Winter (née Rafael Lozano) first went viral back in 2006 and again in 2014, but his story begins long before that. He decided back in 1997 it was his life's mission to visit, document, and have a caffeinated beverage from every Starbucks on this planet: He calls it "Starbucks Everywhere." Now, he's 46 years old, taking computer programming contractor assignments that allow him to travel freely. He lives in his car to make said traveling easier ("it’s fine"), and he's really starting to think about what the next chapter of his life looks like now that he's spent north of $150,000 on "Starbucking" ... also, the chain is set to continue expanding rapidly in the upcoming years.

From his current gig near Deerfield Beach, Florida, Winter tells Delish about his methodology, how his reflections on Starbucking have changed since 2014, and what he really envisions the future of this project will entail.

Is the number on your site now accurate? You've visited 14,402 locations?
Plus one [Ed. note: In 2017, there were 27,339 Starbucks stores worldwide.]. Jacksonville yesterday, that was the one outstanding store in Florida, though I’m sure within a month’s time they will open or relocate another one.

That’s one of the big updates that has developed since the last time the story broke: Starbucks has accelerated the pace of relocations. They've relocated over 500 locations in the last half-decade, something that has to be unprecedented for any corporation anywhere in the world. Every week there’s at least one or two new listings that come up that are older stores that moved. Almost 90-95 percent of those move into a space with a drive-thru.

Do you have an estimate of how far you’ve traveled in total?
403,400 [miles] is the number that comes up when I run my query, but I know that I've left out so many trips that the true number has to be approximately 500,000 miles driven. [That's] not counting miles flown, which would be quite difficult to calculate.

And how much money you’ve spent on coffee up until this point? Four years ago, the number floating around was $100,000.
My best ballpark is $150,000 since 1997.

Another thing people really latched onto back in 2014 was that you appreciated the chain’s business sense, their customer service, their bathrooms, the WiFi, etc., but really weren’t a fan of the coffee. How do you feel about that now, years later?
Oh, I’ve doubled down on that. I started exploring third wave cafés in 2011 and immediately noticed that the coffee was a night and day difference in terms of taste ... When I discovered Stumptown coffee. I’ve been drinking Starbucks exclusively pretty much since 1995, and then I taste this and it was like a whole new world had opened up for me.

I think [Starbucks'] coffee has gotten worse ... I get a lot of cups that are really, really dark and bitter, and I just can barely tolerate them. I went to 60 Starbucks between July 4-12th and so many of them were just ... really bad.

How much coffee, on average, do you drink in a day?
In my regular life, I try to limit myself to two 10-ounce cups a day. One in the morning, one after lunch just to get through the work day. I try not to drink coffee after 3 p.m. on a regular day. Obviously, if I’m out Starbucking, if I’m hitting 60 coffee houses in the course of seven or eight days, I’m going to have to have a lot more.

You must have an iron stomach. What do you typically eat in a day?
I have quite the varied diet, but a lot of things come up on most days: an apple, a banana, a yogurt. A muffin or a bagel or a cornbread-type product. About every other day I have a Soylent. I have a lot of rice and beans. I’ve tried to cut back a lot on meat [since 2011]. I don’t even know what an iron stomach is, but one obvious question is “Does all that coffee, on a day where you go to 10 or more Starbucks, does all that coffee affect you?" And the answer is yes, it absolutely does affect me.

How often do baristas spell your name right?
They almost never ask my name because I almost never introduce myself. I go into a Starbucks, I ask to speak to the supervisor or manager. I explain my purpose, that I’ve been trying to visit every Starbucks and drink the coffee for over 20 years, and I ask for a little sample. Typically they just go over and bring me back a sample in the little sample cups. Occasionally, if I’m in a hurry, or if I just don’t feel like talking to anybody, I’ll just buy a coffee, but typically they don’t take your name for a short or drip coffee because the barista or cashier who rings it up is typically the one getting it for you.

What’s the best Frappuccino you’ve ever had? You're ... not drinking those everywhere, are you?
I might’ve had one Frappuccino in my entire life. All I have to do is drink a coffee beverage in each store, so I don’t need all that other stuff, I certainly don’t need all those calories. Training my gut is an endless struggle for me at my age, so I try not to consume calories that I’m not gonna enjoy, especially like fatty sugar calories. I do it! I absolutely do it because I love my doughnuts. I'm sure you've read about my side-quest to have a doughnut at every Duck Donuts location? [Ed. note: Winter has more recently begun a side-quest to eat a doughnut at every Duck Donuts location].

Is there one specific Starbucks that sticks out to you in a really good or really bad way?
There are so many, but the one that comes to mind immediately just because of what happened in Philadelphia a few months ago, was when I drove into a Yakima, WA, Starbucks [at least 10 years ago]. I asked the barista at that store what time the next [Starbucks over] closed and they told me “10 p.m.” I went over to hang out at Barnes & Noble and I killed time there, and then I went over to that Starbucks and it turned out that they had closed at 9. I explained to the manager what I was doing, that the baristas at the other store told me this store closed at 10, and that my schedule wouldn’t allow me to wait until morning. She said that she couldn’t let me in, but if I waited until they finished cleaning, she would bring me out a coffee. Back then, they had a product called “double shot,” which they don’t have anymore, and since all I had to do was drink any caffeinated beverage, that was good enough for me.

So I go out to my car to wait and 15-30 minutes later, I’m being interrogated by a police officer. It turned out fine because I had all this documentation about what I was doing, I didn’t appreciate that. [Ed. note: Delish has reached out to Starbucks for comment.]

Tell me about some of the larger reflecting you've done on this project. To spend 20 years of your life so committed to one goal is no small deal.
Well, it’s 21 years and ... I’m actually just amazed that I’m 46 years old. It seems like only yesterday it was the summer of 1997 and I came up with this idea at a Starbucks in Plano, Texas. I’m looking forward to when I’m 50 and I’ll have been doing this for exactly half my life.

When I reflect about the most profound realization, though, it’s just how [Starbucking] has shaped the course of my life. My career — I’m determined to remain a contractor because it allows me the flexibility to go Starbucking for as much of the year as I need to keep up. Not that I’m really keeping up, when you count the overseas locations, but even just to keep up with the North American locations takes an incredible amount of time. Right now, I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to keep up with the 350 locations that are currently outstanding.

I’m sure it’s affected my relationships. I was in a three-year relationship until last November. The reason she gave [for breaking up] was that I had too many conflicts with other people online, but I don’t know to what degree my Starbucking and the fact that she knew that these were goals I was serious about pursuing for the rest of my life influenced her. Maybe if Starbucking weren’t there, she would’ve tried harder. I’ll never know about that.

And financially?
Certainly, all the money that I’ve spent on Starbucking has meant that I wasn’t saving as much as I should have. I only started my 401K a couple of years ago and got serious about maxing out whatever the yearly limit is. That will, in turn, affect my Starbucking. It’s a little disappointing to see my balance and know that it’s not enough to take the kind of Starbucking trip I’ve been daydreaming about since late last year, but I’m gonna be grateful for that down the line. It would be nice that when I finally reach the point that it’s too hard to find computer programming work, that I’ll still be able to take some Starbucking trips or drive around the country every five years or so or take a trip around the world because I have the money in that account.

This dream Starbucking trip you’re talking about — what is that?
Some of it is to clear my head after the break-up — I took that really, really hard. I wanted nothing more than to get as far away from Florida as possible and go over to Asia and just see Starbucks and other coffee shops and lose myself in that, but I had to work. Hitting a lot of new countries is on my list — top of my list is Indonesia, because it’s the only major country in Southeast Asia I haven't yet been to. I don’t know if Myanmar [Starbucks] has opened, but it’s coming soon. Kazakhstan has a lot of stores, Azerbaijan has a few stores, Brunei has a couple stores. Taiwan has a lot of stores; I’ve been there but I only saw a few stores. Basically spending three months traveling the world. I’m kinda going stir crazy here waiting until I can get overseas, but the way contracting works, you gotta take the work when you can get it.

You’ve certainly given me a lot to think about here.
Yeah, well, I have a lot to think about because this is a lifetime project for me and I have to figure out how to make it work without ending up on the street. And I already live in my car! So I kind of already live on the street, but as long as I have enough money to afford the upkeep of the car and buy the gas, it’s fine. You can easily imagine in 10 years or 20 years, you have $10 gas, for example, and a whole different global economy. Air fares have gone through the roof: How do you make Starbucking work under those economic conditions? How do you do it?