The Matter of Coffee
Oct. 5th, 2012 10:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rinueAs I have alluded to before, I spend a lot of time at the dentist's. Routine cleanings and checkups mostly, just more frequent ones than other people have, the idea being that if something were to go wrong we would catch it early. (I have a weird mouth, such that the price of biting is eternal vigilance.)
Anyway, there are two bits of hygenist small talk that always come up. Gambit one is to empathize with me about my TMJ, and how I have migraines and wake up in pain from grinding my teeth. (No and no and no. Dentists have been saying this about me for at least 20 years, and nothing has come of it or progressed further. As far as I can tell, this misperception stems from the fact that I can dislocate my jaw at will. Not that I usually do. I think of it as having snake magic.) Gambit two is to ask me if I drink an unusual amount of coffee. (This has not been going on for 20 years, arguably because as a kid I didn't drink coffee, but equally arguably because whitening didn't become trendy until later*.)
I am never sure what to answer on the coffee question. Do I drink an unusual amount of coffee? I am a writer who works a high-stress night job in a northern climate and shares a bed with an insomniac Italian. It sounds plausible. At the same time, I know a lot of baristas and two-pot-a-day programmer types, as well as a lot of people who drink no coffee at all. I think that I drink an average amount of coffee for a person who drinks coffee**. On the other hand, I have a vague suspicion that there is a vast America I never interact with, who drink one cup of instant coffee at breakfast and that's it. With milk.
Usefully, there has been a study.
You know who drinks the most coffee?
Scientists.
Writers are fourth.
We need to step up our game, gentlemen. We need to step up our game. I already knew we were behind the Finns on both coffee and licorice, but it turns out we are being beaten by our own scientists. Who are surely on to something, being scientists.
They are going to beat us to space. I'm just saying.
For the record, on an average day, I drink 1 to 3 six or eight ounce mugs of chicory coffee*** and 2 to 5 shots of espresso (which, calm down, let's remember have more caffeine per volume, but are much lower volume than a cup of drip coffee, so we're talking a third less caffeine than a cup of drip coffee). Average? Outlandish? I welcome your comments.
* Not to mention a popular dental up-sell. I have white teeth. But they are teeth white, not IKEA white.
** Longest possible distance to a Starbucks in the contiguous U.S. is 170 miles. That's if you specifically do not include franchised locations (e.g. bookstores, groceries, airports). More at Edible Geography.
*** About 1/4 the caffeine of regular coffee, according to high pressure liquid chromatography.
Anyway, there are two bits of hygenist small talk that always come up. Gambit one is to empathize with me about my TMJ, and how I have migraines and wake up in pain from grinding my teeth. (No and no and no. Dentists have been saying this about me for at least 20 years, and nothing has come of it or progressed further. As far as I can tell, this misperception stems from the fact that I can dislocate my jaw at will. Not that I usually do. I think of it as having snake magic.) Gambit two is to ask me if I drink an unusual amount of coffee. (This has not been going on for 20 years, arguably because as a kid I didn't drink coffee, but equally arguably because whitening didn't become trendy until later*.)
I am never sure what to answer on the coffee question. Do I drink an unusual amount of coffee? I am a writer who works a high-stress night job in a northern climate and shares a bed with an insomniac Italian. It sounds plausible. At the same time, I know a lot of baristas and two-pot-a-day programmer types, as well as a lot of people who drink no coffee at all. I think that I drink an average amount of coffee for a person who drinks coffee**. On the other hand, I have a vague suspicion that there is a vast America I never interact with, who drink one cup of instant coffee at breakfast and that's it. With milk.
Usefully, there has been a study.
You know who drinks the most coffee?
Scientists.
Writers are fourth.
We need to step up our game, gentlemen. We need to step up our game. I already knew we were behind the Finns on both coffee and licorice, but it turns out we are being beaten by our own scientists. Who are surely on to something, being scientists.
They are going to beat us to space. I'm just saying.
For the record, on an average day, I drink 1 to 3 six or eight ounce mugs of chicory coffee*** and 2 to 5 shots of espresso (which, calm down, let's remember have more caffeine per volume, but are much lower volume than a cup of drip coffee, so we're talking a third less caffeine than a cup of drip coffee). Average? Outlandish? I welcome your comments.
* Not to mention a popular dental up-sell. I have white teeth. But they are teeth white, not IKEA white.
** Longest possible distance to a Starbucks in the contiguous U.S. is 170 miles. That's if you specifically do not include franchised locations (e.g. bookstores, groceries, airports). More at Edible Geography.
*** About 1/4 the caffeine of regular coffee, according to high pressure liquid chromatography.
