You lost me at espresso

And then had me again at mayonnaise.

Hi. Hope you’re all going well. I’ve got a collection of different things for you this week, which is something I haven’t done in a little while, including a diary entry, a comic. Stuff like that.

A quick reminder as well that I still have my zine available for purchase (Oops I Just Died). And in case you missed it, I also sent out a post a few weeks’ back about my paste era, which documents my slow, downward spiral (too dramatic?) and battle to heal my gut.

Anyway, onto the post. Hope you enjoy!

You lost me at espresso

I have been trying to heal my gut lately. This has involved slowly removing a lot of things I enjoy drinking and eating from my diet, not unlike someone removing jenga blocks from a tower. And one of the most recent blocks has been coffee.

I’ve always had a strong aversion to those awful Pinterest style coffee slogans you see plastered on coffee mugs, or on chalkboards outside the front of cafes. Being on the receiving end of one tends to make me want to throw myself down the nearest elevator shaft.

No one in history has ever laughed this hard at a coffee joke. This woman is either high, drunk or having a breakdown. Or all of the above.

My issue with them is mostly that they too closely resemble some very low grade office bants, but I also think it bothers me that on some level, the premise of the joke often revolves around this very simplistic and functional view of coffee drinking. That we are all just knocking it back to get through the day. To quote Seneca some random Etsy store: ‘coffee, because adulting is hard’.

Yes, is the answer to your question. I do consider myself above the coffee slogan. Which isn’t to say I’m a coffee snob - I can assure you that I’ve ordered my fair share of chai lattes from baristas in artisanal coffee roasteries - it’s just that coffee is so much more than that to me. More than an addiction, it’s an experience, a mood. One of life’s greatest pleasures that can be enjoyed solo or with friends.

Now though, having gone off coffee, I am in the midst of intense withdrawals including brain fog, tiredness, and low mood, which is more of a deep unfillable well of grief tied to not being able to drink coffee. And so with that in mind, it’s been hugely depressing to discover the uncomfortable truth. That when it boils down to it, my life really can be accurately described by a series of nauseating coffee slogans. And I am not above any of it.

‘Today’s good mood is sponsored by coffee’ = me. ‘Life begins after coffee’ - gross, but also me. ‘I’m a coffeeholic on the road to recovery, just kidding I’m on the road to the coffee shop’ = me and I hate myself for it.

Coffee is a drug that I am addicted to and adulting becomes very fucking hard without it. I’m sorry Etsy store owners. I was wrong. I’ll take one of those mugs with the generic script lettering and free clip art on it, please.

It’s only now as I’m writing this that I remember the conversation I had with my doctor, and how casually he suggested I go off coffee for two weeks, like it was no big deal. In the same way that someone might suggest giving up peaches or fish fingers, rather than a drug I am extremely dependent on, and the removal of which is more disruptive to my life than if I had instead removed my right arm for two weeks.

In summary, I think I’m handling it all pretty well.

Note: I’d quite like to see some of these coffee slogans repurposed for other products, such as much needed medications. For instance, maybe printed on a little medicine case you could have ‘But first, insulin’. Or a t-shirt with ‘Don’t talk to me until I’ve had my EpiPen’.

Leaf of the month

Look at those plush leaves! I’m not sure what plant this is, but I spotted it on a walk during a recent house-sit, and the leaves are incredibly soft to touch, like a fabric.

This must be how the 1% lives. Why would you have a cheap, waxy leaf when you could be enjoying a premium, plush leaf like this.

Hey, if you enjoyed this, please click the like/heart button. Also, let me know what you thought in the comments. You can even become a paid subscriber if you love the newsletter. And, ironically, you can also buy me a coffee if you want to gift a one-off donation. Which is sort of confusing but basically when I’m back drinking coffee again - 2 days and counting - I will use all the money to buy myself a thousand coffees. It’ll be great, I can’t wait.

Take care and see you soon!