy/cute/energetic/etc and are very photogenic to boot.
Second run of silkscreens will be done soon! You can expect your sloth or crest shortly if you dropped off stuff.
posted 2013-07-23 22:13:34 by px
Next week will be a short one for us, we will be open normal hours Monday 01 July through Wednesday 03 July but closed Thursday 04 July and Friday 05 July! Please take steps to prevent undercaffeination if you plan on being around on either of those two days! Happy US Independence Day if you celebrate!
Next week will also be your last chance to drop off a t-shirt, tote bag, or other garment/fabric item for silkscreening! We will need to collect everything by Tuesday 02 July so please mark your calendars or otherwise remind yourself to bring something by if you haven't already. If you want to make it easy on us you can label your item with your name and which design you would like, like on a piece of masking tape or something. The sloth will be printed in dark grey ink and the crest will be in red, so keep than in mind if you are shopping for something. If you haven't ordered an American Apparel item from us already and you won't be able to drop something off tomorrow or the next day, please hit us up and we can probably figure something out. These silkscreens will be washed out after that and we won't be re-printing these designs.
We still have four kittens that need homes! Ideally they'll go to people who need two (or three! or four!) cats, as they really seem to be getting along with each other. Let us know if you or someone you know is up for it!
posted 2013-06-30 16:22:41 by px
Thank you everyone who made our anniversary thingy a success, whether it was making coffee, cranking out merch, drawing cool stuff, or just showing up! We weren't sure what to expect and you all overwhelmed us (literally at times) with your enthusiasm and support. So great.
Also thank you again to Nicole and FluffyCo for handling all the screen printing and just being great in general. If you saw stuff in person or online that you would like please use the code WHATSUP to get 25% off your order!
Some people couldn't make it or heard about the event too late to get silkscreenable stuff together though, and we're trying to figure out how to take care of you/them. If you missed the event but would still like a t-shirt or tote bag or whatever please hit us up! We're available on twitter or you can use our brand new contact form if you angle your eyeballs down just a little bit. If you have our email addresses you can use those, or stopping by the shop always works too. Please express your preferences w/r/t item, color, size, brand and so forth if you have them-- we probably won't be able to please everyone but we'll see what we can do.
If you have pictures of the event we would love to see them! You can tag them with our location in Instagram or use #PXNX00 to tag them in twitter, or you could always just email/SFTP/AFP them if you roll that way.
posted 2013-06-16 16:33:59 by px
So! Our anniversary is upon us! It literally is actually, we opened the shop one year ago today. Tomorrow is when we're actually celebrating though, and here are the details:
Hopefully we will have hot dogs from one of the world's finest Michigan-style hot dog producers. We (and by we I mean Paul) dragged our feet on ordering them though, so they might show up at 1400H. Or Saturday. Keep your fingers crossed.
Please bring garments, tote bags, or other fabricy items if you would like them to be silkscreened! Nicole will be here silkscreening up a storm but we will not be bringing very many things to sell! Hardly any, in fact! Stop what you're doing right now and go find an old (but clean!) t-shirt, tote bag, pillowcase, scrub top, or what have you if you would like the first run of Papa November merch!
Here is the silkscreening schedule! From 1300H to 1400H we will be printing the crest in RED ONLY on whatever you bring. It looks great on light fabric but is also very cool and understated on dark stuff. Between the hours of 1400H and 1500H you may have the Casual Coffee design on your garment/sack/pet/etc. The CC design will be DARK GREY ink, so bring lighter items or be prepared to be accused of gothness. After 1500H we will be closed and that will be that!
If you would like some background, this was last month's blurb about the event. Kittens have probably been placed btw
posted 2013-06-13 21:34:10 by px
So we mentioned it kind of in passing a little while ago but we will be celebrating our first year in business in a few weeks! The official date is Thursday 13 June 2013 but the festivities will take place the next day, Friday 14 June 2013! We are hoping to have hot dogs, malasadas, and maybe other tasty treats. Mark your calendars and watch this space for more details!
One detail that we can divulge right now is that Nicole from FluffyCo will be joining us to do live screen printing on site! What this means is that if you have ever wanted an official Papa November t-shirt, tote bag, or scrub top now is your chance! You can bring a t-shirt, tote bag, or similar garment/thingy and we will make it official PXNX merch. Logistics might be tricky though so we will probably limit screen printing to light inks on dark items from 1300H to 1400H and dark inks on light items (or dark on dark if you're goth like that) from 1400H to 1500H. If you have thoughts on the matter please let us know. If you're going to be unavailable or out of town or something now is a good time to start lining up a proxy. We will probably have a few blank items to sell if you don't already have anything you would like screen printed, but we aren't planning on having a lot of stuff just eff your eye.
FluffyCo is also planning on bringing some of their own stuff to sell so if anything of theirs catches your eye you might be able to snap it up without shipping!
A lot of you are probably up to date on the kitten saga but for those of you who aren't here's the deal. We found five kittens in our backyard a couple weeks ago (along with their mom, who is kind of mad right now) and got them into the gifted feral kitten program which means that we will probably be fostering them for a few weeks. We've begun asking around for potential kitten takers but there is a little time to figure things out so we're not in a hurry to place them just yet. If you or someone you know would like some kitten in their life please hit us up! Super bonus if you plan on feeding them raw and if you can take a pair or three!
Oh, We are also planning on being closed the coming Monday which is Memorial Day here in the USA.
posted 2013-05-20 22:58:19 by px
This is a quick one. We were featured in a collection of vignettes called (oddly enough) Vignettes | San Francisco! Go check it out if you like, we're at the very top! You should watch the other ones too though, they are all doing cool things and were nice to us at the launch party. Apparently we're a household name now too, w00t! Thanks for everything Sköna!
posted 2013-05-06 19:42:19 by px
So we took the wall of text off the front page but don't worry, you can still read the archive whenever it pleases you. We also killed the top menu and stuck all the info a casual user would probably want on the index page. You can still view individual entries, so don't worry if you have a few bookmarked!
Our one year anniversary is approaching, and now that we're (mostly) done with taxes we're thinking about stuff to do for it. The official date is Thursday 2013-06-13 but the festivities will be on Friday 2013-06-14! Mark your calendars, and maybe root around in your dressers for some blank t-shirts!
posted 2013-04-28 18:16:21 by px
So we have power now! It's been a while in the works but we put the generators in storage and are running pretty silently now. Big ups to our landlord, our electrician, and our generators for installing, rewiring, and toughing it out respectively. We are hooked into a big solar array up on top of the building so we went from having noisy, smelly, polluting, expensive, temperamental machines to being possibly the greenest coffee shop around! The only remaining issue is that the fluorescent lights flicker irritatingly when the water tower comes up to temp, so if you come by and the lights are off inside that is why. We are looking into alternatives and would welcome suggestions for cool lighting ideas.
We are also considering ideas for our one year anniversary! hot dogs and malasadas are pretty for sure but we might also have t-shirts and special stickers and other stuff! Suggestions will be entertained if you have any ideas!
posted 2013-03-21 22:45:02 by px
So it looks like we might be getting power pretty soon! Fingers crossed! Generators gave us a little trouble last week so this is a welcome development.
Thank you to Noise 13 for inviting us to your anniversary party, it was super fun. Sweet space, cool people, delicious food. Thank you, really.
posted 2013-01-13 21:45:38 by px
We have mentioned this elsewhere but our coffee bean availability is now listed on our menu page! We are attempting to keep it current so if there's a bean listed we should actually have it on hand. As always, let us know if there is anything that you're curious about on the Stumptown website and we can investigate/order/discuss!
posted 2013-01-06 15:15:27 by px
Oh hey, sorry if this is kind of late but we will be closed tomorrow (2012-12-24) and Tuesday (2012-12-25). We will probably be closed for the 2012-12-31 and 2013-01-01 but that is still up for debate. Any thoughts?
Hope everyone is having good breaks! See you soon.
posted 2012-12-23 16:14:43 by px
No news on the generator, boo. We got a case number though, 126154747 so that's kind of something.
There are new stickers! Come by or use electronic means to contact us if you would like one. We are also redoing the Bubo stickers smaller and better.
We might be running on solar/semisolar power soon! Details as they become available.
We lost a funny nut on the trailer, it looks like the bottom right one in this picture. Anyone know what those are called or where we can find one?
posted 2012-11-05 20:46:20 by px
So we hate to break the radio silence with bad news but one of our generators was stolen today! We have two more which we can get by on all right but it's still a drag, especially since one of the remaining ones was giving us a hard time recently.
Najla was out running errands and getting lunch for a bit today, so it was just me in the trailer. At 11:33 the power went out inside, which is not that out of the ordinary-- the generators usually run out of gas around then. I think I may have heard a thump at around the same time-- or I may have retroactively hallucinated that, not too sure. I stepped outside to gas up and found an empty spot and some dangling plugs.
So of course I looked up and down the street but not only did I not see any unusual activity, there wasn't even any traffic on the sidewalk or street at that moment. Clearly the thieves were lurking until the opportune time.
We asked around but nobody saw anything and there are no surveillance cameras pointed in that direction as far as we have been able to tell. We will be trolling Craigslist for sure and we have filed a police report which we are waiting to get approved, at which point we will have a case number.
The generator is a Honda EU200i, which go for about a thousand bucks new. We could probably find a used one for $600-700 but obviously it would be better recover ours or just do without until a better power solution comes along. We might have the serial number somewhere but it might take a bit to find it. Our remaining ones will be locked up now which seems a little silly, because who steals a 50 pound generator while it's powering a business in broad daylight? Oh.
We will happily discuss details with anyone who wants to, especially if you have advice, encouragement, or experience with this kind of thing. We are hopeful but not bating our breath for recovery, any new info will be tweeted or will show up here.
posted 2012-10-09 18:20:38 by px
Just a quick one here-- we are planning on being closed this coming Monday in honor of Labor Day. We have asked around a fair amount and it sounds like hardly anyone else will be in the neighborhood either. If you're taking the day off too we hope you have a great holiday!
posted 2012-08-29 20:35:00 by px
Well those weeks just flew by, and lots of stuff happened. Business is picking up for sure but the growth is manageable, which is nice. We'll see how it goes when school starts.
We are investigating the possibility of getting power from the building instead of running generators. The generators have been great for the most part in terms of reliability but they are a drag to lug around and keep gassed and so forth. They aren't exactly cheap to run either, so shore power would be most welcome.
Thanks go out to John Quintos of Cento, Vega, Special Xtra and a zillion other projects, not least of which is a secret new spot in an undisclosed location. We wouldn't have made it this far without his help in a number of ways, and we're not sure how he has avoided being mentioned here so far.
We are still meeting new people, which is always exciting. Hewn is even newer to the neighborhood than we are. We also discovered that there is a Sennheiser lab/office nearby, which is cool. I also don't think we have mentioned Partridge, Waterworks, Noise 13, Roll bike shop, or Dos Piñas yet either, and they've all been here all along. We talked with one guy from Flixter who says they're nearby and working on some cool new things. Oh, also it's been a little while now but the blog post that we mentioned a little while ago went up, thanks Creativebug!
Some people have asked what we're listening to, and most of the time the answer is KFJC. Our internet connection is a little spotty on the corner so we usually queue up some stuff from their broadcast archive and let it go for a few hours at a time. We're partial to Cousin Mary, Robert Emmett, and Ms. Tiza but there is a ton of variety and lots of other good stuff on almost all the time. It is tough to find (even a college) DJ who will play much in the way of chiptunes though, so sometimes we have to take care of that ourselves.
I know I have mentioned this before but if you arrived here via a mass email which you would have preferred not to have received please let us know via one of the usual methods. In addition (or instead) of email there is also a feed if you would like to keep up, and of course there are tweets if you swing that way.
posted 2012-08-19 16:50:56 by px
What a great week. We experimented with some menu additions, got to meet and eat food made by Seoul Patch, got our generator fixed, and met some nice new people. We also made some delicious coffee if we do say so ourselves. We are also trying out new baked items, so if there are favorites you have or stuff that you always wished we made now is the time to say so.
We also had a visit from Four Barrel. Thanks for stopping by, Jeremy and Hein!
posted 2012-07-22 17:16:09 by px
Oh hey, the cross-stitching is complete (2.3MB GIF), there is also a PSD file if you feel like fiddling with it. This (the GIF, not the actual cross-stitching) was somewhat hastily made, we may come back and revisit it at some point.
posted 2012-07-22 16:29:26 by px
This week was a little weird for us and for most of you from what we can tell. The holiday right in the middle of the week threw off everyone's rhythm, but it was nice to have a little break.
There has been some discussion about the screen that we are required to keep up during service hours. DPH specifies a maximum area for the pass-through windows and the rest of the main service window has to be covered with a number sixteen mesh screen at minimum. Most MFFs do this with a plexiglass cover so they (and you) can see through but we like the ventilation. Anyway. Yes, we have to have it up. Yes, we are working on making it nicer.
On a related note, the nice Creativebug people have somehow escaped mention here so far, so hello to them. There is allegedly a blog in the works where we will allegedly appear at some point in the future? Shrouded in mystery, it is. Likewise our neighbors at Acclaro and Advent Software have been supportive and pleasant to interact with.
If you're one of those people that takes a long time to decide what to order, we now have our menu up on this very website. You can check it out on the way over using your smart device and be ready when you get here. No pressure though.
posted 2012-07-08 15:09:08 by px
So the USA is celebrating Independence day this coming week, and we will be celebrating also by not being open on Wednesday 04 July 2012. We will be open every other weekday though, so please come say hi MTuThF if you're around. It sounds like it will be slow all week, so maybe plan on hanging out for a while and chatting.
We met some Dolby people, they are very cool and you should go buy some Dolby stuff. Maybe you have already?
The Bubo stickers are almost out. We are planning the next batch, which may take a little while. The other two cats are named Pris and Thor, if you would prefer we do one or the other first let us know.
posted 2012-07-01 20:05:05 by px
Oops, I know I promised some of you updates a while ago and wasn't able to get to it until now. Sorry about that. The good news is that we have been busy baking, making coffee, and talking to people, so there's that.
Week zero was fun, getting set up was pretty quick and nothing went seriously wrong. Lots of people came out for our opening day on Wednesday, which was nice. We forgot change so thank you for your help, Thieves Massive. Thursday and Friday were significant improvements despite the crash and fire which we presume prevented or dissuaded people coming to work from the East Bay. So, a pretty good start.
Last weekend I wrote a couple tools to track our sales and expenses. Does anyone want to lend a hand with a couple adjacency list questions, specifically getting them into and out of multidimensional PHP arrays? This guy seems to have dome more or less what I'm trying to do but not quite. Specifically the arrays returned have a bunch of extra stuff I don't need and I was trying to get the depth of the dimension as well but couldn't figure it out. Looking at it now it seems he was able to get depth, maybe I'll give it another try now that it's been a week.
Week one was really nice, we started seeing some of the same people from week zero which we hope means that we're doing something right. We figured out some espresso machine idiosyncrasies. We now have a delicious Tung Ting oolong tea for those of you who aren't in the mood for coffee. We started seeing more people from Adobe, CCA, SEGA, Airbnb, Jawbone, and a bunch of small design offices, antique shops, and furniture stores. Everyone has been happy to see us and have confirmed our suspicions about there being nothing in the area aside from Starbucks. Haven't seen very many people from the other CCA but we hear that their term just ended so maybe in a little while.
There were a lot of pictures taken. The following are in no particular order, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some. If you have pictures you would like to see here send me a link or a file and I'll put it up.
Whew. We had a little blurb on Tablehopper but feel compelled to mention that our drips will not be exclusively single origin and that there may or may not be seasonal scones.
We would also like to thank Stumptown for their support and for making such an awesome product. Seriously, go check out what they do and if there is anything that piques your curiosity let us know. We're up for special drips, experimental blends, single origin espressos, or whatever.
Thank you, everyone who came out to see us and get coffee. If you haven't been able to make it yet please drop by when you can, it would be good to see you.
posted 2012-06-24 20:32:12 by px
Oh hey, we opened! It was great. Today was day two, also great. More soon, thanks for everything.
posted 2012-06-14 19:08:58 by px
OK this is it! Our coffee arrived so we are going to go ahead and open tomorrow! Just to refresh your memories, we will be located at 15th and Kansas on the southeastern corner. Our hours will be from 0800 to 1500 Monday through Friday. If our hours ever change there is a special place you can look right on this very website.
Hope to see you tomorrow, if you can't make it then you can tell your pals or other nice people in the area to come by. We will also have coffee beans for sale if you're a make-coffee-at-home type person or if you're one of those surprise-your-friends-with-little-presents type person, just F your I.
posted 2012-06-12 16:46:38 by px
Hi, just a quick note to mention that we did not open. You probably already guessed that though. We are now shooting for possibly Monday 11 June but Tuesday or Wednesday are much more likely. We have a bunch more coffee that will be old before we can open, if you would like some hit us up and maybe we can scoot some over to you.
In other news you may have arrived here via an automated email blast, if the email looks weird or if you happened to see it in your spam filter please let us know. It's obviously not our intention to spam you, so if you'd prefer not to receive emails altogether please let us know that also. Or instead, I guess.
We're spending the weekend getting new tires and fine tuning our iced coffee recipe. Turns out the iced coffee is not so bad with Irish whiskey added. Don't think we can sell that though, sorry.
posted 2012-06-09 18:50:45 by px
So! Remember when I said that we were almost certainly not going to be open today? Turns out I was right, boo. We got a thing in the mail today that got us all excited because it looked really official, took it down to the OoTaTC and everything. Turns out it was our renewed business license and not really directly related to the somewhat pressing matter at hand.
We figured that while we were there we may as well pony up for the license, but OoTaTC said they didn't have our info from SFDPH yet so we can't pay. Huh.
Luckily SFDPH is a block away from OoTaTC so after a leisurely stroll to Fox Plaza we discover that our stuff was sent two days ago. I wonder how they sent it.
In any case, the clerk lady said that she would re-fax our stuff to City Hall. So that was kind of nice. She also said that we could call our inspector if we had any questions, and that we could do that as early as Tuesday. We mentioned that we'd like to be open by then and she said we can open right now if we want. That is incorrect, by the way.
So we're still waiting for the go ahead to go pay City Hall. Ready when you are, dudes.
posted 2012-06-06 19:16:52 by px
Just a quick one. We're still waiting on the DPH verification to hit the Office of the Tax Collector. I guess it's also supposed to come to us via USPS which is kind of a drag. Our mail has already arrived today and the item didn't make it.
So what I'm getting at here is that we are almost certainly not going to open tomorrow. Thursday hopefully? Maybe even Friday?
posted 2012-06-05 13:33:38 by px
Thanks, Eater SF!
Haven't looked to see if anyone is using the feed but if you are one of those people and you were seeing funny dates it's been fixed. For the record mktime() expects a long int, but you probably already knew that.
We still have some coffee for our accidental promotional giveaway. If you go through beans quickly and live or happen to be in the Sucker Free this weekend, let us know. You will also need a grinder, maybe that goes without saying?
posted 2012-06-02 10:38:57 by px
Good news, we have been approved by DPH!
Now we have to wait for them to transmit/deliver our status to the Office of the Tax Collector, then we pay a fee. Then we get a receipt from the OotTC and take it back to DPH whereupon we receive our permit. Then we start making you delicious coffees. Speaking of coffees, we bought a bunch thinking we were going to be open by now and it is not going to be good for much longer. If you're in San Francisco or thereabouts and would like a preview bag of coffee, hit us up.
posted 2012-06-01 02:12:35 by px
oh hi so our aggresive optimism regarding our opening date (today) may have failed us somewhat. we had our health department inspection, and it went pretty well, considering that we didn't pass. our water pressure is flabby, apparently. i mean the water pressure in the trailer. mine's just fine, thank you very much. but it's fixed already, a quick one two with a new filter and we are good to go squat on inspector reyes' doorstep tomorrow morning at 0700 hours. thank you stevie. and then, we should be all buttoned up for a for realz monday open. a hard open.posted 2012-05-30 17:44:18 by nx
As you may have heard we passed our SFFD inspection, we had to get a new fire extinguisher but otherwise it was pretty straightforward. Onward to DPH, then coffee time!
We got some fresh cups, a beefy grinder, and a bag of beans so we are ready to start dialing this in!
posted 2012-05-24 00:14:26 by px
We have a date, and it is soon! We're hoping to be open for business on Wednesday 30 May 2012. We have a lot to do between now and then not least of which are two inspections by the fire and health departments, but things are looking pretty good.
We would love to see you and make you a coffee, if you can't make it then we hope you can make it soon after!
posted 2012-05-22 16:48:02 by px
Oops, I forgot pictures, sorry about that.
posted 2012-05-12 18:00:55 by px
Well, that certainly was a long delay, sorry about the dead air. Things have accelerated though, and we're hopeful to be up and running Very Soon Now.
So. We gave up on the truck idea, it was going to take too long to get it roadworthy and was probably going to cost a lot in the process. Thankfully the guy we got it from agreed to buy it back, if anyone is looking for a smoggable stepvan let us know and we'll hook you up with him after he has the work done on it. It will cost more than what we paid for it though, since he's going to have to put more money into it.
The exciting thing is that at almost exactly the same time we sold the truck back we heard that a trailer was available with a bunch of coffee equipment already installed which had been in operation recently in San Francisco. For those new to this whole MFF thing that means that the trailer would have had to pass a variety of inspections in order to do business in San Francisco, so the possibility exists that our permitting would go more smoothly or more quickly than if we had started from scratch. That is what we are hoping but this is the DPH we're dealing with, anything could happen.
Other good news: we secured a commissary, a storage parking spot for nights and weekends when the trailer is not in use, and have been talking with people about design, insurance, healthcare and whatnot. Getting administrative stuff done is oddly comforting, maybe everything feels more official at this point.
posted 2012-05-12 14:14:38 by px
Well, so much for that cautious optimism! We took the truck in to get smogged and it didn't pass. Sometimes you'll take a vehicle in to get smogged and it won't pass but the smog guy will give you a short list of things to do or have done that will cost you $50, then offer to redo the test in a few days. This wasn't one of those times. The smog guys were really pleasant, knowledgeable, and apologetic when the truck didn't pass though, so there's that. If you find yourself in the position of needing a smog test on Easter Sunday they'd be my first recommendation.
On the upside, we were able to get some better pictures while we were out there so the trip wasn't totally a bust. Also had a delicious coffee at secret/not-so-secret backdoor alleyway while being only slightly irritated by crazy monologue lady outside.
posted 2012-04-09 21:04:16 by px
Well we met with the DPH this week, and it went better than we were expecting it to. Keeping cautiously optimistic...
Also we may be talking with some health insurance brokers soon-- it didn't even occur to us that that is someone's job, which seems silly in retrospect.
posted 2012-04-07 15:53:21 by px
OK one more of these and then we can put all this testing nonsense behind us.
In the meantime you can catch up on Steve Albini's cooking blog!
posted 2012-04-01 15:54:49 by px
Oh hey listen, we changed our Twitter username. It's adjusted up top but just so you know...
posted 2012-04-01 15:40:33 by px
OK well technology is fun, that is for sure. Anyway. We went to Hayward and met with the nice people at US Catering Trucks who told us that the truck we got might be too small! We're going to try to meet with SFDPH next week to see what they say. Wish us luck!
posted 2012-04-01 00:11:35 by px
OK I am back from ifttt, this is a test item. While we're here though what do you think of this flageolet gratin recipe?
posted 2012-03-31 23:47:09 by px
Well! I made that feed we were talking about a little while ago. Snappy! Big fun to use in ifttt, which is where I'm headed right after this.
posted 2012-03-31 22:59:41 by px
Woah, you can now view a single bloglet entry by specifying a number like this! Whee!
posted 2012-03-31 21:53:47 by px
We've been reading some on how to go about getting group rates on health insurance, but it's still bewildering. Any ideas?
posted 2012-03-29 20:55:39 by px
Probably the worst time of year to ask about this, but we also need a(n) accountant/bookkeeper/tax preparer, any advice?
We will need someone for 2011 taxes too, hopefully to advise on how to deal with early 401(k) distributions, urk!
posted 2012-03-26 18:17:43 by px
I should also mention that there are a few things we do not (yet) need help with:
This list will most likely change quite a bit, stay tuned.
posted 2012-03-25 01:14:11 by px
Oh! Forgot to mention that we will be tweeting. We will also eventually have an RSS feed, possibly an Instagram account, maybe a tumblr, and so forth. We will not be doing Facebook, MySpace, Whrrl, or Plaxo.
posted 2012-03-25 00:49:23 by px
So. Welcome to whatever this is, I think it's going to be a bloglet? We'll see I guess. I am having a hard time remembering who is up to date on what, so I'm going to try to keep events here as they happen.
As most of you know by now Najla and I are in the process of starting a coffee truck. Kind of like a food truck but without much food and hopefully without as much of the hassle as there would be if we were to have grills, ovens, and all that tomfoolery. Oddly enough we will be in the second most complicated/expensive category of MFF, but I'm getting ahead of myself here.
The truck (and the business) will be called Papa November, there isn't much to the name aside from being a phonetic alphabet version of our first names. Which is kind of funny because we thought it would be nice to have a name that's unambiguous on the phone or what have you but we wind up having to repeat ourselves a lot when telling people what our name is. Oh well.
The truck itself is a 1984 GMC P3500 which has been outfitted as an ice cream truck. It started service somewhere in Alameda county, then moved to Massachusetts, then moved back here. It currently resides in Bayview but we're hoping to find a parking spot somewhere closer to where we live or where we will eventually be selling stuff. The engine is in good shape as the guy we bought it from had a bunch of work done on it before he sold it to us. There is an existing electrical system (separate from the truck's engine/ignition system) that consists of two banks of deep cycle marine batteries, two inverters, a fair amount of conduit, and a number of outlets. We are assuming we won't be able to run much or any of the coffee equipment off this system, so we will probably get a generator. There is a possibility that we'll be able to get shore power from the building adjacent to the spot but it looks unlikely at this point. The truck has a bunch of equipment in it already which looks to be in OK shape but hardly any of it is stuff we will need. If anyone is interested in a milkshake machine, a smallish chest freezer, a largeish chest freezer, a serious-looking microwave, a soda fountain with CO2 tank, a two-bin sink, or other stuff I probably forgot please let us know. There is plumbing and a water tank as well but we haven't even started evaluating that part. We are assuming that we have a fair amount of work ahead of us in terms of getting the truck up to speed for the SF department of health but we're not sure how to proceed at this point. We will also need to paint or wrap the truck but that is not a priority at the moment.
Here's what we have:
Here's what we need to do next. We would love love love to hear from you if you have experience, insight, or any other thoughts regarding any of this stuff, since most of it is stuff that neither one of us is particularly good at:
posted 2012-03-24 21:22:35 by px
Papa November is a tiny coffee shop Serving Stumptown coffee. We're located at 15th and Kansas in Showplace Square, a part of the Potrero Hill district in San Francisco.
Oh hey, here's a Google map.
We are open from 0800H to 1300H, Monday through Thursday.
Do you have Questions? Some are Frequently Asked— and answered.
To keep up to date you can follow us on Twitter or Instagram.
Papa November serves the following items:
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