Coffee Catastrophe

Did you know that this past Wednesday was National Coffee Day?

It also happens to be the day that the lovely machine you see below went kaput. Oh, the irony.

 

 To make it even better, my almost-1-year-old decided that this would be a good day to break her streak of sleeping through the night and wake up at 3am, laughing and talking to me as I tried to rock her back to sleep. I don't do well on 4 hours of sleep and I don't do well without my coffee. Put the two together and it's exponentially worse. A raging headache and little NoNaps McGhee went strong all day. Good times. I did resort to hot tea. Four cups of it to be exact, but it just wasn't the same.

Maybe you're thinking "catastrophe" is a strong word to describe anything relating to coffee. Clearly you've never met me. I'm an 8-cup a day *cough*minimum*cough* coffee drinker so yes, it really was that big of a deal. We live in an extremely rural area. The only coffee options within a 20-mile radius are the gas station and the grocery store. Both are repulsive. The grocery store offers free coffee from 7-9am, but I'm fairly certain it's leftover from the employee breakroom the day before. The gas station isn't undrinkable, but it's certainly not good and you have to time it just right to even get a cup before the old men drink it all.

Yesterday I hit the motherload. I recently started working a few hours every Thursday morning. I'd previously spotted a little coffee shop along my route there and decided now was prime time to give it a whirl. The cafe just happens to be a Crimson Cup location! If you've never heard of Crimson Cup, you should check it out. As their website describes, they're "a network of 400 independent coffeehouses, grocers, colleges & universities, and food service operations across 28 states." Their coffee is grand and their efforts to promote and support local coffee houses are even better. The staff was super friendly and my nonfat venti frosted pumpkin latte knocked the socks off the pumkin spice lattes I've had recently from that other famous coffee franchise.


You would think that 20 ounces of delicious espressoness would get me through the day. Not so much. After work, I swung back through the drive through and got a large cup of their signature blend coffee. It's pretty bad when you amass two large, matching cups from the same coffee house in less than 4 hours. Oh well. It got me through the day as a happy human being.

Today I was torn. I didn't want to make the 30-minute trip for decent coffee, but I also didn't want to do without or drink sub-par caffeine and I really didn't want to go another day without. As luck would have it, I remembered that the little Amish store just down the road sells locally-roasted coffee by the cup. As soon as the wee one woke up, we had breakfast and headed that way. 


They only have one size and that's small, but for 50 cents a cup you can afford more than one. I'll let the picture speak for itself and yes, that's all for me. There also may or may not have been a cup consumed before this picture was taken.

 My husband should be home tonight and we're headed to get everyone accessorized for a wedding we're attending tomorrow. Peanut needs tights, my husband wants new shoes and I have high hopes of getting a new coffee pot. :)