Cup of Youch!

I stopped into the AM/PM this morning to grab a cup of coffee. With the windy, wacky weather keeping me up the last couple of nights, I needed the caffeine to get charged up and focused for another challenging day; or to stay awake if it’s a boring one.

Even though I would've liked a white mocha from Its-a-Grind (a concoction to die for), I'm not really a super-dooper coffee connoisseur. If it’s hot, black and smells like coffee I'll generally drink it. And with the nearest Its-a-Grind about 25 miles away, I was content to settle for a cup of $1.25 AM/PM "house" blend. But Good Lord, why do places like mini-marts have to make everything so dang stinkin' hot?!

Yes, hot coffee is good. Molten coffee is not.

Once the plastic cup was full, and even with the little cardboard thingy wrapped around its circumference as I carried it over to the register, I thought the fingerprints were being burned off my hand. With all that seared flesh, my first concern was, "Dang, how am I gonna send a text?"

Then in the car, through the tiny hole in the plastic lid I took my first tentative sip.
Immediately I felt my tongue recoil in shock. So for the sake of safety, and to avoid incurring another second degree burn, I placed the coffee cup in the cup holder and drove on.

Periodically I picked it up to try a touch or taste test, only to find it was still just this side of spontaneous combustion. It's like they brewed this stuff on the sun. So I kept driving. And driving. And driving some more.

Twenty minutes later I pulled into the parking lot at work, and at last was able to get a sip in edgewise. My caffeine fix was satisfied. I could face the day. But had more than half my brain been engaged, I could've just waited till I got to the office, headed to the break room and got a fresh cup of workplace coffee there.

Already brewed, lukewarm and free.