Around the Bluhmin’ Town

By

Judy Bluhm

Coffee, how we love thee. It is our favorite American beverage that helps us get through our daily struggles, gives us a boost of energy and holds the promise of good things to come. All manner of challenges may await us, but fortified with a cup of coffee, we can do anything.

Coffee is to adults what ice cream is to kids. Except that lucky adults get to have it often and daily. We have our favorite brews and concoctions. Americans consume over 400 million cups of coffee a day! And many will happily pay five bucks for a creamy, swirly, caffeine-laden drink three to five times a week! Sure, there is inflation, but that will not stop us from indulging in our beloved cup of java!

Weren’t coffee shops intended as gathering places for friends and colleagues? There was something fun about having a business meeting over a cup of coffee or just chatting with a few friends to the wonderful backdrop of steam shrieking out of those little machines that made our brews so wonderful. Perhaps coffee was never meant to be a nonsocial drink, but a bonding experience. But then the drive-throughs opened and suddenly people lined up to buy their little cups of pleasure, only to drink them in solitude.

How do you like your coffee? Evidently, Americans like it expensive, fancy and often. What else could explain our national obsession with the old “cup of Joe?” Not only are the coffee shops multiplying like backyard rabbits, but also our craving for java seems to be insatiable. Americans spend about 2000 dollars a year on coffee!

Some folks get downright frothy if you try to suggest that their love (obsession) with coffee is a problem. Medical experts say that coffee drinking is a habit, and caffeine is the “big ingredient” that keeps us coming back for more. I seriously doubt that. It’s the enticing aroma, the artsy ambiance, the beautiful smelling scones and fresh sandwiches, plus the cozy feeling that makes a coffee shop so irresistible.

The smooth, dark roast with billowy clouds of frothy milk that tastes like heaven in a sip, is why we have forsaken our home coffee pots. Why drink “ordinary,” when “special” is just around the corner? I try to make good coffee, but sadly, I am no barista. It’s hard brewing “magic” at home!

Okay, so some health-conscious person reading this will start percolating and tell me that green tea is much healthier. Someone else will call me and say that buying cappuccino at a coffee shop is the biggest rip-off in the world. I’ll get an email from my doctor saying that it’s about time I cut down on caffeine.

You know what I say? Bean there. Downed that. I do not want to hold off on my Latte Grande and go back to the dark ages – when we only drank a cup of java at home, without steamed milk. Oh, and if you’re steamed up about it, please don’t drop me a line. But I may see you in line at the local coffee shop.

Judy Bluhm is a writer and a local realtor. Contact Judy at [email protected] or at www.aroundthebluhmintown.com.