A 34-year-old programmer named Winter (he legally changed his name from Rafael Antonio Lozano this year) has made it his life's mission to drink a cup of coffee at every Starbucks on the planet. There are over 12,000 Starbucks — new ones open daily — and he has visited over 6,000 so far. He's worn a Starbucks shirt every day since October 2001.
Radar has a fascinating interview with him.
The primary rule is I have to drink at least one four-ounce sample of caffeinated coffee from each store. The store has to have actually opened for business; I can't get there the day before, when they have friends-and-family day and they're giving drinks away—in many ways that's kind of arbitrary. It has to be a company-owned store, not a licensed store. I have to drink the coffee, but there is no time limit on when I have to drink the coffee. But the longer I go without drinking it, the greater the risk that I might lose it. There are two stores I need to go back to in Washington State because I didn't finish the coffee—I lost it. I took it out of the store, I had it in a cup, and in the middle of the night I forgot I hadn't drank it all and I used the cup to relieve myself.The day you hit 29 stores, what were the side effects?
Well, pretty early on I started developing a headache, I started feeling jittery. Later, because of all the liquid I drank, I started feeling bloated. Just looking at the little cup of coffee made me nauseated.How many total ounces did you drink that day?
One hundred and four ounces and three shots of espresso. It hurt. And I lost an hour when my jeans ripped in the crotch while I was leaping up to a stone ledge to take a photo—so I had to stop at a mall to buy a pair of jeans. Toward the end of the day there were times when I felt like I was going to hurl, and I really didn't want to because I don't have a rule in place for what happens if I vomit. Would I have to go back to the store and drink the coffee? I probably would. So I definitely wanted to avoid vomiting.
