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The coffee shop was packed. Young people were talking rationally and loudly, enjoying the cool weather. The sun illuminated the whole scene, painting a golden glow upon the customers.

Mr Espresso sighed in his small corner, hidden from the crowd by a large shelf of raspberry flavoured cookies. He was tired, and not only because it had been a long day. He hadn't slept well in several weeks.

*They don't understand me anymore.* thought Mr Espresso as he stared at his clients. *They'll never understand.*

He knew he had to change something. Something drastic. A few months ago, Mr Espresso had felt that he was having a good time with his patrons. They came regularly, ordered their drinks and sat in the same place every time, chatting with each other or reading the newspaper while drinking their cup of Joe.

But now they came less often. They ordered faster and left faster too. The conversations were shorter, and they weren't as good as they used to be either.

There was a time when people didn't mind spending hours in front of an espresso machine waiting for their drink to be ready, to savour every precious moment of taste, smell and sound: the tiny spurt against the glass walls when it first started to flow, the loud whistle of the gas being released after pressing the button, then the slow trickle into the cup as you waited for it to stop flowing and see if you got your desired thickness right on the first try (if you did you could give yourself a mental high-five).

And then there was also the ritualistic part: putting sugar into your cup first, stirring it slowly and watching how it transformed from a clear liquid into an opaque brownish substance that smelled like caramel; adding milk next, gently pushing down with a spoon so that the liquid would touch all sides of your cup and still be hot enough to warm it up; adding some more sugar if you liked your coffee sweet; then putting one or two cookies into your mouth and chewing them slowly so that they would release all their flavours onto your tongue; finally taking your cup and raising it towards someone who was sitting nearby... this small gesture said so much without words!

But now what? No one cared about those things anymore! Their drinks were made at lightning speed (and tasted horrible), they came in whenever they wanted (even during prohibited hours) and they left after finishing their drink (without saying goodbye even!). And they didn't do anything else but drink! It wasn't just bad business - Mr Espresso had started feeling lonely!

That's why he decided to change things once again: this time drastically! He'd already tried everything else possible but nothing had worked out satisfactorily so far... maybe this time...

A young woman entered his coffee shop at around 11am. She tied her hair behind her neck before sitting on one of his chairs near his counter. Then she took out her mobile phone and started typing away on its keypad with furious speed while occasionally looking up from her screen to check if anyone was watching her (she wasn't happy about this). After several minutes she seemed satisfied with what she had written and sent her message off into the ether by pressing two buttons in quick succession (without even checking whether she had pressed "send" or "cancel"). She then shook her head slightly before letting out a sigh of relief: apparently whatever she had typed wasn't as important as she had thought it was before sending it off!

Mr Espresso observed all this silently from behind his counter while laying out some cookies on a plate on top of another one which rested on a shelf right above him (so that customers could reach them easily). After doing so he took a deep breath before putting his plan into action: he walked towards the young woman while holding up three fingers in front of him signalling her to wait for him patiently while continuing whatever task she had been doing prior to his arrival. When he arrived in front of her he put both hands on her shoulders firmly but gently (as if trying to calm down a wild horse) while whispering quietly: "Time is precious." Then after putting both hands over his heart he continued "but moments are priceless." After completing this sentence he looked into her eyes for a moment before starting over again until finally saying: "I'm going to make my customers value time again." After saying this Mr Espresso smiled at her reassuringly before turning around and walking away towards his counter where he picked up two cups from underneath another shelf containing assorted biscuits including chocolate chip cookies, orange chocolate chip cookies and rainbow chip cookies (he couldn't decide which one suited best so he put them all!) before returning towards her with them in his hands with an eager smile on his face anticipating seeing how surprised she would be when finding out that today's special included not one or two but three free cookies!