Photo: paintMonkey, Flickr Creative CommonsMy coffee was only brown today, not black. Apparently, the burr grinder has gotten a little clogged and didn’t process as many beans this morning as it’s supposed to, leaving my morning cuppa a little on the light side for my tastes.
I’m actually a little ashamed to admit this, but I’m back on the caffeine bandwagon. I spent a couple of years in college without consuming any caffeine other than the occasional chocolate bar and for most of my adult life the drug was never a regular part of my routine until I took up drinking tea every work day last year. I’ve been buying good coffee and grinding my own for a while, but until the past couple of months, this has always been a weekend indulgence. Lately, grinding beans and turning on our four-cup coffee maker has been a morning routine. I’m not fond of what has become of me. I don’t want to be like my dad, incapacitated with headaches if he doesn’t have his java by 9 a.m., or my mom, forced off of caffeinated drinks after a spate of chronic kidney infections about 15 years back. Those kidney problems were one of maybe three times I’ve seen my mom cry in my entire life. I kind of associate regular caffeine intake with excruciating pain because of this. It doesn’t help that the research on the effects of caffeine basically shows that regular use of caffeine makes you stupid. You do feel more alert and together after a cup of coffee, but only because you’re getting brain function back to where it was on average before you started drinking on a regular basis. I don’t want to be stupid. I don’t want to have to drink baby crack just to get back to normal. I don’t want to die of exploding kidneys, but dammit if I don’t just love the roasty toasty flavors.
But all of this is not my most pressing concern this week. This is the last week of the semester for my masters classes so I’ve got a string of due dates starting tonight. I’ve not even looked at the instructions for any of these assignments, although I have a general idea of the work level required. Luckily for me, today is the last day of NaBloPoMo, so if I end up not having time to post this week it won’t really matter to my artificial personal posting requirements. I still may waste a little time tonight trying to clean out the insides of my coffee grinder, though. Like I said this weekend, real productivity makes me irritable.
4 comments:
Finals have messed up our plans, too. No driving to Tampa for the GT game. No having a party to watch. Matt has to study. What's up with that?
I have never felt any effects of caffeine. I can drink a coke before bed and be asleep in no time. I to like to prove my dominion over it occasionally, though, by going several days or even months without imbibing. It helps that I don't like coffee and can take or leave tea. I just have to worry about the sodas.
Congrats on finishing NaBlo. Well done.
I drink coffee or tea most mornings, but every so often I purposely skip it just to make sure I'm still not addicted to the caffeine. I don't want to be addicted to anything.
My last due date is Thursday, so I won't do shite but watch football and drink beer on Saturday. I only have one local friend (two if you count his wife, which I probably should, but I'd only see them together so they pretty much add up to one) anyway, so no parties for me. Just a lack of sobriety and an excess of football, perhaps on my new HDTV if it gets in by then, but I probably won't have HDTV service by then so I'm probably wasting my time considering it.
"forced off of caffeinated drinks after a spate of chronic kidney infections" Seriously? I had no idea that coffee could do this to you. I've never been a coffee drinker myself. Up until a year ago ...
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