On an average day in the life of me, I will prepare and drink an orange pekoe tea in the morning, a cappuccino when I come home for lunch, and then a varying caffeine-free tea before bed. Depending on my mood, my surroundings, and of course the time of day, I will select a different mug from our dedicated cupboard. When a friend comes overs and is offered a hot beverage, they must also choose the mug it will be served in, which says a lot about them whether they want it to or not. The following is a list of the available mugs, including their background and when they are needed.
K – The K is for Kelly and is the appropriate size for tea. It’s usually self-imposedly off-limits for me, to be saved for her. Then again, if she’s working her butt off late into the night I’ll make a dream tea for myself and sit in the porch hammock, Toast at my feet.
American flag – This was gifted by a couch surfer who presented it to me sans irony. Also on the larger side, it too is used for tea, primarily Tetley, and usually when I’m feeling ironic, often brought on my being unable to avoid a piece of political news from the south that boils my goats so much that only a tea can make it scram.
B – My father came to visit last year and got his own mug. I regularly use this for a honey ginger evening tea, when I’m pining for my homeland and the family and friends living east of me.
Chimp – This coffee holder is meant for when I’m feeling silly, much like the iconic primate scratching his head with a handle for an arm or an arm for a handle.
Black chalkboard – I will write a note on its surface in associated chalk to the consumer of the drink. This might be me, when I need a little pick-me-up or reminder to do something when the coffee is over, but is also handed to friends who are in a different room and are thus not given the opportunity to choose their own.
Penguins – It ended up as a go-to in the mid-day, as it’s a great size for my cappuccino and it’s blue but mostly the blue is obscured by penguins and who doesn’t like penguins especially when there’s a bunch of them in the same place!
Shuswap Lake – There are certainly coffee-consuming occasions when I like to be brought back to the houseboat in a big pond, full of friends and hot tubs and Evil Rajiv and how to Doritos in a Cube and Captain Forsey and the first wedding I ever officiated and beach fires and Dirt Lake getting stuck in the sand and dancing butts and nothing existing outside of a large vessel that you can live in that we should have in no way been given the keys to.
Toast – A gift from me to Kelly on her birthday, Mainly used to make her an americano on a sunny weekend morning as the eggs are frying and Things Are Really Great Here, Sort Of… is sounding out of the Baby Robot and Toast is licking her face.
Mouse – When I want someone to talk to in the afternoon as I read my book and drink coffee and eat chocolate in our outdoor living room.
Scrabble I – The I (an upper-case i, not a lower-case L) was a gift from Stacy (I think) and is used for any hot drink at any time. It represents my affinity towards word games and if anyone else uses it I be mad but not really but kinda even though they don’t know but they should.
Duck – Another for the silly times. There are myriad silly times. For coffees and sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly wazoo, for orange juice.
Camels – A souvenir from my time in the Middle East, retrieved in a thrift store in North Vancouver. Tiny coffees hold up well in its confines.
Forest – Nature baby! Throw some coff coff or some tea tea in me! Trow it in me.
Blue & shapely – Waiting to be filled with a nighttime tea, to be enjoyed outside which admiring the stars above our collective heads and then you really think about what that means and it’s too much to handle but some of those stars are suns for planets which are homes for beings or whatever a being is outside of our vocabulary but for some reason we’re so short-sighted that anything that isn’t a carbon-based life form within our perceptive range of light and density and size and everything else couldn’t possibly be the extra-terrestrial we’re looking for. Well, look again. It is.
