Coffee: A Delicious Alternative To Hating Everybody Every Morning Forever
If you know one thing about me, I don't like coffee. I didn't like it in high school when some of my friends started drinking it. I didn't like it in college, which is when I believe Bill began his love affair with coffee. I didn't like it when I got my first office job, and I certainly didn't like it a few years later when I was an exhausted parent of a toddler.
Oh, no way to coffee! My method of caffeine ingestion has always been a good, old, most likely toxic, chemical-laden Diet Mountain Dew.
As for the java, I can list three reasons why I'm not a fan:
Hot drinks make me sleepy. (So does iced tea. Unexplainable but true.)
We lived in a secluded little town with zero coffee shops. It was the only place in America where you could throw a stone and not hit a green Starbucks sign.
It tastes terrible. The smell? Intoxicating. I could drop my head into a bag of coffee beans, inhale all day, and be in aroma heaven. The taste? YUCK.
But then there is Bill, who has started each day as long as I've known him running to the coffee maker and pacing in front of it until it produces his go juice.
Bill is the King of Sloth without coffee - and because I'm slightly annoyed with him today I'll mention that Bill can occasionally be that WITH coffee too.
He shows no signs of life until he drinks a cup or two. Sometimes I get up in his grille about that, like "You can't...oh you know...acknowledge me or FUNCTION before coffee?"
That's not to say I didn't give coffee a chance. I remember sitting in a diner with friends ordering a cheeseburger and a cup of what was probably crap-tastic coffee, except that I was coffee-stupid and didn't realize that, and I doctored it with hundreds of creamers and sugar packets and then sipped and pretended to be a grownup who liked coffee because my friends were all doing it, but I really wanted to throw up. (Oh the things we do to fit in.)
My attitude has always been coffee is gross, coffee gives you bad breath, and coffee makes you a weaker person for your dependency.
But let me tell you, that sanctimonious attitude will almost always bite you in the butt because the worm has turned, my friends.
It started innocently at a 5K race where the fine people of Dunkin Donut were promoting their new Churro Signature Latte. (To be clear, I had not run the 5K race because COME ON NOW! I was cheering on a family member.)
I collected two coffee samples because they were free, handed one to Bill, tasted mine, and experienced a life-changing moment. Because OMG!! So much icy, sweet goodness!
I have seen Bill drink possibly a hundred thousand gallons of hot coffee in the last 35 years and love every sip, but iced coffee? He was not having it. He had a small taste and said, "That's not bad" because the Dunkin people were standing there with a "Please-Like-Our-Coffee" vibe and he wanted to be polite but I knew a lip-curl when I saw one. He was about to sneakily chuck the rest of his into the trash when I intercepted and drank it because I couldn't get enough.
But it's a slippery slope once you start on the coffee. Running errands? Get an iced coffee. Feeling sluggish in the afternoon? Get an iced coffee. Passing Dunkin on the way to Greenwise? Get an iced coffee! Budget? What budget? I NEED an iced coffee!
I may have developed a coffee habit.
I said MAY HAVE.
Perhaps Dunkin was adding a pump of crack to those things to keep me coming back and shelling out four dollars without a second thought. Or maybe spending money on overpriced coffee fulfilled some deep need I never knew I had, OKAY?
After a can of Diet Mountain Dew in the morning and an iced coffee in the afternoon, I spent most of the day hopping around like the Energizer Bunny, which was awesome for getting things done but not so great when I crashed on the couch before dinner.
There was also the nerve-wracking effect of my heart pounding out of my chest and how I spent enough money on coffee to fund a Caribbean vacation. (Okay, I'm exaggerating but still horrified at how much moola I dropped on that stuff.)
For those reasons, I decided I must put myself in a coffee time-out. I went cold turkey and endured the horror of withdrawal (again, slight exaggeration.)
Now I'm adjusting to losing the extra caffeine boost, not having a special treat in the middle of the day, and occasionally launching a full-scale whining campaign about the great injustice of being headachy and tired.
Meanwhile, Bill is still chugging down his coffee - not Dunkin, not iced, but regular brewed coffee made in his little machine every morning just like the hooked-through-the-bag coffee addict he is.