listen, internet. i need to get something off my chest.
i know that brewed coffee can be Bad. okay? i know. i know!!! we all know!!! espresso is your cool hip fancy coffee and when you drink it you automatically gain 4 Sophistication Points (tm). espresso automatically makes you more likely to find a lover fifteen years your senior who is willing to pay off your student loans. espresso believes that the author is dead and acknowledges graffiti as protest art. i get it, europe!!!! i get it.
but here's the thing. i love coffee. real coffee. throw-your-tea-in-the-harbor coffee; coffee made in a terrible Mr. Coffee machine that doesn't always work right; folgers and maxwell house coffee when you're desperate; coffee with terrible flavored creamer in it; coffee that's Too Strong and also coffee that's essentially just water; coffee that's gone cold because you forgot about it; coffee in a big mug that says you bet your sweet ass on it; coffee that makes the whole kitchen smell like it's Time To Get Up; coffee that's warm and soft and gentle and occasionally iced; coffee that is more about the ritual of coffee than the taste, necessarily, although now that i've talked all this shit i would like to emphasize that good coffee tastes better!!!!! than good espresso!!!! i'm sorry, i don't make the rules, that's just a fact, don't @ me.
espresso is a thing to be gotten through, that's why it's served in such tiny portions. you can say all you want that "well actually it's served in tiny portions because it's ~sooooo ~stroooong," no. well, maybe. but then you're missing the point!!!! coffee isn't about waking up, i mean, it is about waking up but it's not just about waking up.
it's about how warm a coffee mug makes your hands. it's about rolling the bitterness around on your tongue, about the thickness of cream, embrace cream, don't use skim milk, skim milk ruins everything. it's about the way the steam kisses ur face because coffee loves you!!! espresso doesn't love you. espresso is willing to listen to your thoughts on byron's "the prisoner of chillon," but afterwards dismisses both you and it as "juvenile." espresso secretly, but not really that secretly, judges you for getting a second croissant.
coffee is like, "buddy!!!! you only live one time!!!! get a second croissant. get a third!!!!! let's watch golden girls reruns all day and discuss the change in the narrative structure of sitcoms since 1980."
espresso only watches french films and thinks fiction only has meaning if it ends in tragedy. coffee has a copy of the complete curious george on its shelf. espresso dismisses romeo & juliet as "just two dumb kids who get everyone they know killed." coffee is like, "romeo and juliet were two dumb kids whose problems would not have escalated so drastically if they'd had, like, one responsible adult in their lives. wHAT KIND OF A PRIEST GIVES A CHILD FAKE POISON??? JUST WONDERING??? HOW ABOUT EVERYONE IN VERONA JUST HAS A SNACK AND CALMS DOWN."
what was my point? oh right. a tall brewed coffee in switzerland costs $6.50. that's fucking insane.