 I'll get a high off of just freaking people out. You have to figure out other ways to make strong art. How do you create something that's also new? I never moved my shit. I never moved nothing. I just abandoned it all for this. I came out here. I thought what was going to be for three days. But I never went back, you know? Oh, hell no! Hi, baby! Good to see you! What'd you like, man? What did you use? What'd you like? I never moved my shit. I never moved nothing. I never got my guitars. I never got my books. I never got my clothes. I never got my dog. I never got my girlfriend. I never got my house. I just abandoned it all for this. We don't fuss with the coffee too much here. I moved it first. I know Jamie might give you a different version of this. So, yeah, I... I was in Oakland and I was looking in the Craigslist and I found an ad. It said, Lower East Side Restaurant for Sale. And Liz was living here at the time. I said, check it out. I remember walking down the street in April, I think. And the sun was hitting it and I was like, that's it. I know that this is like the right spot. And she talked to Mohamed Koudabeda, the guy who run the falafel stand, who's infamous for the... What's that man's name? I can't put my finger on it. That's my mom, my mom, Mohamed. I bought the place for Mohamed Koudabeda in the Wien video. I mean, he's well liked. He gets excited about life. Hi, come in. You know, he doesn't talk to you like a businessman. He doesn't talk to you like, you know, he talks to you like you're his friend. What'd you like? Like it was a era of coffee where, boy, if anybody had any knowledge about coffee, they wanted you to know it. You want sugar in the ice cream? I think I treat people like you would want people to treat your own mom, you know, don't treat them snobby because they want to put sugar in their espresso. Fuck you, man. You know what I mean? My first time at a brazo, I thought the guy is too friendly. He doesn't understand New York. First sip, I was like, this is the best ice coffee I've ever tasted. And that was it. A lot of people, like, let their guard down and they feel comfortable enough to talk to somebody else. I'm like one arm touching the machine and one arm out the window and the other way is not much larger. People say it was like being in a subway car. Shit, it was like being in the fucking conductor's compartment in a subway car. All I ever wanted to do all this time was open my own coffee shop. Since high school, what are you looking at? I became a coffee fanatic before I ever worked in coffee. Sleeping in my station wagon so I can go to the med in the morning. And then I finally, you know, after all those years, I got a job there. Every place I ever worked at kind of got me where I am now. That was college for me. That's studying with the masters, man. All right, see you late night. Or when you're on. Bye. So I started the shop in 2007. Now I'm opening a new place across the street. It's gonna be beautiful and I'm very happy about it and I really lament leaving this place because this place has been home for 10 years. And I have a baby coming in a couple of days. It's all beautiful stuff. I need a fireball. This might be one of the last times I shut these windows. It's not the last time, but it's one of the last. It truly is. Like maybe the last, and I'm not gonna cry about it. I mean, I don't think we've lost anything. I think we've gained when we opened the smaller bra. So it was just me and Jamie and then Lily grew up in that small space. And now it's Lily Amateo and us here. Gives me a place to hang out with my daughter. And she can sit on that little table and draw and play her Toca Boca games, do whatever little girls do. Liz is about 60% of this place. She is responsible for the entire repertoire of fake and soon to be new stuff, you know? Part of the reason why we met and why we got along is because I brought him food when I first met him. She brought me some olive cookies and I thought that that was insane. My food always went really well with the coffee he made. So there is something just about balancing the two pallets. There you go. See you guys later. What Jamie and Liz offer is much more than coffee. They offer a good chunk of community. I want you just to take it for granted 100%. Walk in, give me two bucks. You get a great espresso. All you need to worry about. Trust that you are going to get great shit. It's not your problem and it's not your responsibility to know why. That's my fucking problem. I just want you to listen to the grooves. Have a good coffee. Have a good time. That's it. One day I was sitting in a Brasso and it just kind of vibe in the place. I think the lights might have even been out. The song Akela Brasso, come on. And it just hit me. I was like, that's it. That's totally it, man. And then I emailed a friend of mine who's a big coffee guy. He kind of belittled the idea and said, oh, hugs. I was like, no. A Brasso is not a hug. It's an embrace. Hugs are for bears. A Brasso is where we're going.