Life’s Not Fair, Kid

17Jun08

So while I was walking the streets of San Francisco or New York or some place… I just remember it was with Apple people, OK? I came to the realization that my life is made more difficult on a daily basis because I don’t like two beverages: coffee and beer. I’m serious. If you drink one or both, you’re missing out on a world of challenges and strife. We, the teetotaler martini drinkers (not an oxymoron) are “roughing it” day in and day out. Allow me to explain this new form of minority.

My morning begins with a cup of hot tea with sugar and cream. To make tea, one must immerse tea leaves in water using some vessel for a fairly precise period of time, usually 3-4 minutes. Any longer and it’s burnt; any shorter and it’s weak. After the tea has steeped, you can add your accoutrements like lemon, honey, sugar, or cream. Then, you’re on your way. I’m lucky enough (actually, sort of embarrassed to make tea with it) to have a Flavia machine at home, so I get tea in seconds without thinking. I then add my cream and sugar and go about my business. But allow me to share what happens when I try and get a tea in the fast-paced world of 8 AM at McDonald’s or Dunkin’ Donuts.

I frequently stop by Dunkin’ Donuts before work to pick up breakfast. I am brave enough to ask them for tea with cream and sugar. They take the order without question, adding two tea bags because of the size of the cup, and adding some secret ratio of sugar and cream with magic foot-operated dispensers. On a plus, it’s consistent - the tea is basically the same every morning because the sugar/cream/tea ratio is the same. On the downside, it’s basically the sweetest tea I can comfortably drink. I’m sure for many it’s too sweet. But I can’t do much because it’s a secret ratio with secret machines. I drink it and I like it and I settle for it.

Yesterday, for the first time as an adult, I went to McDonald’s to pick up breakfast instead. I ordered a value meal and asked for tea instead of coffee. As I waited, I happened to look at the LCD screen that shows your order to the assembly line folks. There I found my breakfast order, along with LRG SWEET TEA. I did not want a large chilled sweet tea. I wanted some medium-ish-sized hot tea. Yes, I’d have to add my own sugar and cream, but I was willing to sacrifice. But instead, I’m handed the most monstrous cup they have which I’m supposed to fill with their new sweet tea. I grin and bear it, as I wanted to try this newfangled beverage anyway. It tastes like corn syrup, for the record.

The point is, tea isn’t sitting in vats waiting for you to order it at a billion different locations like coffee is. It must be painstakingly prepared and steeped before it’s right. New business model: become the Starbucks of tea. I smell profits.

When it comes to evening beverages, I’ll occasionally seek out a nice mixed drink. Anything with vodka should work. The problem with this is that “mixed” part. I have neither the idea how nor the equipment to make mixed drinks at home (yet). I can’t walk into my local liquor store (or supermarket if you live some place cool like that) and pick up a case of cosmos. Actually, that may not be completely true. I’ve definitely had a cosmo out of a box before. It was OK. But that’s not the point.

The point is that coffee and beer are so ubiquitous and I don’t like them. At all. Not even a tiny bit. There’s a Starbucks on every corner and a brew in every bucket at the party, but Dominic won’t have it. So I spend a few painstaking minutes daily to brew the perfect cup of tea and pay bartenders a pretty penny to mix me delicious cocktails. I can only hope that some time soon I’ll find a bottled beverage I like and a form of coffee I can live with. In the meantime, who wants to make a line of bottled cosmos and open a chain of anti-Starbucks’?

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Tags: alcohol, beer, beverages, breakfast, caffeine, coffee, drinking, drinks, Dunkin' Donuts, martini, McDonalds, morning ritual, parties, rush hour, starbucks, tea, teavana