LoL #50: It's Gold!

Why do they call it Ovaltine? The jar is round, the mug is round, they should call it ROUND-tine!
Or not.

Sorry. That's my random Seinfeld reference for those of you out there that understand why soup is not a meal and what that first line has to do with the subject of this LoL. And for those that are reading this and just going, "Huh???" all I have to say is "No soup for you!". Anyhoo, I made it to LoL#50!! So welcome I guess to the Golden LoL!!! (Actually this is pretty pathetic because had I stayed with this actually being a weekly thing I would be on #104 or something but that's kind of a scary thought so we'll just celebrate the first fifty and take it one rant at a time from here.)

It's Tuesday today and let me just state for the record that Monday gets a pretty bad rap because I highly aver that Tuesday mornings are hellishly worse. At least on the M-day you can roll into it with the thought of "Hey at least I got to sleep in yesterday". And by Wednesday the weekend is at least visible, but Tuesday it seems is without either saving grace.

Especially when you have Tuesdays like today when autumn's darkness does nothing to promote waking and the temperature outside is tragically barely approaching freezing. I've long believed that waking up is a process and not an event and it's days like today when that process takes considerably longer than it has any right to. So now is where you ask yourself, "Self, if lisa had such a hard time waking up, how did she possibly get to work early to write out this randomly pointless LoL?" The answer to that is as simple as it is delicious: Coffee.

I don't know who invented the stuff but it's pure liquid genius. I think I would've liked to have been there when someone started pulling beans off a plant and said "Hey maybe if we grind these suckers up, pour boiling water over 'em, .....add in some of that ground up cane plant ....and a little of that white stuff that came out 'o the cow... Whoooo-eeee! I think we got ourselves a drink!" Or maybe not but at the very least Juan Valdez should've won the Nobel Peace Prize decades ago.

In honor of my tribute to this hot caffeinated concoction I give you - both Good and Bad - The Top Ten Things That Could Never Have Happened Without Coffee: (Disclaimer: Okay so there's nothing accurate or scientifically correct about this list, it's just for amusement and yes, without coffee they all could have come about anyway. There is after all, such a thing as Mountain Dew)

(10) Travel Mugs - Now it might seem rather obvious that without coffee you wouldn't really need travel mugs but seriously, have you ever stopped to consider how many millions of dollars must be spent each year on the design and production of Travel Mugs? I think that - based on the uniqueness of colors, shapes, forms and the constant invention of newer and better temperature tolerant materials, plus the aerodynamics involved in spill proof, tip proof, scald proof, drink proof designs - the travel mug industry must have been birthed as an offshoot of Vogue meets NASA.

(9) Really Bad Commercials - I'm not trying to say that something as cruel as cramming Sarah Jessica Parker and Lenny Kravitz into thirty seconds of audio-visual tormentia is solely the fault of coffee but the execs over at GAP should at least have the courtesy to spare us from the type of psychedelic strutting your stuff in all our clothes will make you super cool propaganda that can drive anyone nuts. Either the producers of this half-minute trash have had way too much coffee and can't quite connect the common sense and action parts of their brains or they need a little bit more coffee to stop and think through such questions as "Why in the world would anyone layer eighteen tank tops when it's the middle of summer???"

(8) Toys 'R Us - Ah yes. The Happiest Place on Earth Where a Kid Can Be a Kid... Or is that the ShowBiz Pizza at DisneyWorld? Either way Chuck E. Cheese never stood a chance against Geoffrey the Giraffe. And Kay Bee? Don't even try! Toys 'R Us has to be the most caffeine and consumer and caffeinated-consumer inspired store ever to anchor the outskirts of the Fox Valley Mall. Toy stores were created with caffeine in mind and even now, I begrudgingly type this knowing that my keyboard can never give proper tribute to the backwards R sandwiched so elegantly between Toys and Us. Just don't go near there around Christmas time....

(7) Infomercials - Anyone who's seen a self-tanning accident with gaudy jewelry trying to sell you the world's most useless kitchen utensil at three in the morning knows exactly what I'm talking about. Coffee is certainly responsible because no decaf individual could possibly get that excited about a free tote bag and insomnia - caused by coffee - is the only reason an audience for these 90 minute flea markets even exists!

(6) Alternative Pop Music - Say what you want about the influence of Ecstasy and Mary Jane on today's rockin' youth I'm going to make a bold claim here that caffeine is responsible at least in part for the hyperactive nature of the rock videos that I've seen recently. I'm talking more about the Blink 182 crowd than the Brittney Backstreet waves of the early 2000's and I'll refrain from commenting on the irony of how a knock-off band like Good Charlotte makes it big with an anthem about not being like everyone else. (??!??!?) But with singers that speak quicker than senatorial spin doctors and can jump around more than a monkey on hot asphalt I honestly think caffeine must come into play somewhere.

(5) A Passing Grade On The Final Exam That You Didn't Study For Until 13 Hours Before The Test Began - That first late night cram session was probably how most of us got hooked on the delectable brew and all I can say is that from my experience, it was the start of a beautiful relationship!

(4) The Taster's Choice couple (and other psycho coffee commercial people) - Okay in all fairness I haven't seen the Taster's Choice couple around for the better part of the last twelve years but we can all look back with some fondness on the insanity of these ads. MAN: Darling, doesn't this coffee remind you of our vacation last summer? WOMAN: Oh yes, honey. You mean when we went to that sidewalk cafe in Paris? MAN: No that's what the Parisian Blend instant coffee reminds us of. This is the Swiss Chalet Roast. WOMAN: Oh you're right. Now that I taste it I definitely recall that hotel of ours in the Alps. MAN: Wasn't that a fun time? That great view of the mountains.... WOMAN: Hiking through the snow.... MAN: Fighting off that bear.... WOMAN: Using our last match to cauterize your massive skull wound.... MAN: Struggling with hypothermia after the search party found us.... WOMAN: And that really great coffee that they served when we were released from the hospital!! MAN & WOMAN: That was a great vacation! *kiss kiss kiss*

(3) My relationship with God - I had to throw in a serious one here because I know that some of the best Bible studies and most amazing things I've learned and taught about God and theology and Christian living have been in coffee shops and that's just cool. God and coffee - what can I say they make a great combo and are, in a nutshell, how I make it through the worst of my work days. ;)

(2) Astrophysics - I was reading this article in a science magazine about quantum physics versus the theory of relativity in trying to explain black holes and the potential for information to ever be released from them (what you thought I only read Dan Brown novels?!??) and it hit me just how deep astrophysics really is. And the more I thought about it the more I realized that it's one area of science that would vanish entirely - or at least cease to propagate - if not for the existence of caffeine. Not only is caffeine essential to getting your brain to work fast enough to follow the trains of thought from the great physicists of our time, but without caffeine none of us would stay awake long enough to even try.

(1) The LoL - It's long been assumed, stated, irrefutably proven that none of this insanity would ever be coming to you without the unbridled assistance of massive doses of caffeine. So if you like what you read, thank coffee, if you wish for my prolonged periods of incommunication, blame coffee. Regardless, you should drink coffee because you just never know what it will inspire next.

Cofeefully Yours,

lisa :)