Caffeine

Robbie dropped me off tonight, after a full day of shopping, dining, and hanging out. Anna threw her arms around me and inhaled deeply. "You smell like coffee," she said.

As well I should, because we just spent about two hours at Dominican Joe. I don't go there often anymore - having taken Robbie's departure as a fair enough excuse to quit signing my paychecks directly over to them every month - but the siren smell of sweet, sweet coffee used to lure us across Riverside almost every morning as soon as I got to work.

"It's so different, being here at night," I remarked, looking around, "and not having to leave in a hurry."

"It is," agreed Robbie, "and we always had the whole, long work day ahead of us when we were here, too."

Ugh!

We did discover a dirty little secret about DJ's, which is that they serve decaf at night. Decaf! During the day, they always have two carafes at the self-serve bar, one of them Dominican, and the other from some other part of the world: Mexico, Guatemala, Columbia, Sumatra, New Guinea. But at night the two carafes are Dominican and decaf.

One morning, when I was fixing my coffee, another customer came up behind me and asked if one of the carafes were decaf. A barista overheard and stared at him, aghast. "Good lord, no!" I exclaimed.

"Oh. Thank God," he said, filling his cup.

But they are not as scrupulous at night.

Well, whatever. We'd had a hard day's shopping, and relaxed over bottomless cups of Dominican coffee and carrot cake. I finished my Christmas shopping! It's been a very good day!

I'll be here all night.