One day last month, I took 10 minutes to escape a hectic workday and sit in the sunshine. This attempt to center my mind was by all measures ineffective—I was so distracted that I left my purse behind on a bench in the middle of waterfront tourist mayhem. I didn't even realize my stupidity until it was time to go home.

Frantic searching and wailing and canceling of credit cards ensued. But at 9pm I got a call from an employee of the Pier 55 Starbucks, not too far from where I'd been sitting. Someone had turned in my bag. Everything was still there, right down to the six $1 bills in my wallet.

I was elated, but also guilty. I had just finished working on a project as part of our September issue, a smart-alecky ranking of every single Starbucks in the city, best to worst. This particular Starbucks clocked in at no. 96 owing to, as the text succinctly puts it, "So. Many. Tourists."

So, universe, please consider this my apology for preemptively spurning that good karma. Hopefully all the baristas who get up at 4am to open stores and remake drink orders with nary an eye roll will take this piece in the spirit it was intended: a semihumorous exercise in ranking things that are by definition pretty much the same and a commentary on how seriously people take Starbucks' role within our city.

My purse episode was just further proof that Seattle's 104 Starbucks locations function like the banks or post offices of yore—as a sort of civic gathering point, complete with cake pops and power outlets.