Val's Tea & Coffee Meme

Over at Val's, she has a coffee or tea meme. It's taken some days but here is my response. Please let me know, dear Reader, if you do it too.

What's your preference - coffee or tea?

Coffee, mostly. But I have a thing for tea-based chai.

I am not a tea drinker like everyone else in the family. My mother said that the reason for this was because, as the first child, I was brought up perfectly. In other words, unlike my sister who came along six years later, I was not drinking black tea out of my father's sauce at eighteen months old.

Instant or Brewed?

Either - on the proviso that neither is cheap and nasty. Cheap coffee should not be drunk by anybody. On the other hand, prior to leaving Sydney nearly six years ago, I worked next door to the Sydney Stock Exchange. The most expensive cup of coffee at The Bourse, the coffee shop there, was $12.50. Coffee has now become like wine with some people airing their knowledge on which side of the mountain the coffee grew on.

How do you take it?

Milk and no sugar, perhaps, if its instant. But prefer long or short black.

Do you have a favorite cup?

See picture above for the current favourite. It is a mix - in true shabby chic style - with a coffee cup from a set belonging to Herself mixed with an Indian bone china saucer belonging to moi. Always have to have a saucer!

How many will you enjoy during a normal day?

Two or three on a good day - but often don't have any.

Does it matter if you don't start the day with a coffee/tea?

No.

But I'll let you in on a secret, dear Reaer. I have, since adolescence, been a consumer of diet cola. In the last few years, during which I have had bouts of severe ill health, my consumption has strayed into litres per day. Diet Coke or Pepsi Max have become my preferred method of caffeine ingestion. I am now in the process of trying to eliminate it - but while I can go days without either, it is difficult to get through a whole week without. When I am drinking these, I don't drink tea, coffee or chai. My health is better at the moment but - and this is my excuse/reason - there have been times when I don't know how I would have got through without that taste tingle or the caffeine surge.