The man sitting at the window table has light brown curls, a pair of sunglasses atop his head. His eyes are down, focused intently on the book he's been reading, but I'm imagining them to be warm and light brown. Perhaps with flecks of amber in them. For some reason, I've always looked for a pair of eyes like that - but the ones I've found have always been either chocolate brown, blue or one particularly memorable pair of green.

He is foppish, I've decided, strictly because the word seems to suit him. Beth and I will later debate the proper meaning of the word and how it applies to a man in a coffeeshop, but foppish it is. In the Hugh Grant, pre-prostitute manner of the word, with more of a New England, master's degree spin.

The analysis is making me giggle a little as I sip my latte and converse with my friends. Although the giggles may also have been helped along by the margarita I enjoyed with other friends about an hour prior. Who knows. What I do know is that I had a lunchtime drink and am now drinking coffee, a combination of upper and downer that makes me feel mellow and caffeinated at the same time. I'm rather fond of the sensation.

Muddy's is as sublime as it always is on spring Sundays. We sit at a three-top, one of us working through a stack of papers, two of us reading our respective books. I have Chuck Klosterman's latest propped open before me, and I'm chuckling regularly at the healthy doses of self-deprecation included within. Reading Klosterman is an experience aided by today's coffeehouse music selections - a mix of obscure and familiar pulsing through the speakers and eliciting headbobs from my chair. One particular song kept me guessing about the band until I jumped up to ask the barista.

Death Cab, which explained the sense of familiarity, but (surprisingly) a song I'd never heard of, which explained the puzzlement. It was included in his iPod playlist, and we chatted about the tune for a few moments before I grinned and returned to my chair. I wondered during the short walk whether he was the same employee I'd chatted with about Bright Eyes' "First Day of My Life" several months prior - that gent had been equally charming, but was a different kind of handsome.

That past guy had also been foppish, actually - this one was more James Dean than Hugh Grant.

(And I've demonstrated in the past a particular penchant for James Deans.)

A few minutes later, a song is playing that possesses elements of both rockabilly and alt-country (yes, Virginia, there is a difference) that sounds a bit like Ryan Adams when he's playing with the Cardinals, but I'm not confident enough to make a guess.

(No, I'm not returning to ask James Dean about another song. I will write down snippets of lyrics and find that the song is actually The Weakerthan's "A New Name for Everything" and purchase the song off iTunes.)

I feel good. Better than good. A puzzling mix of sensations running through my body, a good book to read, a hot latte and friends. And - and I believe this to be important - my hair is in pigtailed buns and I have Chuck Taylors on my feet. It's a Sunday afternoon and I am ignoring the work I should do because I've been thinking about it all weekend and my pre-margarita shoulders tensed just thinking about it. I am imagining flirtations with men who make or drink coffee, men I can imagine to be caring and charming, possessing admirable tastes in music and who will likewise appreciate my own.

I'm rebelling and relaxing at the same time. Two things I rarely do, combined to form another mixture of upper and downer, all nestled next to a warm pot of peppermint tea.