The End is Near/Time for a New Beginning

Modern Times Coffeehouse New Year's Hours

December 31st: 8am to 7pm

January 1st: 10am to 8pm

(bookstore will be closed - access the coffeehouse through the parking lot door)

Happy Holidays!

Thanks for making Modern Times a great place to celebrate with family and good friends this holiday season.
Just a reminder that we will be closing at NOON today so that our staff can travel safely to their families.
Take care!

MTC Holiday Hours & Wi-Fi Access Update

     Sundays in December (2, 9, 16, 23):    8 am to 10 pm

     Christmas eve, Dec. 24:                           8 am to 12 pm

     Christmas, Dec. 25:                                  Closed

     Day after Christmas, Dec. 26:                10am to 8 pm

     New Year’s eve, Dec. 31                          8 am to 7 pm

     New Year’s, Jan. 1:                                10 am to 8pm

Please note, that, to accommodate for all the families visiting the coffeehouse and bookstore during the holidays, we have decided to TURN OFF WIRELESS ACCESS.  We will go off the grid during these dates:

December 21st through the 24th

this is why we can't have nice things

This is taken from very sternly worded e-mail we received from Verizon, our ISP:

We are writing to advise you that we recently received a second notice from a copyright owner of possible copyright violation that appears to involve your Verizon Online account (the "Complaint"). 

Copyright infringement level: 2
Notice ID: 14-32591147
Title: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy 2011
Protocol: BitTorrent
IP Address: 108.18.16.163
DNS:
File Name: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy[2011]R5[Studio-Audio}XviD-

ExtraTorrentRG
File Size: 740146230
Timestamp: 11-29-2012 23:50:20 UTC 

While this activity may have occurred without your permission or knowledge by an unauthorized user, or perhaps by a minor who may not fully understand the copyright laws, as the primary account holder, you are legally responsible for all activity originating from your account.  

With these notices, MTC's love affair with wireless is coming to an end.  We will not be held accountable for the irresponsible actions of some abusing a courtesy we offer at no charge. 
  
These abuses, compounded with the complaints we receive from disappointed people who are unable to be accommodated, has led us to once again revisit and update our wi-fi policy.  We know it would disappoint many of you if we were to eliminate our free wireless service completely; so, in the spirit of community, a fair compromise would be to limit the hours during which we offer the service.  We are considering shutting off the wireless during our busiest days and hours - weekends and lunch-time during the week.  

We understand if many of you are upset by this decision, but you have to see it from our perspective.  This decision is based on economics - we need to turn over tables to make a profit - as well as the spirit of Modern Times - we want to continue fostering an environment where people are aware of their neighbors, the surrounding community and the various needs of those visiting Modern Times and Politics and Prose Bookstore.  

We want to give you a fair amount of warning before the new policy goes into effect.  Expect us to have it in place by January 15th, 2013.  In the meantime, please don't hesitate leaving a comment or writing me an e-mail.  Note that our comments are moderated so as to encourage constructive dialogue.   

Popping Up in December

We're pleased to announce a partnership with Trohv in Takoma to host a pop-up coffee bar every Sunday there in December! On Sundays Dec. 9, 16, 23, and 30, come between 11:30am-2pm where we will be preparing select coffee offerings from our featured local roaster, Ceremony Coffee. The most special thing about this service is that we are offering coffee prepared three different ways, none of which you can currently get at Modern Times. There, we make a house blend in a French press; and offer two choices of single origin coffees (coffee that has been sourced from the same crop/lot instead of being mixed with other beans) either as a Chemex brew pot, or as a single-cup pourover. If you've never had coffee prepared this way, we highly recommend it. For each order, the weight of the coffee and the volume of water is calculated in relation to the amount of time that the coffee is allowed to "brew", resulting in the optimal extraction of the beans, and thus, the best tasting cup possible!

For more information about our pop-up venture (which ultimately will result in the grand opening of our new business, LA MANO COFFEE BAR in spring 2013), visit our Facebook page.

Curvature (Dec. 1, 2012 - Jan. 13, 2013)

MTC is proud to present Curvature, a new show by Marcie Wolf-Hubbard.

Please also be sure to join us in the cafe for a reception on Thursday, Dec. 6; 7-9pm to celebrate Marcie and her art.

"My encaustic paintings can be rugged with the wood support and textural elements, but I retain my focus on the grace of the figure. I have loved re-immersing myself in figure drawing and combining drawing with wax painting adds to my excitement. The effect produced by applying wax to charcoal drawing is that of an image floating on vellum. The “back and forth” of additive collage imagery is married with encaustic’s mysterious depth and transparency. Drawing and carving into the wax with a tool and then applying pigment augments the sense of energy in the brushwork."

For purchasing information, please contact Marcie directly at marcieplusart@gmail.com 

Next Pop-up: Come in your pajamas!

For our next pop-up event to promote our forthcoming coffee bar in Takoma, we'll once again be hosted by the kind and lovely home goods and furnishing store Trohv on Sunday, Dec. 2nd. On this morning, patrons that visit participating stores in Takoma dressed in their pajamas between 7am-10am will receive special discounts on their purchases. There will also be prizes, games, and other goodies. The folks at Main Street Takoma have dubbed this tradition PAJAMARAMA and we hear it's quite the event!

We'll be there starting at 7:00 to serve coffee and compliment you awkwardly on your pajamas.

For those of you that came to the last event, you know it was crowded and the pourovers couldn't come out fast enough for the demand. This time, in addition to the individual pourovers, we'll be offering an alternative, quicker method of coffee brewing a la the French press, for those of you that still want freshly made coffee but don't need to geek out for ten minutes over the pourover stand with your barista.

Pop-up Coffee and Pajamarama at Trohv
w/ Modern Times Coffeehouse and la mano coffee co.
232 Carroll St NW
Sunday, Dec. 2nd
7:00am - 10:00am

Follow us on Facebook and Twitter for the latest updates and info about Pajamarama participating stores, specials, and what kinds of coffees we'll be serving that day.

SILVER SPRING: Another pop-up with la mano!

Thanks to the eager and patient people of Takoma, Silver Spring, (and to our dedicated friends that came from Virginia and Baltimore!) the pop-up on Sunday at Trohv for our new coffee venture, la mano coffee bar, was a success.

We're pleased to host another pop-up as well as sponsor a local nonprofit event on Thursday, the Silver Spring Stories Festival, sponsored by Docs in Progress. We have co-hosted Documentary Appreciation Salons with DIP in the past, and we can't encourage you enough to support documentary filmmaking and especially local film organizations and filmmakers.

This mini film festival showcases short documentaries made by first-time filmmakers in the teen and adult documentary production classes offered by Docs in Progress. All the subjects of the films are people and places in Silver Spring or Takoma Park.

Modern Times Coffeehouse and la mano coffee bar will be serving our signature made-from-scratch hot chocolate and housemade chai, as well as Pollystyle cookies at the pre-screening reception.

The reception and screening will take place Thursday, Nov. 15th at 6:30pm at the Silver Spring Civic Building in downtown Silver Spring (near the Whole Foods).

For a description of the films and directions to the event, click here.

Please stop by and chat, then go see some films made by, for, and about our community!

Come to Trohv for a special coffee event!

Most of you know from our quiet announcement last month that the ownership of Modern Times Coffeehouse is planning to open a new coffee bar in the Takoma Park neighborhood. We have secured a lease and are working with an excellent team of local architects, designers, and builders to create what we hope will be a dynamic and much-needed addition to the growing crop of small businesses that are helping make the neighborhood more livable and sustainable.

As we wait for permits, pick out materials, and design the menu, we are also going to spend some time introducing ourselves to the neighborhood the best way we know how-- through coffee.

Starting November 11th, we will be hosting appearances throughout the next few months at various locations in the Washington, D.C. and Montgomery County area. At these pop-up events, you'll get to meet us, find out about the progress of the new store, and most importantly, get to try some of the stellar coffee being roasted by Ceremony Coffee, our featured provider. We will be setting up a mobile coffee brewing station including Hario brand drippers, Chemex flask brewers, and pourover stands (pictured below) designed and made by our good friends at Square Form right over in their studio in Columbia Heights. At these events you'll have the chance to try special products-- most notably a series of single origin coffee varietals both rare and experimental, AND get an experience that we don't currently offer at Modern Times-- a hand-poured, single cup of coffee.

Our first event will be held at TROHV, a home goods and gift store on Carroll St. NW, just steps from our future home and the Takoma Metro. We are delighted to partner with Ben and the folks over at TROHV to be able to make and serve coffee in their big, beautiful store. They feature items large and small, out of the ordinary and attention-grabbing, and we challenge you to try and leave the store without finding some ridiculously cool object that you never knew existed but now must have. Plus, if you come out on this day, you'll be among the first people to know the name of the new shop and see the location! (If you stick around long enough, maybe even get a peek inside).

Pop-Up Coffee Shop @ TROHV with MTC (D.C/Takoma Park location)
232 Carroll St. NW
Sunday, Nov. 11th
11am-2pm

Check back on this blog, Facebook, and Twitter for more upcoming events and help us spread the word to your friends in Takoma and elsewhere about the event. Additionally, if you'd like to feature our pop-up coffee bar services at your next event or party, please get in touch and we'll see how we can help.

Javier Rivas                                          
javier at moderntimescoffeehouse.com

Anna Petrillo
anna at moderntimescoffeehouse.com

Washington Animal Rescue League at Politics and Prose

Tomorrow, Friday, November 9th, you can choose to donate 20% of your Politics and Prose Bookstore purchases to the Washington Animal Rescue League's Humane Education Program. 
Also, puppies and kitties will be looking for forever homes between 230 and 430p.