Yesterday afternoon, as I was walking through the front room, I said, “I feel like a cup of coffee.” Then quick as a wink, I said, “But I look like a normal human being.” Then I laughed. Because some people might dispute the idea that I look like a normal human being, but mostly I laughed because I liked my own joke. And in your own house, it’s okay to laugh at your own jokes and the idea that you’re a cup of coffee. Although, truth be told, I laugh at them anywhere.
Now some of my jokes are simple. Someone will say, “Can you hand me the coffee.” And I’ll say yes, and after a pause they’ll realize I’ve only acknowledged my ability to hand them the coffee. If they want the coffee, they actually need to ask me to hand it to them. That’s fun with words. I used to do that with my kids when they’d say, “Can I go outside?” But I don’t do that all the time, because I have a feeling it’s really annoying, and some people just don’t get it.
But back to the coffee and feeling like a cup of it. I had some. Decaf. Because I still like to sleep at night and caffeine in the afternoon is bad juju. But I needed a jolt and the decaf gave me one, partly I suspect because it acted as a placebo. My body thought, ooh, I’m getting caffeine and reacted by instinct rather than reality. And that, my friends, is how I made it through the rest of the day yesterday, by faking myself out with a hot cup of decaf.
