Not just any coffee pot, mind you, but the coffee maker MoM leaves here in my house.
Regular Gentle Readers will know, from my sister blog, Tea in the Parlor, that we do not drink coffee here in the Nest. We are tea drinkers, civilized, middle aged, tea drinkers, sipping the heavenly brew from dainty tea cups or big, strong mugs. MoM's coffee maker is stored carefully away for use only when she visits.
It worked fine Tuesday night, and Wednesday, and Thursday, but sometime on Friday, it broke. So Mother of Mossy decided to make do Friday night and Saturday morning by using the coffee filters in her cup to steep her coffee, much like my tea steeps in a cup. But big old coffee filters are not exactly engineered for squishing into coffee cups. Do you see where I'm going here? Yup, coffee ground explosion all over the floor, counter, stove, and everywhere when MoM tried to carry said filter to trash can.
Saturday dawned bright and clear, a perfect day to go hunting for the elusive coffee pot of MoM's preference. You see, Gentle Reader, she didn't want any old coffee maker--she wanted that exact same coffee maker. Store #1 did not carry it. We tried Store #2; same. Ditto for Store #3. And #4, #5, and yes, #6. That's right, the evil MoM made your poor Nest Dweller, who'd walked 8 miles for her marathon training that morning, drive hither and yon all over the Pueblo looking for that stinking coffee maker. Because someone might carry it. Just because all the major stores do not doesn't mean they no longer make, oh no. It's like Shangri La, just around the corner. After getting a bit cranky (I admit it), she agreed that yes, it is possible to brew just one cup of coffee in a 4-cup coffee maker. One is not bound by immuntable laws of physics to always make 4 cups of coffee at a time.
And so we wound up with a $15 coffee maker we could have bought at Store #1. Or Store #2, or Store #...
She had the temerity to complain to me that she was so tired this morning because she couldn't sleep and it was my fault, because I make her walk everywhere instead of dropping her off in front of the store and holding traffic up and inconveniencing rows of cars behind me because she doesn't hop out of the car, she needs to gently slide out slowly or she'll tweak her back and be unable to move, so really, it's better to park and 'make' her walk. I replied (this was before I had my tea, so that's my only excuse) that it was walking through 6 gigantic stores in search of her coffee maker that made her tired. "What? Only two!" she protested. "What? Try six!" I shot back, and then proceeded to name them. "Ooohhh....." with big MoM eyes widened. Harumph.
Tea is so much easier. Tea bag, mug, hot water. You can even make it in a microwave under dire conditions of extreme deprivation. No mess, no bother, caffeine. Perfect.
A) There's nothing UNcivilized or NON-heavenly about a hot, delicious cup of coffee -- mmm, good!!
ReplyDeleteB) MoM should have though about a Melita drip funnel - insert filter, add coffee, pour boiling water through, and voila! A delicious, SINGLE cup of coffee! And so simple to store a funnel 'til her next visit!
C) And let the rows of cars wait. If they can wait behind the Hyundai or the Subaru for MoM to get out slowly, they can wait behind the Honda. Especially since they are probably also senior citizens... Consider the odds they're seniors or snowbirds. Let 'em wait for MoM.
Actually, last week the car that held up a line of 6 cars in front of the grocery store was not for a snowbird or an old person, but for a very nimble, fifty-something woman to hop out. Then she had to go into the back seat to get the re-usable shopping bags, and then she had to close both doors, and meanwhile, drivers were starting to get impatient, starting to pull out and go around cars, potentially causing accidents with other cars and shoppers crossing between all the stopped cars and which they couldn't see ...
ReplyDeleteShe can barely walk. Literally.Tthat is not healthy and it scares me. I refuse to let her start using a wheelchair if that can be avoided by a simple 50-yard walk from a parking space to the store. I'm not asking her to walk a marathon, but I think it's a really bad scenario when she's too weak and out of shape to walk 50 yards. That is not good for elderly women.
She needs some muscles to support her arthritic spine, because otherwise all she needs to do is trip over a cat or in the store, and she could break a hip or a vertebra. The statistics for how many people die within a year after they break a hip is frightening, and I'm going to do what I can to avoid that for her, even if she grumbles about me for it.
She had a Melitta years ago, remember? She decided she didn't like it, for whatever reason, and won't consider one now.
I'll defer to your better wisdom re: the merits of java.
And this is why she goes back to her home, always having lost at least 5 lbs and feeling better than when she comes out here. I think of it as tough love, but you can call it anything you like.
OMG Daddy's turning in his grave, that's all I can say right now. And I should know, I can see his grave from my front yard.
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