Day #38 Coffee

Day 38, and we reach something very close to my heart: coffee.

I saw a survey on Facebook the other day about people’s coffee-drinking habits. A pal of mine had answered the question: How many cups of coffee do you drink in a month? Which, I suspect, is why I was seeing the survey.

Now, before I say anything else, I will explain that he’s the nicest man in the world, a genuine and kind man who gives great hugs and for whom I have endless time. However, his answer was twenty-one. Twenty-one cups of coffee in a month. I was horrified. I imagine that works out to one cup per day, three weeks a month, and then a week of nothing but tea. And I have a strange, fizzy feeling around the middle which tells me he actually means cups, like little cups. Not mugs.

If I really thought about it – and I’m going to zip past this quite quickly as I write it because it’s probably shocking – I get through something like twelve, or thereabouts, mugs – big trucker mugs – of coffee a day. It’s shocking, isn’t it.

That’s at least 336 in a 28-day month. I’m made almost exclusively of caffeine. It’s a wonder there’s any room for all the sarcasm.

Now, I tell myself that I don’t have to worry too much because I’m only talking about instant coffee, and beans which have been cremated don’t really count. I don’t know if medical science would back me up on this. Probably not. I am not an example for anyone, so please don’t do anything like me. It takes a skill to rock this.

But when I think back to one of the finest days of my life, I was in Exeter, with my brother Trev, about fifteen years ago. Sitting upstairs in the bar above one of the cinemas, there was a new member of staff, buffing the counter and straightening her apron. When Trev and I walked in, we ordered two cups of filter coffee and sat down to chat about indie music and Third Rock From The Sun.

Above the bar was a large sign reading ‘Filter Coffee Plus Free Refill, £2.50’. Now, I’m pretty sure that the words ‘Free Refill’ referred to one free refill. However, I’m not a businessman, and when the girl behind the bar decided that it meant infinite free refills, I didn’t argue with her.

That afternoon, between the two of us, Trev and I drank fifty-four cups of coffee and wound up in Waterstones. It was a great day mostly because of Trev, but the coffee was nice, too.