I'll Take Coffee Over Pride Any Day...
This morning and every morning that has passed since I grew up and tossed out my taste buds, has started the same. I yawn, stretch, pee and stumble to the kitchen. Where I mutter to myself about not having a maid, room service or children who are well trained as I try to measure out the exact amount of precious coffee beans to put in my beautiful stainless steel coffee maker so that I may turn back into a human being and join the world of humanity.Without my java, the lifeblood of the god's, I'm a monster. A pathetic, snivelling little monster.
Yesterday morning started out the same as every morning before it. Bleary eyed, I made my way to the kitchen to caffeinate my blood. As I listened to the coffee percolate, I checked my email and smelled the wonderful scent of ambrosia slowly filling the glass pot. When the coffee was ready I jumped up to pour myself a cup, knowing that my day was only going to get better from the moment of my first sip of that mud colored liquid.
I poured my coffee into my favorite cup (because it doesn't taste the same if it's not in the right cup) and I reached for the sugar bowl. Empty. Not to panic. I have a big pantry. Surely there is sugar, whether it be white, brown or spilled on the floor in there.
Not a grain to be had. In my entire house. My darling (and when you read that please know I mean dumbass) children made gluttons of themselves when left unattended to make their breakfasts. Apparently Rice Krispies don't taste the same with out half a pound of sugar to smother the taste of the rice.
This leaves me in a quandary. How can I have my java without sugar? I am not one of those people who have completely developed into adulthood and abandoned their taste buds altogether. No, I need sugar to drink my high octane vitamin. Dammit!!! I need sugar!!!
I was left with three choices:
1. Suck it up buttercup, and just drink the vile poison without the sweet goodness of sugar to save the taste.
2. Call my mother and face her, knowing that I will hear about how stupid I am for the rest of my days.
3. Call my mother in law and face her, knowing that I will be admitting what a lousy mother and wife I am by running out of a simple necessity.
After careful consideration (and to those of you who wonder why I didn't just run to the store...I live in the sticks, it would have taken an hour to go get my sugar and by then my coffee would have been cold. Plus I'm not fit to drive without my caffeine jolt) I did what any coffee-loving desperado would do. I wandered over to my mother-in-laws, admitted my inadequacy and begged sugar in trade for my soul.I walked away with just over three teaspoons (I'm not kidding, she carefully measured it out into a baggy) and no pride.
But dammit, I had my sugar.
****Later in the day I went to the grocery store and bought out the entire sugar stock. And lectured my children about the dangers of letting this household run out of sugar and not telling their mother. With mental images of blood stained walls and padded rooms running through my children's minds, hopefully this will never happen again.****
posted by Redneck Mommy at 9:56 a.m.
24 Comments:
I love Rice Krispies as long as I have a half pound of sugar at the bottom of my bowl to scoop up with my milk. It's the ONLY way to eat 'em.
You live THAT close to your MIL? Girl you need to move. Come to Ohio. I'll give you...4 tsp. of sugar.
'Cause THAT'S the kind of friend I am.
Why have there not been more posts about the dynamic between you and the MIL that lives so close? There's got to be a ton of hilarious blog fodder there :) Unless she reads this blog, in which case...Hi, Redneck Mommy-in-Law!
Oh gawd that happened to me last week but instead of the sugar it was the cream (and I used to be able to deal with skim milk or artificial creamer, and the powdered ones are still okay but I prefer the bad stuff, half and half), and I live right next to ten places with sugar but the children were all still sleeping and sick as dogs...my options were more like hmm how much milk DO I still have in the old gals vs. how horrid can synthetic amino-acid based toddler formula really taste if it costs THAT much vs. use extra sugar and just gulp it down so I wouldn't kill anyone. My ulcer ruled out number three and one and two were even less attractive so I finally just had a glass of Pepsi and an extra Ritalin.* BWAHAHHAAAA!
*of course I am kidding about the Ritalin, would never take more than my prescribed dose of a controlled substance, etc. It was TWO Pepsis, though.
You can always knock on my door to borrow sugar or whatever, except coffee. That stuff will stunt your growth. Come on, you love your MIL- you know it. ;)
I think I would rather resort to try other sweet factors like honey, chocolate chips, ice cream or powder chocolate milk mix. You are a brave woman.
I love the fact that I can wander over to my moms and pray she is not in and just TAKE the sugar.
So, your mother-in-law...... is she always so.... careful?!
Three teaspoons? Really?
LMAO.
I've been known to pour honey in mine once or twice in desperation. It's kind of gross.
Everybody knows Rice Krispies need more than half-pound of sugar. And chocolate milk instead of plain.
The vision of your MIL hunched over her guarded stash of sugar, practically counting every sweet granule to pass on to you...killin' me!
One of our wedding gifts was a combo espresso/coffee maker. That thing is the one gift we use the most. Although we don't usually use sugar...we keep flavored syrup in the house, so I can have myself a vanilla-caramel latte in the mornings before the babies get up.
Another thing that works good is the Hershey's (chocolate, caramel, strawberry, etc.) syrups that you keep in the fridge and put on ice cream.
Mmmm.
We have a bunch of little sugar packets in a hidden location for that very reason.
First of all, do you all live on a commune up their in the sticks? You live next to your mother and MIL? Wow, you sure do like being, um, close.
And if that ever happens again, I say suck it up. If you drink if fast enough you'll hardly notice and you'll maintain your dignity.
Uh, I meant "there" and not "their". Sure, I'm a dumbass but at least I don't live next to my in-laws.
She actually measured it?
I thought I was the only one with relatives that were freaks!
None of my relatives think I am adequate anyway, can we start a club?
Do you think that your mother might have given you more than 3 tsps simply because you were flesh and blood vs wedding ring and vows?
Find a good hiding place and keep a secret stash of sugar just in case this ever happens again. Of course, if you're like me, you'll have to write down the location of said hiding place because you won't remember where it is when you need it! And then try to remember WHERE you wrote it down!
You don't need pride. You got your coffee!
Imagine your kids' conversation in 15 years.
Frac: "Remember that time we ran out of sugar?"
Fric: "Yeah, what the hell was all that about?"
Frac: "Maybe it wasn't sugar at all (nod nod, wink wink)."
Fric (ruminatively): "You might well be right, Frac, you might well be right. Hey, and remember she couldn't even do that baby puzzle she gave dad for Christmas? It was SOOO easy. What was THAT all about?"
Fric and Frac both nod wisely.
End of story.
Ahhh ... I have been in this very situation a number of times, and have solved it in ways ... um, let's see, I've used Nestle quick (that's pretty much all sugar anyway, right?), a pixie stick I dug out of my step-daughter's stash that she's not supposed to have, dissolved chocolate in my coffee ... then I just resorted to stealing sugar packets from restaurants and hiding them for just such emergencies.
Thankfully my MIL lives three hours away.
When I was a kid I decided I wasn't going to drink milk! It wasn't so much that I was headstong, but I really didn't care for the taste of milk, I didn' eat ice cream either for the same reason. So my father said: "If you don't drink milk, what are you going to drink?" I think he thought I would say soda or Kool Aid, but I said "coffee." I guess he figured he get the better of me and said, "if you drink coffee, you can't have sugar or milk in it!" I was okay with that, didn't want milk in it anyway. So at the ripe old age of about 8 I started drinking black coffee, that was 49 years ago and I still like it black.
I am with ya on this scene. Needs coffee!! Needs coffee to be tasty with sugar!!
Cereal is supposed to be good for you. With sugar it isn't. Who ever said coffee was supposed to be good for you? LOL
I feel your pain and for that very reason, I keep a secret stash of brown sugar. I'm the only one that knows where it is or who would even consider putting it in my coffee!
I don't use much sugar though I always have it in my house...(At least I think I do...LOL)..
You know what you just might try sometime...Coffee without Sugar...!I mean, if that should happen again...It is really very good that way....! (Well, it is an acquired taste!)
It doesn't bode well that your MIL lives closer to you than the Grocery Store, btw! LOL!
A VERY VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR, My Dear....I hope that 2007 will be a truly fabulous year for you and for all those dear to you, too!
I can relate. (And, um, I'm still working on the idea of your MIL carefully measuring the sugar.)
The thought of having to ask my MIL for sugar for my coffee re-affirms my adoration for drinking coffee black. Like the Squeeze song--black coffee in bed, baby.
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