Every morning, I make a pot of medium-strong coffee to start the day. But making the coffee is only the first step in the coffee consumption process. Next, I must choose a coffee cup to hold that precious, energizing black gold. That means I have to really get my sleep-addled brain working and make considered, deliberate choices from an array of distinct options that are available.
Our smallest cup, at the right above, is a narrow, somewhat dainty cup that probably holds about half as much coffee as you would get if you filled the lobster cup on the other end of the line. Its smaller exposed surface area means your coffee will stay fractionally warmer if you are taking your time with your morning joe. Not surprisingly, I never choose this one.
Lately I’ve been going with the cup that is next in line. It’s thicker than the white one, which means it has a good heft as you lift it to your lips, it has a cool bicycle drawing on the front, and it was a gift from my mentees. It has more exposed surface area and is a bit larger, but still doesn’t deliver an overwhelming amount of coffee. I can slug down all of the coffee in this cup when it is still hot and head back for more–which I always do.
From there we move to the Harbor Cafe cup, which (as the name indicates) is your standard restaurant coffee cup, slightly larger than the preceding cups and with still more surface area. This is a good cup to choose if you want to drink a fulsome amount of coffee quickly and feel the heat of the coffee radiating through the thin sides of the cup.
From there, we really move from cup to mug territory, with choices that provide increasingly colossal amounts of coffee and surface areas that are approximately birdbath sized. The lobster mug at the end is enormous, and the coffee it holds cools off quickly. The lobster mug is the right choice when you are going to have a busy day and you need to gulp down a lot of hot, black, highly caffeinated liquid into your system as quickly as possible. It’s not a cup for those who dawdle over their java, because they are going to end up with a cup of unsatisfyingly cold coffee, No, the lobster mug sends your brain a message: sleep has ended, a busy day has begun, and you’d better pick up the pace in all things.
Webner House 